Bus Fares

lodgepole

Absolute shower of kunts

Hiking the price is one thing, but this fare will require a 5c coin at all times. Which is the biggest pain in the fupping arse. How can such a ****ty bus service justify raising their prices again? I spent a year living in Toronto and i've been on the verge of smashing bus stops since i've been home such is the frustration of waiting on them.

netwhizkid

Man go back to Toronto, If you have a problem with that it only gets worse, I presume you haven't ventured onto an Irish train yet. I have relative that returned here from Abroad, I tried to convince them to have a brain scan in case there was anything wrong! I dislike living here alot btw.

RobertFoster

Lodgepole wrote:

How can such a ****ty bus service justify raising their prices again?

Oil prices? At least they're looking into alternatives.

Time Magazine

They're currently running a ~€60m deficit a year.

And they're still crap.

Devon

We need competition. They know they can offer and provide us with a second rate service because they're the only operator. About a year or so ago there was a new company that ran public buses from Tallaght to the Airport with stops in between but I haven't seen one in ages.

Binomate

Oh noes. The fares have gone up by a whole 5 cent. That'll cost you an extra euro every twenty journeys. Oh God, the horror...

muffin_man

Yeah but it goes up 5c every year! Well almost anyway. Now that each fare has 5c added to it you'll prob end up putting in 10c unless you have a 5 handy! I know you get the refund and all but hey, who actually goes into cash them in, especially when it's only 5c. They might as well have upped the price by 10c!

John R

jerryadams wrote:

We need competition. They know they can offer and provide us with a second rate service because they're the only operator.

If you really want to se what a second rate service is then open competition is the way to go, bus de-regulation was a disaster in the UK.

jerryadams wrote:

About a year or so ago there was a new company that ran public buses from Tallaght to the Airport with stops in between but I haven't seen one in ages.

They cut the service because it wasn't profitable.

There is a private operator running Blanchardstown-Airport-Swords.
A single fare from Blanchardstown to Swords is €4.00.

OptimusMime

netwhizkid wrote:

I dislike living here alot btw.

Well then emigrate, or more preferably do something to make this place a bit better to live in!

That's not meant to be a personal jibe, I'm just sick of people bitching and moaning and doing nothing to improve this place.

Oh and OT, we need bus de-reg like a hole in the head, just look at the UK where bus services were decimated because they were unprofitable.

I'd like to see a European(with relevant experience, obviously) brought in to head up CIE and fix it; how come Holland and France etc can have excellent integrated public transport systems and not us; but I doubt the old boys club who currently run the show(both politically and industrially) wouldn't be up for that.

Rabies

5c isn't much. Oil prices, inflation and workers wage demands have to be taken in to consideration.

bounty

OptimusMime wrote:

Well then emigrate...

i hate people who reply with this cliche smart answer to a complaint, ffs think of something original, do you walk away from all your problems?


haha, i cant belive people pay to waste time waiting for late buses, maybe be forced to stand up in a squashed aisle, listening to spanish students old people teenagers and scumbags, smelling the drunks and catching something off the sick people

KTRIC

bounty wrote:

haha, i cant belive people pay to waste time waiting for late buses, maybe be forced to stand up in a squashed aisle, listening to spanish students old people teenagers and scumbags, smelling the drunks and catching something off the sick people

I hear ya, I shell out a huge amount each year on insurance, road tax and motorbike repayments just so I don't have to sit next to the great unwashed on my way to work in the morning.

luckat

The whole idea of paying cash for bus journeys is fairly outdated. You can buy two-journey tickets for the various fares, and probably some time in the distant future there's supposed to be an electronic card coming in; it was first tested in 1995, so it should be here any decade now.

lodgepole

Binomate wrote:

Oh noes. The fares have gone up by a whole 5 cent. That'll cost you an extra euro every twenty journeys. Oh God, the horror...

Actually it's less the cost and more the inconvenience and the principle. I don't carry copper money around with me, and I don't think a bus service which should have speed and efficiency high on its list of priorities should require such a small coin. Unless it's there to increase the amount of change tickets that go unclaimed.

