BusConnects Dublin - Big changes to Bus Network

LXFlyer

cython wrote: »

It's there in part, but not completely. For example when Luas BXD opens, even with the ?1 discount, if I were to take a train from Coolmine to Tara Street, I can see it being cheaper than changing to Luas at Broombridge and getting off at O'Connell Street or Marlborough Street under the current fare system, despite being equivalent journeys.

Quite correct - Broombridge to the stops in the city centre is likely to be 2 Luas fare zones which will make some journeys more expensive for pay-as-you-go rail commuters who change rather than staying on the train (even allowing for the EUR1 discount).

If the bus network redesign involves more people changing buses, then the fare penalty for changing needs to be removed.

dazberry

lxflyer wrote: »

Quite correct - Broombridge to the stops in the city centre is likely to be 2 Luas fare zones which will make some journeys more expensive for pay-as-you-go rail commuters who change rather than staying on the train (even allowing for the ?1 discount).

This should also be reflected in leap card fare capping as there is a penalty for multi-mode capping that ideally shouldn't exist.

LXFlyer

dazberry wrote: »

This should also be reflected in leap card fare capping as there is a penalty for multi-mode capping that ideally shouldn't exist.

Most people commuting on the Maynooth line using pay-as-you-go would not even come close to hitting the Irish Rail weekly cap, let alone the multi-mode cap.

murphaph

punisher5112 wrote: »

That is there with travel 90 style 1 euro discount

To be honest this is nowhere near "integrated ticketing". If I want to go from my house to say Wannsee (in Berlin) I buy a single ticket that I can use to go Regional Train -> Bus -> Ferry. There is no discount, you simply pay for your journey to be completed in 2 hours or less. If I can make the journey with no changes, that's a plus, but it is no cheaper than if it takes 4 modes. I often use 3 modes on my way home from work (tram, S-Bahn, Regional train). That's what I understood is coming under BusConnects and it is hugely different to offering a discount on second and third legs of the same journey.

Real integrated ticketing and fares are actually the precursors to a network because a network that penalises changes is never going to attract people to the concept of changing, regardless how good the infrastructure, vehicles and timetables are.

As for numbering, it's easy really.
Just put an "M" (for Metrobus/Metrotram) prefix in front of the BRT/high frequency routes to denote services with 10 minute or less frequency. All other trams and buses just have a plain number with no prefix. People automatically know that those routes will typically have a 20 minute frequency at best. A service can thus be "upgraded" to "metrobus" simply by adding an "M" prefix. I would not reserve low numbers for more important routes etc. Too inflexible.

n97 mini

Discussing the Broombridge Luas with a fellow train user yesterday. Given the example above (Marlborough St):
Going into CC: not only is it going to more expensive to change to Luas, it will be slower than just staying on the train.
Leaving CC: All of the above, plus if you get the Luas to Broombridge and mistime your connection or get held up you potentially face a 1 hour wait till the next train, stuck in Broombridge! Nightmare scenario.

So we concluded that it would make sense only to change at Broombridge if you were going to somewhere like Dominick, *but* that when it came to going home it would be safer to get the Luas to the city centre and get a train from there, rather than risk being stuck in Broombridge for an hour.

bk

Stephen15 wrote: »

1-9 BRT routes
10-99 Routes serving the cc
100-199 Orbital routes
200-299 Local routes

The 2xx range is used for buses in Cork. I believe that the NTA are now operating a consistent route numbering system through the whole country now.

It was only two years ago or so that they shifted the bus numbers in Cork from example 5 to 205, 8 to 208, etc.

Obviously 1 to 199 is supposed to be Dublin.

BonnieSituation wrote: »

I really like the current livery. Be a shame to lose it. Especially seeing as it manages to incorporate the Dublin colours/flag onto the back.

Which is another reason you couldn't really use if for a livery that is supposed to go on buses all over the country including Cork, Galway, etc.

punisher5112

murphaph wrote: »

To be honest this is nowhere near "integrated ticketing". If I want to go from my house to say Wannsee (in Berlin) I buy a single ticket that I can use to go Regional Train -> Bus -> Ferry. There is no discount, you simply pay for your journey to be completed in 2 hours or less. If I can make the journey with no changes, that's a plus, but it is no cheaper than if it takes 4 modes. I often use 3 modes on my way home from work (tram, S-Bahn, Regional train). That's what I understood is coming under BusConnects and it is hugely different to offering a discount on second and third legs of the same journey.

Real integrated ticketing and fares are actually the precursors to a network because a network that penalises changes is never going to attract people to the concept of changing, regardless how good the infrastructure, vehicles and timetables are.

