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BE strike [Read 1st post before posting]
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Where the unions not accepting pay cuts as long as they come from the top down a few days ago?
Can CIE not help provide for redundancies?
State created this mess allowing so many private operators enter the market. The bin industry is a mess and were getting ripped off, them lads are doing as they please and will eventually get their own way and charge what they like. We rejected Irish Water on one of the basis that it would be eventually privatised so why allow BE be broken up and sold off to benefit others.
Who owns BE sites like Broadstone and BE bus stations around the country. €30 - 40 million is rather cheap considering whats involved here. What assets are availble to BE. Would a move out of Broadstone and find a cheap site around the Airport or so not save money. Can someone regional depots be shut down and transfered into large city areas.
Private operator's are only interested in money making routes which are fast city to city limit stop services. In the long run the country will suffer with the lost of BE. Who will run school buses in the back arse of the country and serve the towns in between cities bypassed by motorways ect.0 -
Where the unions not accepting pay cuts as long as they come from the top down a few days ago?
Can CIE not help provide for redundancies?
State created this mess allowing so many private operators enter the market. The bin industry is a mess and were getting ripped off, them lads are doing as they please and will eventually get their own way and charge what they like. We rejected Irish Water on one of the basis that it would be eventually privatised so why allow BE be broken up and sold off to benefit others.
Who owns BE sites like Broadstone and BE bus stations around the country. €30 - 40 million is rather cheap considering whats involved here. What assets are availble to BE. Would a move out of Broadstone and find a cheap site around the Airport or so not save money. Can someone regional depots be shut down and transfered into large city areas.
Private operator's are only interested in money making routes which are fast city to city limit stop services. In the long run the country will suffer with the lost of BE. Who will run school buses in the back arse of the country and serve the towns in between cities bypassed by motorways ect.
No problem with the bin industry!0 -
It's the PS unions that do annual strikes or threats of them so he's kinda right there
Their leaders do this despite earning way more sometimes double or triple what their average member ears, living in a bubble with the same people, on expenses and sitting on boards they've no qualifications to sit on
Then they try to hyjack democracy to protect a pampered set of working conditions
Now I'm not one of these 'always eat lunch at your desk and if your not miserable you must not be working hard' types , or a divide n conquer type . I've been a union member in the private sector and public and the difference in work ethic, customer service ethos (NON EXISTENT in the PS where citizens are treated as an annoyance to be tolerated) is amazing I literally saw people shamed in the PS by others for doing extra work.
They live in bubbles immune from market forces, on absurd premium pay rates and allowances, constantly hold the country to ransom and treat the very people funding them like crap, as anyone having the misfortune to use the HSE, DSP or even spend 5 minutes in the admin office in most universities can attest
I've heard drivers and union heads in this dispute trying to divert flak by attacking FT users inc disabled ones in many cases with profound ignorance of why and how many FT cards are used, one saying there's "nothing wrong with most of them" (bus drivers can diagnose medical disability by a 10 second visual inspection apparently) and another even more disturbing ignorance giving examples of people making a trip bus station to bus station return on same bus not leaving the station at their destination just having a coffee etc
If he'd bothered to think about why somone would do that he might have hit on the truth. With many mental health conditions (in isolation or as a result of long term physical illness) people loose their normal routine and become isolated so that they are shut ins. If you're stuck not socialising etc for years on end due to illness you loose the basics
So before you can get them back to work a therapist has to help them rebuild that routine from scratch (the mental equivalent of learning to walk again after say spinal trauma). It sounds easy to healthy people 'just do it' but it's not that easy when it's been years since you've done it and your mental healths still improving. The way they do that is baby steps, "get to cc each day for x bus st x time for a month" might be
The first building block. It takes 30 days to eastablish a routine for a normal perfectly healthy person let alone in this case.
So here this guy sees people doing this, making an effort to defeat their anxieties and rebuild normality so they can go back to work...and concludes "they just love wasting trips for the hell of it...errr just cos". Attacking the very kind of behaviour and effort everyone demands of those on welfare and blaming them for financial issues in BE that other companies that take FT cards don't seem to have.
