Bus Eireann Clare Route Change

squonk

Recently Bus Eireann amalgamated a few of their services into the new 350 bus route. The route now serves Galway City through to Ennis all around by the coast.

The problem is that there is now no direct service to Limerick. Passengers have to change at Ennis and the journey time has increased as a result. Prior to the change, it was possible to get from Ennistymon to Limerick in about 1h20m but that's gone up to about 1h50m now. Most of the problem is having to wait for the connecting 51 bus in Ennis. There's also an additional problem in that, as the 350 is coming from Galway via some quite poor roads, it hasn't been on time yet.

I contacted BE and received a reply saying that they were reviewing their routes and that the review was ongoing and that they'd be abck in touch again.

I may be surprised but I'm not expecting too much out of my single mail. I presume others have gone through similar route changes previously and needed to make BE very aware that the changes were not an improvement. What is the best approach to trying to get a direct bus service reinstated? Anybody else had similar experiences and how did things work out over time? BE's reply is so general that it's hard to know what is going on. I'd like to keep the pressure up rather than letting things get forgotten.

LXFlyer

Contact the National Transport Authority - they're behind the changes.

flazio

You could take the train
*ducks*

squonk

Thanks! Mail sent. I'll follow up with a call depneding on what I hear back. I seriously wonder about the calibre of person employed by an agency such as this. A baby could have seen that there were seriousl practical issues with the new route. Judging by their website, all they actually seem to care about is Dublin and, in particular, the Luas.

LXFlyer

squonk wrote: »

Thanks! Mail sent. I'll follow up with a call depneding on what I hear back. I seriously wonder about the calibre of person employed by an agency such as this. A baby could have seen that there were seriousl practical issues with the new route. Judging by their website, all they actually seem to care about is Dublin and, in particular, the Luas.

I'm not sure that's fair. They are trying to refresh the bus services across the country. So far they've reviewed the north east, Meath, Wexford, and the regional cities.

Many of the services badly need updating to become more relevant.

The issue with the 350 sounds like a running time problem - it needs more time to get from Galway to Ennis.

As far as operating through to Limerick is concerned, were many people doing that or were they mainly going to/from Ennis?

squonk

There were a few people doing it. There are always plenty queueing for the 51 now and, before, I never really counted the numbers travelling on to Limerick but the bus wasn't empty.

There is an issue with the runnign time from Galway to Ennis but the major issue is the change in Ennis wasting 20 minutes and then the detours to Shannon Airport and Bunratty. They've turned a trip of slightly over 1 hour from Ennistymon to Limerick into a two hour epic. The distance involved is only about 70Km.

squonk

lxflyer wrote: »

I'm not sure that's fair. They are trying to refresh the bus services across the country. So far they've reviewed the north east, Meath, Wexford, and the regional cities.

Many of the services badly need updating to become more relevant.

It is entirely fair. They started out with a long-standing set of services that worked but weren't perfect but largely suited most commuters most of the time. They replaced it with a half-assed service that suits almost nobody most of the time. Instead of making the existing service more relevant, they chose to make the overall service less relevant seeing as anybody who can will now buy a car rather than endure changes and detours and ridiculous journey times for straightforward journeys.

LXFlyer

I was referring to your comment about the NTA only caring about Dublin when I said your comments were not quite fair, not your complaint about the service itself. Hence my list of areas they've reviewed to date.

However there are two elements to this - the running time and the route itself. You have a very good point about the extended journey times and reliability. These need to be fixed.

I can see what the idea was with merging the two services - they're trying to make it more attractive to tourists, but if it ain't working it'll need changing.

squonk

Sorry for the misunderstanding.

I'm all for making serivces more relevant. There's nothing wrong with streamlining services either and they have provided more daily services for tourists but they could have done this with the exising services in place. The solution now is to provide a few direct bus services to/from Limerick which will require additional setup and timetabling.

squonk

Incidentally, if this national review process has been ongoing elsewhere, how responsive were they to requirements from the travelling public? Did any services change and what was the turnaround time for changes?

Mrs OBumble

squonk wrote: »

Incidentally, if this national review process has been ongoing elsewhere, how responsive were they to requirements from the travelling public? Did any services change and what was the turnaround time for changes?

I don't believe that they are required to be responsive to the requirements of the travelling public - certainly they aren't required to consult the local councils.

I was going to make the point about exactly how many people need to travel from west Clare to Limerick city too ... but then I thought about the need to go there for hospital services, and the fact that it's a social-benefit service not a commercial one.

So I can kind of sympathise.

But even so, I don't really see a problem with changing in Ennis, if it's only a 20 minute wait. And stops at Shannon and NoF would be a given, I'd say, direct but or not.

LXFlyer

Ennis-Limerick direct (bypassing Shannon) is served by Irish Rail and Dublin Coach.

squonk

lxflyer wrote: »

Ennis-Limerick direct (bypassing Shannon) is served by Irish Rail and Dublin Coach.

That's not the point. I shouldn't have to change provider to get a direct link just because one which was there was removed and, in any case, it'd still require a wait for the private coach service.

squonk

Mrs OBumble wrote: »

I don't believe that they are required to be responsive to the requirements of the travelling public - certainly they aren't required to consult the local councils.
.

That's bizzare! I'd say then they have no business meddling in transport in that case. At the end of the day, public transport is about the public. I'ts in the name. There isn't much point in providing a service that nobody will use just because it's some way more efficeint in another context.

Mrs OBumble wrote: »

But even so, I don't really see a problem with changing in Ennis, if it's only a 20 minute wait. And stops at Shannon and NoF would be a given, I'd say, direct but or not.

I see your point but look at it this way, would you be happy to have your regular commut almost doubled in time? It might only be a 20 minute wait but with any journey there are other knock on factors due to traffic, poor weather etc. It's far from 'only a 20 minute wait'. Let's put it another way, a 20 minute wait isn't a lot of fun in mid winter when it's freezing and peeing down rain. The actual additions to the journy time add up as follows:

20 Minute wait @ Ennis
15-20 Minutes to divert to Shannon
5 Minutes to get to a stop in Bunratty.

Then you can add 5 minutes because the bus no longer uses the new motorway.

You can add up to another 35 minutes waiting for the bus to show up from Galway in the first place.

I certainly don't mind a 20 minute wait if I'm travelling far afield and need to change to a cross country service. I'm not however. I'm doing the equivalent of travelling from Drogheda to Dublin and being asked to now change in Balbriggan while the bus I change to tootles around North Dublin for very little apparent reason.