As for numbering, it's easy really.
Just put an "M" (for Metrobus/Metrotram) prefix in front of the BRT/high frequency routes to denote services with 10 minute or less frequency. All other trams and buses just have a plain number with no prefix. People automatically know that those routes will typically have a 20 minute frequency at best. A service can thus be "upgraded" to "metrobus" simply by adding an "M" prefix. I would not reserve low numbers for more important routes etc. Too inflexible.

You don't understand what I was saying.

The old system db had was you travel on as many db services as you wished in the 90 minutes and also worked on xpresso services which made it very cheap at the time.

Obviously it was only db but it was better then the nta leap €1 off.

But that alas is changing so no need to be worrying about it with all the new changes coming.

devnull

The Leap 90 product is much better than Travel 90 in my opinion and a far larger number of customers are availing of it compared to the Travel 90, because the Travel 90 required you to constantly keep buying new tickets whereas the Leap 90 product is built in to the leap card and at least with my fellow colleagues over the past few years, far more of them use a mix of transport modes than two buses.

Stephen15

bk wrote: »

The 2xx range is used for buses in Cork. I believe that the NTA are now operating a consistent route numbering system through the whole country now.

It was only two years ago or so that they shifted the bus numbers in Cork from example 5 to 205, 8 to 208, etc.

Obviously 1 to 199 is supposed to be Dublin.

Which is another reason you couldn't really use if for a livery that is supposed to go on buses all over the country including Cork, Galway, etc.

Yes but there are 2xx routes in Dublin such as the 220 or the 270.

What I would do is have urban routes Dublin, Cork, Limerick, Galway, Waterford and the BE town routes all using the one colour lets say have them use green like an OP suggested and regional BE routes use red. I noticed this in Italy where it is usually the case that urban buses are orange or have a bit of it on the front of their livery and regional buses are blue.

LXFlyer

bk wrote: »

The 2xx range is used for buses in Cork. I believe that the NTA are now operating a consistent route numbering system through the whole country now.

It was only two years ago or so that they shifted the bus numbers in Cork from example 5 to 205, 8 to 208, etc.

Obviously 1 to 199 is supposed to be Dublin.



Which is another reason you couldn't really use if for a livery that is supposed to go on buses all over the country including Cork, Galway, etc.

Actually, the NTA are broadly using the original Bus Eireann numbering system but with some exceptions. That numbering system was:

0-99 - Expressway
100-199 - Dublin & Eastern Region (Provincial stage carriage services)
200-299 - Cork & Kerry
300-350 - Limerick & Clare
351-399 - South East
400-499 - West & North West

Dublin City PSO bus routes are entirely separate from this national numbering system.

bk

Stephen15 wrote: »

Yes but there are 2xx routes in Dublin such as the 220 or the 270.

Sorry, I totally forgot that, you are absolutely right. Cork city services most be using 201 to 219 or something like that.

The point is though that the NTA are now using a nationwide system with unique numbering, so some of your suggested numbers are already taken.

Perhaps they could use a different numbering range for your orbital routes. Or perhaps shift all Dublin Buses up to the 1xxx range.

markpb

devnull wrote: »

The Leap 90 product is much better than Travel 90 in my opinion and a far larger number of customers are availing of it compared to the Travel 90, because the Travel 90 required you to constantly keep buying new tickets whereas the Leap 90 product is built in to the leap card and at least with my fellow colleagues over the past few years, far more of them use a mix of transport modes than two buses.

Travel 90 could have been implemented on the Leap Card. I'm not sure why that decided to change it.

Victor

bk wrote: »

The 2xx range is used for buses in Cork. I believe that the NTA are now operating a consistent route numbering system through the whole country now.

There has been shenanigans - when Sligo town services were re-cast, they became S1 and S2.

It was only two years ago or so that they shifted the bus numbers in Cork from example 5 to 205, 8 to 208, etc.

No, 2XX has been used for more than a decade.

devnull

markpb wrote: »

Travel 90 could have been implemented on the Leap Card. I'm not sure why that decided to change it.

Presumably because they believed that an integrated product that didn't penalize people for changing modes was a better option rather than one which uses just one mode?

Stephen15

bk wrote: »

The point is though that the NTA are now using a nationwide system with unique numbering, so some of your suggested numbers are already taken.

Perhaps they could use a different numbering range for your orbital routes. Or perhaps shift all Dublin Buses up to the 1xxx range.

Yes but as an OP mentioned Dublin Bus are currently exempt from the nationwide numbering system.

bk

Victor wrote: »

No, 2XX has been used for more than a decade.