When you behave like that, when the person behind the counter at DSP doesn't even fake empathy or effort to help you , when the secretary in the HSE office thinks getting a file from the store room is too much work, when the staff in a university office go out of their way to obstruct students from getting work done due to a technicality in the rules (could give you a dozen examples) you can't be shocked when there's not only no support for you, but open hostility
It's all part of the same theme.
You in that bubble the rest of us out here, with no customer service ethos, empathy, thanks or appreciation for how good you have it0 -
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Private operator's are only interested in money making routes which are fast city to city limit stop services. In the long run the country will suffer with the lost of BE. Who will run school buses in the back arse of the country and serve the towns in between cities bypassed by motorways ect.
Bus Eireann serves rural routes and routes that are not commercially viable is it is paid to do so. It is given free vehicles to do so and the taxpayer spent almost 100 million euro on it last year. Private operators don't as they don't get free vehicles and are not funded to do so as of yet.
I know you are trying to make out that in a romantic way that Bus E is some kind of God who does it out of the kindness of their hearts and are portraying rural Ireland as a victim but it's a false narrative.0 -
Here's hoping every last driver is let go...
Then they can try getting a job in the real world.0 -
IE 222 wrote:Private operator's are only interested in money making routes which are fast city to city limit stop services. In the long run the country will suffer with the lost of BE. Who will run school buses in the back arse of the country and serve the towns in between cities bypassed by motorways ect.
Aren't you aware of the PSO provision? The government, quite rightly, provides funding for these so that the country didn't suffer. It's just that BE can't even manage it properly.magentis wrote:Really???
One bin company was so good that arsonists set fire to their bin trucks.0 -
Here's hoping every last driver is let go...
Then they can try getting a job in the real world.
"What do you mean I don't get overtime pay on sick days?????"
"Well ...you didn't actually do any overtime you're out sick..."
"But overtime should be calculated as part of my regular pay when deciding sick pay rate"
"But it's NOT regular pay that's the point"
(Blank stare - does not compute)
"Ah heare diz is n attack on de ordinary decent wuurkin class...err...erm...HEALTH N SAFETY...."
"Go back to work ffsake"0 -
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It's the PS unions that do annual strikes or threats of them so he's kinda right there
Their leaders do this despite earning way more sometimes double or triple what their average member ears, living in a bubble with the same people, on expenses and sitting on boards they've no qualifications to sit on
Then they try to hyjack democracy to protect a pampered set of working conditions
Now I'm not one of these 'always eat lunch at your desk and if your not miserable you must not be working hard' types , or a divide n conquer type . I've been a union member in the private sector and public and the difference in work ethic, customer service ethos (NON EXISTENT in the PS where citizens are treated as an annoyance to be tolerated) is amazing I literally saw people shamed in the PS by others for doing extra work.
They live in bubbles immune from market forces, on absurd premium pay rates and allowances, constantly hold the country to ransom and treat the very people funding them like crap, as anyone having the misfortune to use the HSE, DSP or even spend 5 minutes in the admin office in most universities can attest
I've heard drivers and union heads in this dispute trying to divert flak by attacking FT users inc disabled ones in many cases with profound ignorance of why and how many FT cards are used, one saying there's "nothing wrong with most of them" (bus drivers can diagnose medical disability by a 10 second visual inspection apparently) and another even more disturbing ignorance giving examples of people making a trip bus station to bus station return on same bus not leaving the station at their destination just having a coffee etc
If he'd bothered to think about why somone would do that he might have hit on the truth. With many mental health conditions (in isolation or as a result of long term physical illness) people loose their normal routine and become isolated so that they are shut ins. If you're stuck not socialising etc for years on end due to illness you loose the basics
So before you can get them back to work a therapist has to help them rebuild that routine from scratch (the mental equivalent of learning to walk again after say spinal trauma). It sounds easy to healthy people 'just do it' but it's not that easy when it's been years since you've done it and your mental healths still improving. The way they do that is baby steps, "get to cc each day for x bus st x time for a month" might be
The first building block. It takes 30 days to eastablish a routine for a normal perfectly healthy person let alone in this case.