Listen... I don't care about the actual cost. I paid can$2.50 for every journey I took on public transport when I lived in Toronto. But I never waited for longer than 2 minutes, I could get within 2 minutes walk of any location in Toronto from wherever I was (through transfer tickets) and the service was fast.

Dublin Bus have done nothing to improve their service in the last few years but we are still seeing the price go up. Last week I was waiting for either of two buses. I was at the stop at four o' clock and one was due at 4:05 and another at 4:15. The one that was due at 4:05 arrived and left at 4:55. It wasn't even a case of the 4:05 not arriving and this being the next scheduled... If that was the case he was leaving early. And the worst part was that the bus that eventually took us had been sitting just below the bus stop since I had got there.

There are countless examples of how Dublin Bus is failing at their job. If they were to announce a fare increase to €2 but provided an actual improvements for that (ticket machine at stops, transferable tickets, guaranteed reliability) I would be singing and dancing their praises.

luckat

Everyone carries mobile phones now. If your bus is late, phone the garage controlling it and ask the controller politely where it is at the time: "I'm waiting for the 2.55 16A from Tallaght, do you know where it's reached on the route now, please?"

If it became the norm for people to do this, I suspect that the bus service might improve.

Tha Gopher

What I hate the most about Dublin bus is that there are stops which have advertising which is regularly updated/changed, yet they cant be arsed putting a timetable on the stop (or else, they bother replacing the ad posters but dont bother replacing the timetable that has been scratched to fcuk by vandals)

And whys there usually no proper seating at any bus stop? I heard its to keep the homeless off sleeping on them but tbh how many homeless people sleep rough in Blanch? Theyre all in town.

As for the Urbus someone mentioned earlier have never used it, way too pricey.

luckat

Yes, the homeless are a terrible danger all right.

Back in the bad old days when Ireland was poor we didn't have people sleeping on the street - at least, it was very unusual. Then, mentally ill people tended to live in mental hospitals, and there was a large programme of council house and flat building. The idea of a *child* sleeping rough was inconceivable.

But we do things better now.

Civilian_Target

You all bitch and moan about Dublin Bus - I think they deliver a pretty decent service at a very reasonable price. Try looking around at other places - you can easily do a whole lot worse.

Binomate

Civilian_Target wrote:

You all bitch and moan about Dublin Bus - I think they deliver a pretty decent service at a very reasonable price. Try looking around at other places - you can easily do a whole lot worse.

I couldn't agree anymore. I don't know what bus service everyone else is getting in this thread, it sounds like a horrible bus company, but the one I get is grand.

Civilian_Target

Civilian_Target wrote:

You all bitch and moan about Dublin Bus - I think they deliver a pretty decent service at a very reasonable price. Try looking around at other places - you can easily do a whole lot worse.

Agreed.

Stark

It totally depends on what route you're on. I used to get the 123 bus regularly and that service was absolutely brilliant. These days I get the 38. It's okay most of the time, but you get the problem of drivers waiting for ages at the termini, then driving off leaving passengers standing. There are also more "out of service" buses than there should be on the route. If you live somewhere like Malahide, then expect terrible service.

My therapist says I'm not allowed bitch about Cork buses anymore...

Alkers

That price hike is pretty silly tbh. They should round them up to a more manageably figures e.g. €1, €1.50, €2 etc so there isn't as much messing with changeand what not. I mean what difference is 5cent here and there going to make to their losses, may as well increase them to handy figures. They're still very cheap compared to busses in most other countries I've been to.

John R

Simona1986 wrote:

That price hike is pretty silly tbh. They should round them up to a more manageably figures e.g. €1, €1.50, €2 etc so there isn't as much messing with changeand what not. I mean what difference is 5cent here and there going to make to their losses, may as well increase them to handy figures. They're still very cheap compared to busses in most other countries I've been to.

