Dublin Bus - €1 bus fare announcement

lukem

Labour have announced a pledge to purchase 500 buses and reduce all DB fares to 1 euro for adults and 50c for children. Sounds good.

Several other commitments in their document here - http://www.labour.ie/download/pdf/getting_dublin_moving_nov06.pdf

L

markpb

There's some interesting stuff in there. It's not exactly be new and exciting but at least they're talking about it which is a start and better than most other parties.

I like the flat fare system but I would have thought 25 miles was a bit much. I'd be more in favour of something along the lines of €1 inside the M50 and more for outside it.

Ham'nd'egger

While a flat fare is a great idea and the issue of more integrated ticketing has to be addressed (Especially with BE), the rest of that paper is a load of rubbish

500 extra buses, very good but cut the fares so income to run and maintain them goes down.
No mention of where the extra buses will come from.
No increases in staffing for bus companies.
No mention of where these 500 buses will be stored.
No mention of who is paying for them or the shortfall of a €1 fare.
Condemnation of privatising of Dublin Bus routes yet they will bring in private companies to run services when it suits... "We believe that in order to meet these challenges Dublin Bus would need to supplement their services by the contracting in of private operators."

Add to it the usual QBC rubbish and Westlink twaddle and there is not a thing in this that will do a jot of good.

OTK

Well I'm voting for Labour now.

murphaph

An interesting document. I like that it leaves the longer term infrastructural projects to the end and describes the short term measures that Labour would take. It's certainly a package I could vote for but with Labour you'll get even more cosying up to the unions than with FF.

shltter

murphaph wrote:

An interesting document. I like that it leaves the longer term infrastructural projects to the end and describes the short term measures that Labour would take. It's certainly a package I could vote for but with Labour you'll get even more cosying up to the unions than with FF.

Well they didn't do much cosying up to the unions the last time they were in Government Micheal Lowry was transport minister and the subvention to DB was reduced to Zero
a decision that we are still recovering from.

The thing about Labour and Fine Gael is that they can promise anything they like and then blame the other party for not implementing it.
At the moment unless both parties are signed up for it then it is just hot air.

pleba

are we really all that naive? We need to realise that this is an 'election promise'
It doesnt actually mean they are going to implement it once they are in power.

Remember these ones from the 2002 elections.....

FF --> "to end hospital waiting lists by 2004"

FF --> "end congestion by the end of the decade" - Bertie Ahern (of course if they dont get re-elected they can always claim that they never had the final 3 years to fulfill that promise)

FF --> "A NEW Fianna Fail-led Government would introduce laws obliging convicted drug dealers to register with gardaí after release from prison" -Bertie Ahern

FF --> "A Fianna Fáil-led Government would deliver an extra 2,000 gardaí and tougher laws generally to step up the against fight on crime"

I think I've made my point

John R

pleba wrote:

I think I've made my point

That all political parties are vote-whoring liars because Fianna Fail make promises they do not keep?

If you want to discredit Labour then how about digging up some of THEIR election promises that they did not keep?

gobdaw

shltter wrote:

The thing about Labour and Fine Gael is that they can promise anything they like.........

That is the problem with politics in this country, we allow parties to renage on promises and don't punish them.

I think this document is a valuable contribution to the transport debate, and where we need to go.

Increasing bus numbers and improving journey times should be top of any list. Combined with nominal fares, use of private cars will be less attractive and further free up road space. Subsidising transport fares from central funds would be justifiable in socoal gains which would resultfrom this.

Prioritising interconnector and electrication is obvious and the late delivery of these under P21 always was a great disapointment. The balance of P21 still follows on stream.

The bones of this will, of course, need to be incorporated into an agreed policy for government by FG/Lab. It should, in the short term, raise the importance of transport to those of us who live or work in the Greater Dublin area and should leapfrog transport issues (and solutions) to the top of the election agenda.

I welcome this document.

markpb

I see they have a section about improving bus lanes which I'm all in favour of but I though they were mostly a function of the city councils and not for TDs. Am I mistaken?

John R

markpb wrote:

I see they have a section about improving bus lanes which I'm all in favour of but I though they were mostly a function of the city councils and not for TDs. Am I mistaken?

It doesn't really matter what body is nominally in charge of a particular area. If the majority party in the Dail want it to happen they get their way, they control the money.

pleba

John R wrote:

If you want to discredit Labour then how about digging up some of THEIR election promises that they did not keep?

I'm not attempting to discredit Labour. Those promises could have been made by any political party. It just happened to be Labour and this topic is about the promise that they made yesterday so I cant avoid my post being in some way about Labour.

The only reason why all the quotes I posted were from FF was because they won the election and as such they were the only ones that could keep promises.

I'm not a party voter, I will vote for the individual who has done the most for my local community over the years.

The point I was making was not to believe everything that politicians or parties come up with between now and the election. Ideally, research what they are saying and investigate their past history of keeping or reneging on promises.

The Swordsman

If it leads to less congestion on the roads, and quicker journey times it would be great. But I'm not too sure how much impact more buses will have.

The future lies in other modes of public transport such as LUAS, METRO and DART and their integration.

A single fare is a good idea but the one euro bus fare is a gimmick. It will only serve to cost the taxpayer more money. People would be prepared to pay the current fares if they could be guaranteed an efficient service. For example, how many people on the LUAS line use a bus because it's cheaper. A one euro fare won't get people out of their cars if the service is not efficient.

John R

The Swordsman wrote:

If it leads to less congestion on the roads, and quicker journey times it would be great. But I'm not too sure how much impact more buses will have.