So here this guy sees people doing this, making an effort to defeat their anxieties and rebuild normality so they can go back to work...and concludes "they just love wasting trips for the hell of it...errr just cos". Attacking the very kind of behaviour and effort everyone demands of those on welfare and blaming them for financial issues in BE that other companies that take FT cards don't seem to have.
When you behave like that, when the person behind the counter at DSP doesn't even fake empathy or effort to help you , when the secretary in the HSE office thinks getting a file from the store room is too much work, when the staff in a university office go out of their way to obstruct students from getting work done due to a technicality in the rules (could give you a dozen examples) you can't be shocked when there's not only no support for you, but open hostility
It's all part of the same theme.
You in that bubble the rest of us out here, with no customer service ethos, empathy, thanks or appreciation for how good you have it
Speak for yourself there.My experience of bus eireann drivers has been nothing but positive.I support them 100% in what they are doing.A state sponsored race to the bottom is whats going on here.Just like in numerous other state/semi state companies.
This government has no problem wasting massive amounts of money on white elephant water meters,creating jobs for the boys,and td's lining their own pockets.But are prepared to let vital services decay.0 -
Private operator's are only interested in money making routes which are fast city to city limit stop services. In the long run the country will suffer with the lost of BE. Who will run school buses in the back arse of the country and serve the towns in between cities bypassed by motorways ect.
The reason that the Bus Eireann Commercial arm services little places rather than being non stop is because of poor management not because of the fact they are forced to, this is yet another false narrative being pushed around by the unions.
Commercial Intercity routes between the main cities and Towns is regulated by the NTA who have a duty in law to operate on behalf of the public under the Transport Regulation Act. Their brief requires them to do these without favour to any operator, including Bus Eireann Expressway or any other commercial operator without the fear of what will happen if they don't give a party what they want.
For intercity routes there are two types of licenses
* Interurban - Intercity rotues that stop at many towns en-route
* Interurban Express - Limited Stop / Motorway Services or non stop services. (Non stop or very limited Dublin-Cork-Waterford etc)
The regulator allows two licenses of each type on every corridor which according to guidelines should be seperated by 30 minutes from that of any other operator which has the same type of license for the same route. These licenses are issued on a first come first issued basis and the first two operators to apply get the license, after both are gone no more can apply.
It is very important to note that Bus Eireann Expressway is considered a commercial operator and has the same rights as other commercial operators with this and they have no better or worse rights than other companies when it comes to cancelling or start routes, adding or removing stops or changing times of their buses etc. Note that Interurban and Interurban Express service are considered different services.
So why is Bus Eireann Expressway not operating hardly any express routes? Essentially commercial management of the company has been poor, when the motorway network was build BE management felt that there would not be demand for express or non stop services and had no interest in them and is widely believed to think that they would not be viable and would be a waste of money.
Other operators such as Citylink, GoBus, Aircoach etc felt differently and applied for the licenses and made the services a success and acording to information released by the National Transport Authority, managed to achieve a modal shift to public transport that in some cases such as Dublin to Cork, the non stop services from private enterprise resulted in up to a 60% increase of passengers taking public transport on the route.
The problem is that BE were late to this party since they by the time BE realised they made a mistake in not applying for the routes, all of the licenses on the main corridors were taken up,. Because of this Bus Eireann cannot register motorway services on a lot of routes - essentially they missed the boat.0 -
Brendan Bendar wrote: »Yeah really.
Went into Downeys in Phibsboro at 1309 last Friday and strangely enough I didn't see one Panda hi-viz amongst the rather large crowd there.
So.... really:D
So you see nothing wrong with the tactics employed by these companies,with regard to waste charges.Private companies given free reign to charge what they want for a vital service.Hiking up the price for waste disposal as they see fit?0 -
Speak for yourself there.My experience of bus eireann drivers has been nothing but positive.I support them 100% in what they are doing.A state sponsored race to the bottom is whats going on here.Just like in numerous other state/semi state companies.
This government has no problem wasting massive amounts of money on white elephant water meters,creating jobs for the boys,and td's lining their own pockets.But are prepared to let vital services decay.
We'll see how "vital " they are pretty soon.
The taxpayer, I feel has had enough of this arse boxing .0 -
Speak for yourself there.My experience of bus eireann drivers has been nothing but positive.I support them 100% in what they are doing.A state sponsored race to the bottom is whats going on here.Just like in numerous other state/semi state companies.
I believe that providing good public transport services is the most important thing. Ultimately who provides the service doesn't bother me in the slightest. Many of the improvements that Bus Eireann have made over recent years have only been made because they have had no choice but to. We should always reward people who offer innovative new services.
Bus Eireann said in a full costed and written report that there are 1,378 drivers who work overtime each day which equals the cost of 1,636 drivers. It said if the company was to maximise driver efficiency, there would be a requirement for 986 full-time drivers. This alone is a shocking statistic and must be addressed. Right now they are paying for the equivalent 650 more staff members than the company feels it needs at the moment and the average pay is €45,000 at the driver grade.
Essentially the company is saying that with modern working practices and rotas that make the best use of resources, they can save over €25m before even talking about changing any terms and conditions or rates and any other cost measures. That is staggering.0 -
I believe that providing good public transport services is the most important thing. Ultimately who provides the service doesn't bother me in the slightest. Many of the improvements that Bus Eireann have made over recent years have only been made because they have had no choice but to. We should always reward people who offer innovative new services.
Bus Eireann said in a full costed and written report that there are 1,378 drivers who work overtime each day which equals the cost of 1,636 drivers. It said if the company was to maximise driver efficiency, there would be a requirement for 986 full-time drivers. This alone is a shocking statistic and must be addressed.
Right now they are paying for the equivalent 650 more staff members than the company feels it needs at the moment and the average pay is €45,000 at the driver grade. You are saying that private operators have the same level of fat and excess in them that BE has?
Essentially the company is saying that with modern working practices and rotas that make the best use of resources, they can save over €25m before even talking about changing any terms and conditions or rates and any other cost measures. That is staggering.
Cloud cuckoo-land Dev.
But hey, some people will lower their living standards to support them.
Cannot understand that mindset0 -
Brendan Bendar wrote: »We'll see how "vital " they are pretty soon.
The taxpayer, I feel has had enough of this arse boxing .
Ah yes, but the taxpayer appears to have no issue with the waste of money in other areas.Will the taxpayer be happy when he/she is funding loss making rural services.Or will it be a case of i'm alright jack?0 -
Brendan Bendar wrote: »Cloud cuckoo-land Dev.
But hey, some people will lower their living standards to support them.
Cannot understand that mindset
Is that you minister Ross???
Oh I forgot!!you dont get involved in anything that might involve a little work....0 -
We're just wide to the gouging. We don't appreciate it as taxpayers (and yes, I am a taxpayer in Ireland). CIE has been a jobs club since day one. Providing quality public transport has always played a distant second fiddle to this!horseburger wrote: »You're gorgeous too!
Thanking a post that calls people morons, suggesting the employees are striking for the fun of it.
The state has no business actually operating transport services, especially bus services. This can all be tendered out (following the German model or TfL model) and we gain private sector efficiency and maybe even a smile from the staff now and again.0 -
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Is Apple not a commercial company?0
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A race to the same level as private sector bus drivers, ie reality more like.Speak for yourself there.My experience of bus eireann drivers has been nothing but positive.I support them 100% in what they are doing.A state sponsored race to the bottom is whats going on here.Just like in numerous other state/semi state companies.
This government has no problem wasting massive amounts of money on white elephant water meters,creating jobs for the boys,and td's lining their own pockets.But are prepared to let vital services decay.0 -
What on earth gives you that idea? Maybe it's your attitude, but it's certainly not mine. I despise waste in the public and semi-state sectors. I know that's my money being wasted. This is a small but important battle to be fought for the taxpayer.Ah yes, but the taxpayer appears to have no issue with the waste of money in other areas.0 -
nhunter100 wrote: »Is Apple not a commercial company?
This isn't a politics forum but I'll bite. The benefits are obvious in Ireland, we have at the last time of checking the fastest-growing economy in Europe driven by the exports of about 1,000 multinationals that employ a large amount of the workforce and generate nearly a quarter of our economic output.
The government realised that multi-national companies provide a huge amount of jobs to this country, because whether you like it or not, as a small country we need such companies here to provide jobs to our students and to help grow our economy stop the situation that happened in the 80s and 90s where people could not find jobs here so emigrated to the UK or other places because they simply felt they could not find work here.
If the government did not appeal the ruling about this it would result to a lot of the companies who have similar arrangements possibly pulling out which would cost tens of thousands if not more jobs in this country which would make a massive spike in unemployment which could be beyond even what was seen during the last recession. This would cause the tax base to collapse and would no doubt put the country into another recession as it would cause the economy to collapse.
I can't say I really like the fact companies use Ireland to set up here to avoid paying tax or paying very little tax. However at the end of the day I realise that the reason the government is allowing them to do so is that without such companies opening up headquarters and offices here, we would have mass unemployment and families would have no choice in some sectors but to emigrate or find it very hard to find jobs in this country and possibly have to sign on the dole.
I'm not easy with it at all, but all I will say is look at past unemployment issues before the multi-nationals came and the levels of people leaving these shores for the UK and other countries to find work then versus what we have now where many more young professionals who graduate are able to find jobs in their own country in the sectors they wish to work in.0 -
Bus Eireann serves rural routes and routes that are not commercially viable is it is paid to do so. It is given free vehicles to do so and the taxpayer spent almost 100 million euro on it last year. Private operators don't as they don't get free vehicles and are not funded to do so as of yet.
I know you are trying to make out that in a romantic way that Bus E is some kind of God who does it out of the kindness of their hearts and are portraying rural Ireland as a victim but it's a false narrative.
Fully aware of PSO services it will take a lot more than a free bus to entice PO to take up all them services. It also require a massive increase in drivers ect. BE are by no means gods.
Your living in a fantasy world thinking once BE is gone PO won't start increasing prices soon after.
NTA can only control routes that companies are willing to serve. What happens when no company bids to run a service. They will get more money one way or another either by higher fares or high tax payer subsidies.
It's an integrated transport system the country is crying out for and desperately needs not a load of individual companies eventually doing there own thing.0 -
Fully aware of PSO services it will take a lot more than a free bus to entice PO to take up all them services. It also require a massive increase in drivers ect. BE are by no means gods.
It would take a lot more than a free bus for Bus Eireann to take up these services as well. They are paid to operate the services and are not simply getting a free bus and running it out of the kindness of their hearts.
Bus Eireann said in a full costed and written report that there are 1,378 drivers who work overtime each day which equals the cost of 1,636 drivers. It said if the company was to maximise driver efficiency, there would be a requirement for 986 full-time drivers.
Right now they are paying for the equivalent 650 more staff members than the company feels it needs at the moment. You are saying that private operators have the same level of fat and excess and grossly inefficient rotas in them that BE has and therefore couldn't do it for less?
Figures that have been quoted in the press suggest otherwise:
http://www.irishtimes.com/business/transport-and-tourism/private-bus-operators-pay-lower-wages-than-bus-%C3%A9ireann-1.2802281NTA can only control routes that companies are willing to serve. What happens when no company bids to run a service.
This is irrelevant since there has been no shortage of tenders for the very few routes that have so far been put up for tender. These services are pretty rural.They will get more money one way or another either by higher fares or high tax payer subsidies.
An automatic monopoly and a direct award on PSO contracts never gives good value for money. A monopoly of either private or public operators is never good for business or obtaining value for money, it never has been.
When operators tender for services they will be paid a set fee to run the service they will have no decision in fares and the lowest tender will win the route, you seem to think profit margins are huge in private companies but if you look at all the big UK groups they are all single figures and their profit is less than the waste there is in Bus Eireann, that is for sure.It's an integrated transport system the country is crying out for and desperately needs not a load of individual companies eventually doing there own thing.
I think you will find the National Transport Authority have been trying to do that through Transport for Ireland, however what has happened is that unfortunately the state companies wants to protect their own brands.
The problem is despite being a public transport company, set up to run for the benefit of the public rather than to be self serving, Dublin Bus and probably Irish Rail and Bus Eireann as well, are very protective of their brands and their own interests and they won't sacrifice what is good for them, even if it's better for the transport system as a whole.
Unfortunately that explains a lot of why transport is bad in Ireland, there are lots of parties who will happily look after their own interests rather than looking at the bigger picture of providing a proper integrated public transport system.
These parties don't want to become part of a TFL style organisation where TFI has the power, management, staff and unions want to keep the status quo and how things are organised now where they largely get to call the shots at company level, rather than a system like TFL where the regulator calls the shorts and the companies do what they are told.
The NTA planned to have a single livery before now introduced on all PSO bus services however because of resistance from both the state companies and the unions this to date has not happened and it's unlikely to happen at all in the near future for services operated by state companies because there is fierce opposition to it.
The Dublin Bus maps were brought out a month or two after the NTA maps were being handed out and publicized, DB then came out and started having street distributors of their own maps and distributing them after many many years of not producing maps, the maps did a very similar thing to the NTA maps, but they stripped out all other operators.
The same happened with the Mobile Apps, when the NTA started heavily promoting their fully integrated real time app, a few weeks later Dublin Bus started heavily promoting their own, it appears an attempt to shore up their commuters with making sure they go to DB direct and not Transport for Ireland.
I also heard on the Grapevine that Dublin Bus were supposed to use the Transport for Ireland Journey planner but DB would only use it if certain conditions were met of which the NTA would not agree to therefore Dublin Bus decided to continue using their own planner. That was some while ago. I would guess that the conditions probably involved stripping out every operator apart from LUAS, Irish Rail and Bus Eireann.0 -
The reason that the Bus Eireann Commercial arm services little places rather than being non stop is because of poor management not because of the fact they are forced to, this is yet another false narrative being pushed around by the unions.
Commercial Intercity routes between the main cities and Towns is regulated by the NTA who have a duty in law to operate on behalf of the public under the Transport Regulation Act. Their brief requires them to do these without favour to any operator, including Bus Eireann Expressway or any other commercial operator without the fear of what will happen if they don't give a party what they want.
For intercity routes there are two types of licenses
* Interurban - Intercity rotues that stop at many towns en-route
* Interurban Express - Limited Stop / Motorway Services or non stop services. (Non stop or very limited Dublin-Cork-Waterford etc)
The regulator allows two licenses of each type on every corridor which according to guidelines should be seperated by 30 minutes from that of any other operator which has the same type of license for the same route. These licenses are issued on a first come first issued basis and the first two operators to apply get the license, after both are gone no more can apply.
It is very important to note that Bus Eireann Expressway is considered a commercial operator and has the same rights as other commercial operators with this and they have no better or worse rights than other companies when it comes to cancelling or start routes, adding or removing stops or changing times of their buses etc. Note that Interurban and Interurban Express service are considered different services.
So why is Bus Eireann Expressway not operating hardly any express routes? Essentially commercial management of the company has been poor, when the motorway network was build BE management felt that there would not be demand for express or non stop services and had no interest in them and is widely believed to think that they would not be viable and would be a waste of money.
Other operators such as Citylink, GoBus, Aircoach etc felt differently and applied for the licenses and made the services a success and acording to information released by the National Transport Authority, managed to achieve a modal shift to public transport that in some cases such as Dublin to Cork, the non stop services from private enterprise resulted in up to a 60% increase of passengers taking public transport on the route.
The problem is that BE were late to this party since they by the time BE realised they made a mistake in not applying for the routes, all of the licenses on the main corridors were taken up,. Because of this Bus Eireann cannot register motorway services on a lot of routes - essentially they missed the boat.
I understand how the system works currently.
Take away the largest bus operator in the country and the NTA will be just another white elephant or become the new HSE endless money pot. They can't force PO into running services that BE provided. There will be a massive shortage of bus operators meaning they can demand what they want.0 -
You just do it the German way.Fully aware of PSO services it will take a lot more than a free bus to entice PO to take up all them services. It also require a massive increase in drivers ect. BE are by no means gods.
Your living in a fantasy world thinking once BE is gone PO won't start increasing prices soon after.
NTA can only control routes that companies are willing to serve. What happens when no company bids to run a service. They will get more money one way or another either by higher fares or high tax payer subsidies.
It's an integrated transport system the country is crying out for and desperately needs not a load of individual companies eventually doing there own thing.
NTA recognises a public service need for a bus route from x to y. NTA receives all the fares from the route. NTA says "we want an operator to run these services, with this level of punctuality, how much will you do it for?" Private companies tender for the route and the NTA selects an operator and contracts the route to them. The private operator never gets their hands on the fares, which are all returned to the NTA.
This stuff is tried and tested outside Ireland. It's not rocket science.0 -
devnull wrote:This isn't a politics forum but I'll bite. The benefits are obvious in Ireland, we have at the last time of checking the fastest-growing economy in Europe driven by the exports of about 1,000 multinationals that employ a large amount of the workforce and generate nearly a quarter of our economic output.
Nothing got to do with politics, it just seems to be selective subsidisation. Whatever the benefits it's still against the spirit of EU Law.0 -
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Take away the largest bus operator in the country and the NTA will be just another white elephant or become the new HSE endless money pot.
Just a few things that they have done.
- Large modal shift to public transport on intercity journeys
- LocalLink Rural Transport Iniative
- Provision of Ticket Machines at Dublin Airport
- Leap Card roll out to 5 cities
- Discounts for switching between multiple modes.
- Wifi on DART, Bus Eireann, Dublin Bus
- Real Time Information across the country
- Integrated Real Time App with Bus, Train and Luas all in.
- Integrated Route Planner showing ALL public transport services.
- Public Transport Spider Maps showing ALL operators.
- Departure and Local Area Boards at Airports, Stations and high traffic areas
- Visitor Leap Card
- Student Leap Card virtually cutting all student travel fraud
- Automatic discounts with Leap 90
- Fare Capping
- Onboard Passenger Information (screens/voice)
- Cycling Planner
- Walking Planner
- Higher spec double deck buses
- An increase in the double decker allocation in regional ciites
- Easier to read timetables in regional cities
- Taxi Fare Estimator
- Leap Card Top Up App
- Taxi Driver Check App
- Maps and guides for major events
- Family Leap Card for 1916.
- Phoenix Park Tunnel
- Intergration of Dublin Bikes and Leap
- Smarter Travel Workplaces Scheme
Soon to come will be
- Completion of LUAS Cross City
- 24 Hour Bus Services
- USB Charging ports on Buses
- New Luas Trams
- Returning of stored Irish Rail Stock into service
Many of those things CIE could have done years ago but it took the NTA coming on the scene for something actually to happen about them. it's great that someone might actually do something in the interests of the services and the public that use them rather than the good old days when they didn't exist and the unions and the staff ran the show with no damn given about the customers as the staff were of the opinion that all there is to running a bus service is charging a random fare, turning up and driving the bus and that is all there is to it and the company as a business shouldn't do anything else.0
This discussion has been closed.
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