The bus fare increases are all political. Every year or two the same stupid game is played. CIE (and now LUAS) ask for a 10/15/20% increase at the beginning of December, it usually reaches the papers with some snide comments on how terrible they are then just before Christmas the govermnent announce that they are agreeing to a small increase, they think it makes them look good.

No account is taken of how these increases will effect how the service is run, a few years ago at the time of the Euro changeover Dublin Bus applied to merge the two lowest fares into a single fare of €1, it was rejected by the government because they were afraid of being accused of raising fares.


For those moaning about having to have lots of coppers the solution is simple. Go in to your local shop and buy a bunch of pre-paid tickets. They will be at the lower fare for a few months and for many journeys they are cheaper than cash fares to begin with.

Dave!

F*cking hell! I hate Dublin Bus.

It'd be great if some motivated person (not me) were to organise a boycott or something. I'd cycle to college every day rather than get 2 buses, if I thought it made a difference to them.

Hitchhiker's Guide to...

I like dublin bus - low price, quite frequent, good coverage, (usually) polite staff...

Smurfpiss

Dublin bus is alright i guess.. i mean it usually gets you there. but they're never on time and usually stink of wee.
price hike seems awkward but i'll live with it.
I have to agree with the OP, my parents live in toronto and it is one hell of a good transport system. completely integrated. you can get transfers from metro to either bus or tram at each station. And they are very frequent, clean and good value when you consider you could theoretically travel the entire city on one fare.

spiderlegs

I have a love hate relationship with Dublin Bus.Sometimes they're great, they're on time the busman lets me on for free and it's not packed and I'm happy.Other times, they leave me waiting twenty minutes in the freezing cold and rain and get me squashed between strangers.it all depends.

lodgepole

Civilian_Target wrote:

You all bitch and moan about Dublin Bus - I think they deliver a pretty decent service at a very reasonable price. Try looking around at other places - you can easily do a whole lot worse.

Which routes do you use regularly out of interest? I know that when I was in college I was well serviced by the 46a. But from home I get the 15 or 15b, the 49, the 75 and the 65. None of which are reliable.

Take today for example, just after I started this thread. I left for the bus giving five minutes for it to come from the terminus (15). The bus came 25 minutes late, not coinciding with any bus on the timetable. Getting the same bus home this evening from college street I was there at 6:15 with a bus due at 6:25. No bus came until the next scheduled bus at 6:50. These aren't isolated incidents and it doesn't matter that they only occur on certain routes. I can't rely on Dublin Bus. I just can't... If I have to be somewhere then I have to either leave with ample time to allow for their lack of punctuality or convince somebody to drive me. That's not the kind of service that a capital city should have.

I stand by everything i've said previously. A price hike is fine in principle but we won't see any benefit from the extra 5c that we're going to have to pay from next week on. The service will remain adequate for some and poor for others.

Don't even get me started on the 75...

senordingdong

Lodgepole wrote:

How can such a ****ty bus service justify raising their prices again?

You've said it right there.

Civilian_Target

Stark wrote:

It totally depends on what route you're on. I used to get the 123 bus regularly and that service was absolutely brilliant. These days I get the 38. It's okay most of the time, but you get the problem of drivers waiting for ages at the termini, then driving off leaving passengers standing. There are also more "out of service" buses than there should be on the route. If you live somewhere like Malahide, then expect terrible service.

Nawt wrong with the 38/A - especially given that you're 15k from the city centre out there. Sure, there's a lack of decent cross city service, particularly to the airport - but overall, miles ahead of somewhere like Belfast.

And the arkward price of the normal tickets aren't really a huge deal anyway - most frequent users have prepaid tickets, its way handier.