The future lies in other modes of public transport such as LUAS, METRO and DART and their integration.

That is where you are dead wrong.

People no doubt prefer the idea of tram and train solutions but for the forseeable future bus will be the biggest public transport mode in Dublin. Even after all the T21 projects (including the fuzzy ones that may well not get built) there will be more people using bus than all other modes combined.

With the lousy planning that has allowed huge sprawling suburbs sprout up through the countryside there is no way that rail solutions will EVER provide a comprehensive network.

Without a strong and progressive improvement in bus service provision in the region any hopes of a switch away from a car-dependent and car-choked environment is doomed.

The Swordsman wrote:

A single fare is a good idea but the one euro bus fare is a gimmick. It will only serve to cost the taxpayer more money.

Well the taxpayer should be paying much more into public transport, for too long it has been starved of funding and for once the government coffers are overflowing with unspent taxes.

The other huge benefit of a flat fare (particularly a nice round one) is that it reduces dwell times at bus stops with ditherers unsure of fares and searching for the cirrect change.

IMO a €2 flat fare along with a big push towards heavily discounted pre-paid alternatives is the way to go.

John R

pleba wrote:

I'm not attempting to discredit Labour. Those promises could have been made by any political party. It just happened to be Labour and this topic is about the promise that they made yesterday so I cant avoid my post being in some way about Labour.

The only reason why all the quotes I posted were from FF was because they won the election and as such they were the only ones that could keep promises.

I'm not a party voter, I will vote for the individual who has done the most for my local community over the years.

The point I was making was not to believe everything that politicians or parties come up with between now and the election. Ideally, research what they are saying and investigate their past history of keeping or reneging on promises.

I do realise what you are trying to say but there is a large dollop of irony in warning against believing the promises of one party by listing a litany of lies from their opposition.

I have no particular party allegiance but I am sick of the "they're all the same" ****e a lot of people spout as some justification for their lazyness in not finding out who stand for what or which politicians actually do have a history of bare-faced lies.

The Swordsman

John R wrote:

That is where you are dead wrong.

People no doubt prefer the idea of tram and train solutions but for the forseeable future bus will be the biggest public transport mode in Dublin. Even after all the T21 projects (including the fuzzy ones that may well not get built) there will be more people using bus than all other modes combined.

Wasn't the point I made. I'm no expert on this, but I would imagine a metro sytem would transport thousands of people more efficiently than a fleet of buses doing the same thing even with realitively free roads.

John R wrote:

With the lousy planning that has allowed huge sprawling suburbs sprout up through the countryside there is no way that rail solutions will EVER provide a comprehensive network.

Depends what you mean by comprehensive. They may not offer a solution for everyone but could offer a solution for a majority.

John R wrote:

Without a strong and progressive improvement in bus service provision in the region any hopes of a switch away from a car-dependent and car-choked environment is doomed.

In a way we are in agreement here. There has to be an improvement or car users won't change their ways. I think where we differ is our views on whether bus travel can help.

John R wrote:

Well the taxpayer should be paying much more into public transport, for too long it has been starved of funding and for once the government coffers are overflowing with unspent taxes.

The other huge benefit of a flat fare (particularly a nice round one) is that it reduces dwell times at bus stops with ditherers unsure of fares and searching for the cirrect change.

IMO a €2 flat fare along with a big push towards heavily discounted pre-paid alternatives is the way to go.

Agree the taxpayer should pay more into the system, but not to oversubsidise(?) fares.

markpb

The Swordsman wrote:

Wasn't the point I made. I'm no expert on this, but I would imagine a metro sytem would transport thousands of people more efficiently than a fleet of buses doing the same thing even with relatively free roads.

More effeciently: yes. More people: I doubt it.

I don't think a single metro line will carry anywhere near a bus network. I guess thats the important difference: line vs network. Even when metro north and west and up and running, they're still only two lines so there'll be plenty of journeys that will be faster / more direct by bus.

Assuming the bus network changes so it's more focused on being a metro feeder service (where possible), people will still view changing mode as being unreliable.

AlekSmart

It`s a real pity that the Labour strategy has to major on the most Unlikely element of the whole package.
This €1 fare reveals a rather worrying lack of understanding of the on-the-ground situation.

As another poster notes,the thrust of good effective use of Public Transport should revolve around improving its efficiency on a broad spectrum.

Given that the major stuff,QBC`s,Interconnectors,New Vehicles/Rolling Stock are subject to the usual incredible time lags we need to begin looking at the areas where REAL progress is possible at little cost.

There are MAJOR cross-system gains to be made from simply speeding up the Dwell Times of Dublin Bus vehicles.
The Labour Party could and should have proposed that cash fares be set at a punitive level of €3 for ALL Platform Purchased tickets.

This would be bringing us into line with,for example,London where the On Bus Cash Fare from 1/1/07 will be €2.97.

Coincidental with this would be the IMMEDIATE introduction of the Dublin Bus TGX Contactless Card system.
This would then allow prepaid or electronic purse fares to be discounted by at least 50% or more if off-peak prioritization were to be introduced.

The salient point here is that this seriously beneficial package of measures is sitting there ready to be switched on.
It could be operating TODAY.

Instead today,as every other day,one can position oneself in front of Dublin Bus HQ and observe a scene of incredible,imposed delays whilst Drivers in possession of technology of the latest highest level are required to carry out a cash handling and inspection routine of antedeluvian proportions.

Irish society does not readily recognize the benefit of the Common Good principle.
However if any real progress in Public Transport terms is to be made then quite a few Primacy of The Individual party asses will need a good kicking !!! :eek: