Travelling by train to Newbridge or Kildare? Buy a ticket to Athy

Drimnagh Road

Heuston-Newbridge (25.47 miles)
Day return €16.20
Five day return €19.90

Heuston-Kildare (30.00 miles)
Day return €18.50
Five day return €22.70

Heuston-Athy (44.80 miles)
Day return €15.40
Monthly return €18.50

**Timbuk2**

But don't the IE terms and conditions specifically state that buying a ticket for a longer journey but using it for a more expensive short journey is not allowed?

I'll try find a link!

Edit: Having said that, once I was trying to get a return to Skerries from Dundalk. Dundalk-Dublin return was €10 after 9.30am but Dundalk-Skerries return was €24.50. However, when I got to the station and asked for a return to Skerries, they only charged me €10 (I can't remember whether the ticket said Dublin or Skerries on it, but we had no hassles getting back on at Skerries).

Our man in Havana

It is against IR rules to do that but in practice they can't keep you hostage on the train and force you to Athy.
Unless Newbridge or Kildare has exit barrier validators you will be fine.

goingnowhere

Our man in Havana wrote: »

Unless Newbridge or Kildare has exit barrier validators you will be fine.

Being fitted at the moment..

Rud

Our man in Havana wrote: »

It is against IR rules to do that but in practice they can't keep you hostage on the train and force you to Athy.
Unless Newbridge or Kildare has exit barrier validators you will be fine.

Newbridge,Kildare and Athy are all exit barrier free

EDIT : for the time being anyways

Drimnagh Road

It's an interesting one alright, because it is in a different league to the usual genuine mistake threads.

Passenger: Excuse me my ticket won't fit through the barrier.
Gate Bert: Give me a look... Sir your ticket is valid to Athy.
Passenger: And?
Gate Bert: Well you still have 20 miles to travel.
Passenger: Change of arrangements, now getting picked up from Newbridge.
Gate Bert: Then I will have to charge you the standard penalty fare
Passenger: But I haven't travelled beyond where my ticket is valid to.
Gate Bert: Exactly.

I doubt that would stand up in court were IE to pursue it.

Also, with barriers, if you try to get out at a station that is before where your ticket is valid to, it will let you out.

corktina

i was under the impression that a break of journey was permitted. How could they tell you didnt come back to do the other bit?

Our man in Havana

It would certainly be an interesting case if one ever reached a court.

I have heard of people in the UK being prosecuted for it.

Drimnagh Road

A much bigger difference than the few euro we're talking about in this thread,

but just to give an example of a similar situation across the water, a look online for tomorrow reveals;

London-Holyhead walk on fare £80.30
London-Chester walk on fare £69.00
London-Dublin walk on fare £38.00

I wonder how many people "going to Dublin" never venture beyond stations on North Wales Coast.

It's interesting, because at Chester for example, there is never a problem asking the barrier man to let you through for a cigarette or a visit to WH Smiths, and returning a few minutes later.

If a Chester resident, donning a sail-rail ticket, says she is going for a smoke and never returns what can the staff do?

foggy_lad

corktina wrote: »

i was under the impression that a break of journey was permitted. How could they tell you didnt come back to do the other bit?

I think the break of journey only applies on intercity journeys

6. When the fare to an intermediate station exceeds the fare to a more distant station, no person shall, for the purpose of traveling to such intermediate station, take or use or attempt to use a ticket for the more distant station with intent to avoid payment of the additional fare to such intermediate station. The liability to or infliction of any penalty incurred by the contravention of this Bye-Law shall not prejudice any right of the Board to treat such ticket as forfeited and to recover the full fare for the distance actually travelled by the offender. SI 109 1984

http://www.railusers.ie/passenger_info/ticketing.php#different_lines

some very interesting reading on the rail users website including

A hidden gem in the terms and conditions is that given your end destination could be a within reach of a number of rail lines, normal single and return tickets may be used interchangeably on adjacent lines. So a passenger could buy a return to Cork, travel to Cork and upon return board in Millstreet for Dublin. You may have to pay the difference in value between the tickets to complete the journey where a difference exists for example you travel Dublin Limerick but want to return from Cork its €71.00 Dublin Cork, but €58.00 Dublin Limerick, you pay €13

Break of journey is allowed on Intercity tickets

Say you are traveling from Dublin to Cork and decide to stop in Thurles to have lunch or see a GAA match, do you need two tickets? The answer is no, a Dublin-Cork single or return is all you need!

