Why does Nitelink not run on BH Sunday?

devnull

Losty Dublin wrote: »

This was a good decade ago and was a slower and longer service bus unlike the limited stop Aircoach which serves other parts of the borough.

Obviously DB did it to try scupper Aircoach, not to offer better service to the city's passengers :rolleyes:

If DB had the interests of the passengers as priority and there were so many passengers who needed a service between other places rather than the airport, then losing one stop of which you claim was not the primary reason for the bus anyway, was hardly a reason to not bother the service at all.

They could have picked one of a number of routes to operate 24 hour services on, yet only picked one based on the fact they would run it only if it served an airport and on the only route where there was a comparable service also serving the airport from a private operator, at the time, must be all just a complete co-incidence of course.

devnull

lxflyer wrote: »

This was a proposal by DB to convert the 746 route into 24 hour operation back in the late 1990s and not recently. It was under the DoT regime.

The Department of Transport funded the purchase of additional RVs with extra luggage racking specifically for the service, which were delivered. At the last minute (literally a week or two before operations were due to start) the licensing branch of the Department of Transport withdrew approval for the service. You could not make this kind of thing up.

I was not aware at that, I took what the previous poster said at face value and assumed that it was because of competition with the Aircoach Dalkey service which appeared to have been implied, which it appears I was wrong to so it appears I have got my wires crossed in relation to that so apologies for coming to that assumption!

If there was no competitive service and this service was approved before Aircoach started operating along the route, then there clearly was no reason to reject it and it should have been accepted and allowed to commence service and I'd be interested to know the reasons that the DoT denied it, despite the fact that nothing surprises me when that regime comes to mind.

From my perspective I would prefer to see additional funding being used first and foremost to increase the frequencies on daytime routes where capacity is becoming a real issue, and then to develop a much enhanced network of orbital routes, and to improve the local network at Dublin Airport. Night time services would follow those in terms of priority in my book.

I would agree with that certainly, however I cannot see much happening before the network re-design early next year which is going to be needed anyway with the commencement of LUAS cross city journeys which clearly is going to create changes on demand of bus services as well as also create changes to traffic flows and journey patterns.

coylemj

gizmo81 wrote: »

Some people visit hospitals, out of hours doctor services at night and can't afford a taxi.

You would be seriously unwelcome visiting someone in hospital at 1 a.m., by the other patients in the ward, by hospital security and by the night matron nursing manager who would probably show you the door without much ceremony.

The out of hours doctor service typically involves a freelance/locum doctor getting a taxi to your house, you don't go to them.

gizmo81 wrote: »

So someone can't leave A&E at the Mater at 2am and get a nitelink home?

Correct. Pickup in the city centre and at one or two designated stops outbound only on each route. No inbound service.

gizmo81

Perhaps there's some confusion;

A person could attend James/Mater A&E at 1pm and might not get discharged till 1am, they can walk to any of the Nitelink stops in the City Centre and get the bus.

Alternatively, a person could attend Mediserve on SCR and walk in to town after and get the Nitelink.

Clarification: as a patient or as company for a patient at A&E

coylemj wrote: »

You would be seriously unwelcome visiting someone in hospital at 1 a.m., by the other patients in the ward, by hospital security and by the night matron nursing manager who would probably show you the door without much ceremony.

The out of hours doctor service typically involves a freelance/locum doctor getting a taxi to your house, you don't go to them.



Correct. Pickup in the city centre and at one or two designated stops outbound only on each route. No inbound service.

Losty Dublin

coylemj wrote: »

The out of hours doctor service typically involves a freelance/locum doctor getting a taxi to your house, you don't go to them.
.

The out of hours GP have drivers who get them to and from wherever they are needed. Or at least the ones I've seen around my area have.

coylemj

Losty Dublin wrote: »

The out of hours GP have drivers who get them to and from wherever they are needed. Or at least the ones I've seen around my area have.

Was that 'clarification' really necessary?

Stephen15

XPS_Zero wrote: »

Whats our aversion to Nitelink Rail? We've experimented with a few Luas and DART nitelinks but never put it on regularly, why? Is it an overtime thing?

Because they do maintenance on the track at night I imagine and service would be regularly distrupted the railways aren't like roads where you do things like stop and go roadworks and diversions.

coylemj

Stephen15 wrote: »

Because they do maintenance on the track at night....

No, they do track maintenance on bank holiday weekends .....

Iarnród Éireann Irish Rail would like to advise customers that the following engineering works are taking place this May Bank Holiday Weekend

• Saturday 29th April - Line improvement works on Heuston Line, more info below
• 29th - 30th April - Major Works affecting Northside DART, Northern Commuter & Enterprise

LXFlyer

coylemj wrote: »

No, they do track maintenance on bank holiday weekends .....

Iarnr?d ?ireann Irish Rail would like to advise customers that the following engineering works are taking place this May Bank Holiday Weekend

• Saturday 29th April - Line improvement works on Heuston Line, more info below
• 29th - 30th April - Major Works affecting Northside DART, Northern Commuter & Enterprise

A substantial amount of maintenance is done at night - including along the DART line - it's just not advertised as it doesn't affect operations.

It's just the more significant work that requires a lengthy engineers' possession that happens at weekends.

n97 mini

gizmo81 wrote: »

So someone can't leave A&E at the Mater at 2am and get a nitelink home?

In theory. I doubt it ever happens in practice. Some would have up to a two hour wait till the next bus.

thomasj

n97 mini wrote: »

In theory. I doubt it ever happens in practice. Some would have up to a two hour wait till the next bus.

unless they're living in Blanch.

39N passes the mater but the nearest pickup stop is St Peters Church in Phibsboro

XPS_Zero

Bray Head wrote: »

Aircoach is a unionised company with services that operate 24 hours a day.

The problem with DB is as much management as with unions. Unionisation is inevitable in the transport sector, but unions manage to develop most control when management is weak and does not achieve the respect of its workforce.

The difference between Dublin Bus and Aircoach isn't the unions and management, it's the incentive structure both operate under. If your employer is owned by the state you have the sense that there are unlimited funds available since the state can (theoretically anyway) always create more money or otherwise generate it. The management likewise are not under the pressure of a competitive environment so they are sheltered from real world management decisions, which means their skills atrophy and they get sloppy, or if they never worked in the private sector they never had such skills to begin with.

The CIE unions think that if the companies are running deep into the red the state should just shovel more money in, never ask questions like:

• Is it too far in the red even for a PSO service?
• Is it being inefficient?
• Is it fair to pay sick pay calculated to include overtime?

Because nobody ever asks those questions, and the conception is that more money can just be shoveled in to cover up problems instead of fixing them, they end up being run into the ground.