I'm a definite believer though that they should integrate the whole lot, and seperate the whole city into 4 or 5 zones, and just have zonal pricing for the whole lot, and a single card to do everything as well.

projectmayhem

my regular routes (19/19A) are great tbh. i have no issues whatsoever with this price "hike" (it's 5c more. if you hate it so much queue in the traffic in a car or pay for a taxi)... it's hardly going to break the bank. years ago i would have had the opinion that dublin bus were a shower of idiots, but they've improved massively.

some routes are obviously still horrendous, but the price increase may help solve some problems. i've noticed they got some newer buses now, with tinted windows. pimp my bus, indeed.

lodgepole

projectmayhem wrote:

(it's 5c more. if you hate it so much queue in the traffic in a car or pay for a taxi)

I'm not in a position to use either of those alternatives. Again, it's not the amount of money involved. The inconvenience of requiring a coin that I don't generally like carrying with me is one thing, but the concept of yet another raise in the fare without any obvious improvement of the service (based on the routes I travel regularly) is another. Like I said, i'd happily accept a more significant price hike if it meant a service worthy of the city but until we get that i'm going to take issue with it.

Having seen how it can be done has made me all the more aware of how poor a job they are actually doing in Dublin.

ChillyS

My route is the 39, and the bus stop is literally outside my house. However i go over to the bus stop and in the time that 5 or 6 were meant to come, there are none.

To get into town, to catch a bus home, go for a interview, meet up with people etc I have to give 45mins to a hour extra time, so that I'm on time. It's a massive pain in the hole. By the time i get a bus, freezing (I've had 4 colds already this winter) hacking my lungs up coughing the bus is packed and I stand for the half a hour journey to town, being jostled by people and squished into the aisle. If I'm lucky to get a seat I usualy end up giving it to an old or disabled person, thats if they can get on with they're zimmer frame.

Some drivers are lovely, but some have the worst attitudes i've seen in a long time. Once the driver left a mother and a buggy with her -1 year old baby standing in the rain, when on this rare occasion the bus was fairly empty, Two women questioned him and he shouted at them.

It's rediculous, the 42c swords is meant to run every 15 min's you're lucky if one comes every hour, then it's full.

I wouldn't mind paying the extra, for a halfway decent service.

qwertz

Is there a limit on how many copper coins the bus drivers have to take or can one pay with only one and two cent coins?

ferdi

OptimusMime wrote:

I'd like to see a European(with relevant experience, obviously) brought in to head up CIE and fix it

bang on. i'd suggest a former head of the Hamburg publc bus service. In that town, when it says 10.52 on the timetable - the bus actually arrives at exactly 10.52 without fail.

Civilian_Target wrote:

You all bitch and moan about Dublin Bus - I think they deliver a pretty decent service at a very reasonable price. Try looking around at other places - you can easily do a whole lot worse.

i can only presume you are lucky enough to a person who uses some of the few good routes that dublin bus provides (eg: no. 7 or 46a) otherwise you could not possibly make that statement.

its nothing to do with bitching and moaning. the fact is many people on many dublin bus routes recieve an absolutly appauling service with rediculously long delays and buses failing to show up at all on a regular basis.

someone wrote into the Irish Times yesterday compalining about DB. He worked out that if only 15% of people do not go into DB HQ in town to collect their ticket change, thats still E1million per year that DB make without any effort and as we know the % of people who do not bother collecting their ticket change must be far higher.

the adding of 5c to the fare is a ploy to add to this. who carries 5c coins around with them all the time? people are far more likely to through an extra 10c,20c,50c coin down the slot - the change of which will more than likely go into DBs coffers. i dont care if they are making a 60million lose every year, this is just highway robbery. and half the time when you through more money than is necessary down the slot, the poxy drivers dont print you a change stub for it.

Sam Vimes

Civilian_Target wrote:

Nawt wrong with the 38/A - especially given that you're 15k from the city centre out there.

i once started waiting at 4pm for a 38. i had to be in work at 6. i was late. i never got it again.

Sam Vimes

ChillyS wrote:

My route is the 39, and the bus stop is literally outside my house. However i go over to the bus stop and in the time that 5 or 6 were meant to come, there are none.

that odd about the 39, i've found it to be quite good. i can get a 37, 38 or 39 home from town and i always end up taking the 39. drops me ten minutes walk away but a few times i've decided to wait for a 37 or 38 to save me the walk and i've eventually given up and taken the 5th 39 to go by.

the_menace

Dublin Bus is administered, like most Irish public service companies, by idiots. You'd think for such a supposedly well educated country we'd stop humiliating ourselves on the world stage. Hike up the cost for single fares and round off to the nearest euro, reductions for regular users/ticket holders. Simple as that. We're a nation of f**king eejits.

Litcagral

ferdi wrote:

someone wrote into the Irish Times yesterday compalining about DB. He worked out that if only 15% of people do not go into DB HQ in town to collect their ticket change, thats still E1million per year that DB make without any effort and as we know the % of people who do not bother collecting their ticket change must be far higher.

the adding of 5c to the fare is a ploy to add to this. who carries 5c coins around with them all the time? people are far more likely to through an extra 10c,20c,50c coin down the slot - the change of which will more than likely go into DBs coffers. i dont care if they are making a 60million lose every year, this is just highway robbery. and half the time when you through more money than is necessary down the slot, the poxy drivers dont print you a change stub for it.

AFAIK Dublin Bus are not permitted to keep change which has not been reclaimed.

projectmayhem

Lodgepole wrote:

The inconvenience of requiring a coin that I don't generally like carrying with me is one thing, but the concept of yet another raise in the fare without any obvious improvement of the service (based on the routes I travel regularly) is another. Like I said, i'd happily accept a more significant price hike if it meant a service worthy of the city but until we get that i'm going to take issue with it.

if the coin is your problem buy one of those monthly ticket things.

fair enough if your route sucks, but if it's ****, complain. they can't improve it if they don't know people aren't happy

John R

ferdi wrote:

bang on. i'd suggest a former head of the Hamburg publc bus service. In that town, when it says 10.52 on the timetable - the bus actually arrives at exactly 10.52 without fail.

He'd take one look at the conditions in Dublin and be on the first plane out of here.
Just the thought of taking responsibility for running a bus service in the dangerous, unplanned, lawless, corruption-ridden circus that is Dublin would give any self-respecting German official a coronary.

ferdi wrote:

someone wrote into the Irish Times yesterday compalining about DB. He worked out that if only 15% of people do not go into DB HQ in town to collect their ticket change, thats still E1million per year that DB make without any effort and as we know the % of people who do not bother collecting their ticket change must be far higher.

The capacity of Irish people to bitch and moan about the most petty things while completely ignoring the huge problems all around them never ceases to amaze me.

Not only is it stupid but it is incorrect, all the money issued as change tickets is held seperately and not used by the company. They do not gain anything from unclaimed change, in fact the extra accounting and staff hours costs them money.

It is just pure lazyness that deprives people of their change. If you can't be bothered to have the correct fare or going to one of the 300 odd ticket agents or collecting the tickets and cashing them in whenever then FFS stop the moaning.

If the slightest bit of effort was taken you could have a handful of pre-paid tickets in your wallet to use whenever, a few pieces of card weigh a lot less than a pocketful of coins and in many cases they are cheaper than paying cash.

ferdi wrote:

the adding of 5c to the fare is a ploy to add to this. who carries 5c coins around with them all the time? people are far more likely to through an extra 10c,20c,50c coin down the slot - the change of which will more than likely go into DBs coffers. i dont care if they are making a 60million lose every year, this is just highway robbery. and half the time when you through more money than is necessary down the slot, the poxy drivers dont print you a change stub for it.

They will if you make it clear you are paying over the fare and ask for change. People throw a dozen coins into the box and then stand mute expecting the driver to count all the coppers and give them the change ticket, then they jump down his throat when he just assumes it is the correct fare and issues the ticket.

If you want change then ask up front, it takes about 2 seconds and saves all the hassle of causing an arguement over 5c and just maybe the 80% of passengers who have given the correct fare or who have used pre-paid tickets won't be staring at you wishing you would just get the fukk off the bus and stop delaying their journey.

Stark

Litcagral wrote:

AFAIK Dublin Bus are not permitted to keep change which has not been reclaimed.

Actually they can and do keep the change which isn't reclaimed. They claim they "re-invest" it in the network.

fischerspooner

People who have been saying the de-reg of buses in britain was a disaster... I lived in edinburgh for a year and the buses were ALWAYS bang on time, every day. The thing that annoys me about Dublin bus is that they only give the times on the timetables of when they leave the terminus, so you have to work out for yourself how long it will take to get to the stop you're at. In Scotland they have it down to the minute for every stop. If the driver is early he will wait at a stop until he's on time etc. etc. I know people who work for Dublin Bus who tell me of drivers leaving early to miss the schools/offices etc. It's a disgraceful service. And it's far too expensive. In Germany for example petrol is about 1.25 a litre now (20c dearer than here) yet the bus services are about 30% cheaper than here and in true German fashion always on time. I don't know what we can do to get Dublin Bus off their arses but I wish I did know. Lazy unions and too much comfort are probably the main problem.

ciaran76

Tha Gopher wrote:

As for the Urbus someone mentioned earlier have never used it, way too pricey.

Well you should but a 10 journey ticket with them which is €25. So thats €2.50 a trip from Blanch to Swrds which ain't bad at all

MarkK

I used to live in Dublin but live in Leeds now.

In Leeds there are no buses after 8pm on New Years Eve and no busses at all on New Years Day.

Over Christmas there were no buses after 8pm On Christmas Eve,
None all day on the 25th or the 26th.

Totaly crap for anyone dependant on buses to get around.

The fares are not cheap, they go up twice a year.
My 10 minute Journey to work is going up from £1.20 to £1.40 from Monday.

Give me Dublin Bus any Day!

Victor

fischerspooner wrote:

In Germany for example petrol is about 1.25 a litre now (20c dearer than here) yet the bus services are about 30% cheaper than here and in true German fashion always on time.

They use the petrol money to subsidise public transport.

John R

fischerspooner wrote:

People who have been saying the de-reg of buses in britain was a disaster... I lived in edinburgh for a year and the buses were ALWAYS bang on time, every day.

Like I said, it was a disaster, except for a few cases. Edinburgh is one of those.

Along with a handful of other UK cities the local government in Edinburgh re-acquired the main bus operator, in this instance Lothian Buses. Although a PLC they are owned by the local councils so they are still effectively a nationalised service. There is competition in Edinburgh, mainly from FirstBus who in recent years have been in front of various authorities, including the competition commission because of their underhanded activities in Edinburgh.

the_syco

Meh. I'll just continue to use the 5 day rambler pack.

[qoute]Is there a limit on how many copper coins the bus drivers have to take or can one pay with only one and two cent coins?[/quote]
Fúck em. I've done it before If they say no, tell them its legal tender, and that they have to take it.

I'm a definite believer though that they should integrate the whole lot, and seperate the whole city into 4 or 5 zones, and just have zonal pricing for the whole lot, and a single card to do everything as well.

They have zones. Just no-one knows what they are.

Stark

qwertz wrote:

Is there a limit on how many copper coins the bus drivers have to take or can one pay with only one and two cent coins?

Nope you can pay with one and two cent coins. I've done it plenty

Victor

Stark wrote:

Nope you can pay with one and two cent coins. I've done it plenty

Just don't ask for any favours.

There are limits to the amount of coins / notes you can proffer.

ChillyS

Commander Vimes wrote:

that odd about the 39, i've found it to be quite good. i can get a 37, 38 or 39 home from town and i always end up taking the 39. drops me ten minutes walk away but a few times i've decided to wait for a 37 or 38 to save me the walk and i've eventually given up and taken the 5th 39 to go by.

Yeah, coming back from town the service is pretty ok, however going into town when they are suppossed to be on the way back from Ongar you can wait up to an hour, kinda annoying when you're stood there looking at the warm house but too scared to go in cos you dont want to miss the next one!!