8.1 - Except as may be specified in the publications and notices of the and applicable to Iarnród Éireann, the holder of a single ticket may break his or her journey at intermediate station on any route for which the ticket is valid within the period of validity of the ticket. Iarnród Éireann Conditions of Carriage, Nov 2004 ed, Section A 8.1

An intercity journey is any journey which occurs outside the suburban areas e.g. Short Hop zone in Dublin or between Cobh and Cork or a journey which starts within a suburban area to any destination beyond it.

http://www.railusers.ie/resources/IE_conditions_of_carriage_2004.pdf

10. Using tickets from any other stations
10.1 Subject to Condition 8, any passenger using a ticket for any station, either
beyond or short of that for which the ticket is valid will be liable to pay the full
ordinary single fare for the journey made and he or she may be liable to
prosecution.

Our man in Havana

Athy would be classed as Intercity would it not?

foggy_lad

Our man in Havana wrote: »

Athy would be classed as Intercity would it not?

Yes it is afaik so there should be no trouble claiming you were breaking your journey in Kildare but staff might stop you and question you and the journey is such a short one on which people wouldnt ordinarily need or want to break their journey they might believe you are evading the correct fare and issue a fine.

Our man in Havana

foggy_lad wrote: »

Yes it is afaik so there should be no trouble claiming you were breaking your journey in Kildare but staff might stop you and question you and the journey is such a short one on which people wouldnt ordinarily need or want to break their journey they might believe you are evading the correct fare and issue a fine.

Which would be thrown out in court. A break is allowed.

Drimnagh Road

Any reasons why the fare structures are like that?

We're hearing a lot lately about how IE and other companies are been pro-active in fare evasion by having a zero tolerance policy etc, however they would find that they would do better by putting a fairer fares system in place first, and therefore discouraging fare evasion from happening in the first place.

BenShermin

Drimnagh Road wrote: »

Any reasons why the fare structures are like that?

AFAIK there are different fare structures for differing qualities of train line.

For example the Dublin to Cork/Limerick Line would be a high quality line because it is double tracked, therefor it attracts higher fares.

Dublin to Rosslare/Sligo/Galway/Westport/Waterford are for the mostpart single track lines and therefore attract lower fares.


Athy is peculiar in that it attracts the single track structure of fare pricing and therefore it is cheaper than Newbridge and Kildare which fall under the double track pricing structure.

foggy_lad

BenShermin wrote: »

AFAIK there are different fare structures for differing qualities of train line.

For example the Dublin to Cork/Limerick Line would be a high quality line because it is double tracked, therefor it attracts higher fares.

Dublin to Rosslare/Sligo/Galway/Westport/Waterford are for the mostpart single track lines and therefore attract lower fares.


Athy is peculiar in that it attracts the single track structure of fare pricing and therefore it is cheaper than Newbridge and Kildare which fall under the double track pricing structure.

It all sounds messy and hard to work but should be easy to sort out with a simple pay by mile system. Would such a system work here though?

LXFlyer

Drimnagh Road wrote: »

Any reasons why the fare structures are like that?

We're hearing a lot lately about how IE and other companies are been pro-active in fare evasion by having a zero tolerance policy etc, however they would find that they would do better by putting a fairer fares system in place first.

The reason the fares are higher for Newbridge and Kildare is that they have a much better service in terms of the number of departures each day.

Fares to and from Athy are set lower to encourage people to use the train and to reflect the fact they have a lower number of services.

Niles

foggy_lad wrote: »

It all sounds messy and hard to work but should be easy to sort out with a simple pay by mile system. Would such a system work here though?

Thing is though would it really be fair for someone on a low frequency route like the Rosslare line to have to pay the same amount per mile as some on a more frequent route like the Cork service?

I suspect that checkers are well aware of the Kildare/Athy anomaly, though I also suspect that it's hard to enforce. It's been highlighted before on the railusers website IIRC. I get the logic behind it though.

BTW, what's with this "Ticket Bert" thing (presume it refers to the checker), I've seen it once before in an another thread a while back.

BenShermin

On the flip side Niles, is it fair to charge people from Newbridge a higher fare when the majority of their more frequent service is made up of slower "stopping at all stations" commuter trains? Should there be a higher price for non-stop intercity services from Newbridge and a lower price for the slower commuter services from Newbridge?

IMO for a country so small with so few railway lines the whole fare scheme really is a shambles and needs an entire overhaul, especially on the Internet sales side of things.

Our man in Havana

Gate checker, some stations have these where there are exit barriers.

Drimnagh Road

I agree about historically the service on the mainline was superior than that offered on the branches, however I'm not sure if that is still as relavent these days.

For example, Athy now has 10 trains on weekdays which is probably adequate for a town that size. At the least, the serice is certainly better than back in the 90s when I think there was 4 trains daily from Waterford, with an additional Carlow commuter in the morning.

Also, where as the Cork line had the better mk3 trains, the Waterford in the main been served by mk2s and / or Cravens, nowadays all Intercity routes are served by modern trains.

Kildare and Newbridge have 31 trains on weekdays, 31 is probably too much for a town of Kildare's size, that said Kildare was always an important junction station so was probably always overserved.

Newbridge could do with the 31 trains alright.

Would a zone fare systems work? For example all stations in Kildare county are the same price?

foggy_lad

BenShermin wrote: »

On the flip side Niles, is it fair to charge people from Newbridge a higher fare when the majority of their more frequent service is made up of slower "stopping at all stations" commuter trains? Should there be a higher price for non-stop intercity services from Newbridge and a lower price for the slower commuter services from Newbridge?

IMO for a country so small with so few railway lines the whole fare scheme really is a shambles and needs an entire overhaul, especially on the Internet sales side of things.

If you get the 120 Bus Eireann bus from Celbridge into Dublin it is slightly dearer than the normal Dublin Bus 67A, the extra busses on the route does not mean an increase in fares out to Celbridge for everyone though!

mickydoomsux

Ah, our ticketing structure. An enigma that even us employees don't fully understand.

You can break a journey. No problem there.

Now, the price difference i reckon may be down to the type of day return. A Waterford line day saver return fare is cheaper than a regular day return fare so i think that may "explain it". The only thing is that the day saver is supposed to apply to and from all stations between Waterford and Heuston but if looks like the standard day return is being charged out of Dublin to Kildare and Newbridge because they are major junction stations so technically they don't exclusively belong to the Waterford line.

Clear as mud. Also, the tickets are zonal, based on a mileage chart thing but then tickets types come into play which can cause price difference over similar journeys. It's a mess tbh.

We've lobbied to have it as a flat zonal system with a separate price for a single, then slightly dearer again for a day return and then again for a monthly. It would make it easier for us to do our job rather than trying to explain to a customer why a single is the same as a day return expect for certain days when it's the same price as a monthly. We were told that the current system was "fit for purpose" and that was the end of that.

waylander2002

train station in athy is on the waterford route which is a saver route, Kildare Newbridge are on a more expensive route, its a bit stupid that athy is further away but cheaper to travel from, also the waterford route is cheaper because there is alot of competition from cheaper buses, just to note, athy carlow, take in more revenue than the rest of the waterford line together, revenue protection is 100 euros fine for no tickets and if u do not produce id or details they will have gardai waiting in the next station, but note also there is still ticket men who just issue tickets and do not fine, this is because they are stuck on a older contract and have not been moved onto the revenue protection grade yet