I meant that the city buses in Cork were only moved from 3, 8, etc. to 203, 208 in the last few years.

Stephen15 wrote: »

Yes but as an OP mentioned Dublin Bus are currently exempt from the nationwide numbering system.

I don't think they are "exempt", more of a case that the NTA seemed to have been focusing on making the changes to the rest of the country first, before tackling DB route numbering. Or perhaps more just of a case of Dublin Buses having the 1 to 199 range, as that what they traditionally had and they are the largest operator.

murphaph

punisher5112 wrote: »

You don't understand what I was saying.

The old system db had was you travel on as many db services as you wished in the 90 minutes and also worked on xpresso services which made it very cheap at the time.

Obviously it was only db but it was better then the nta leap €1 off.

But that alas is changing so no need to be worrying about it with all the new changes coming.

Ah ok yes I misunderstood, the "old" T90 was indeed better than the discount and much closer to integrated fares (but as you rightly point out, only for DB). What we are getting appears to finally be integrated fares, the most overdue development in Irish public transport history (yes, above even metro or DART upgrades!)

RayM

Bambi wrote: »

The old CIE cream and navy was probably the most aesthetically pleasing combination

I'm not sure how well it would look on today's buses. Although that old CIE logo was a fantastic design. Can't understand why they got rid of it.

LXFlyer

bk wrote: »

I meant that the city buses in Cork were only moved from 3, 8, etc. to 203, 208 in the last few years.



I don't think they are "exempt", more of a case that the NTA seemed to have been focusing on making the changes to the rest of the country first, before tackling DB route numbering. Or perhaps more just of a case of Dublin Buses having the 1 to 199 range, as that what they traditionally had and they are the largest operator.

Read my post again above bk - the Dublin City bus routes are in a completely independent numbering sequence. They bear no relation to the national numbering which gives the route numbers below 100 to Expressway. It all reverts to who operated the services originally - CIE Dublin City Services or CIE Provincial Services.

Indeed the Dublin City numbering is based initially on the tram routes, and from 30 upwards goes in an anti-clockwise sequence across the north city and then clockwise across the south city until it becomes completely random - look at a bus timetable from the 1960s or 1970s and this will become obvious!

Outside of Dublin the route numbering follows the BE numbering system more or less. If you go back through old CIE provincial bus timetables you'll see that while routes didn't display numbers, the timetables did have table numbers, which correspond to today's route numbers.

There was always a gap from 200 to 220, which was for the Cork City Services which like those in Limerick, Galway and Waterford used numbers from 1 to 20 rather the 2xx, 3xx, 4xx and 6xx numbers reserved for them.

It's more of a quirk of history than anything else.

dfx-

lxflyer wrote: »

Probably either a staffing issue (no driver to take over in the city centre) or running time issue (bus is running late due to traffic).


If the latter - it needs new rosters (as has been introduced on the 1 and 75) to deal with it.

Absolutely no doubt it could be any number of key structural issues, but it sort of says it all about where the problems lie, rather than the BusConnects solutions. It is a regular problem, so it's not a particular driver or type of bus or how many doors it has (last night my bus was SG270, newest in the fleet, may as well have been an AV).

I know drivers who drive the 13 as overtime in Harristown and hate it above all other routes (slightly more than the 4 and 15) mostly being too long and too busy. God help the regular drivers.

Stephen15

So decided that since I have too much time on my hands I would make out how current and future DB routes would under my proposal. Im only including all day DB routes and no peak time only services or xpresso routes.

BRT Routes
1- Blanch to UCD
2- Tallaght to Clongriffin
3- Swords to CC

Routes serving CC
10- Santry to Sandymount
11- Sandyford to Wadelai Park
12- Harristown to Monkstown
13- Harristown to Grangecastle
14- Beaumont to Dundrum
15- Clongriffin to Ballycullen Road
16- Ballinteer to The Airport
17- Mountjoy Square to Cherrywood
18- Mountjoy Square to Loughlinstown
19- Harristown to Kimmage
20- Parnell Street to Ashtown
21- Driminagh to Ashington
22- Ringsend to Citywest
23- Kilnamanagh to Marino
24- Aston Quay to Park West
25- Merrion Square to Dodsboro
26- Merrion Square to Palmerstown
27- Clarehall to Jobstown
28- Eden Quay to Harristown
29- Abbey Street to Baldoyle
30- Abbey Street to Castle Avenue
31- Talbot Street to Howth (31)
32- Talbot Street to Malahide
33- Abbey Street to Balbriggan
34- Hawkins Street to Rathcoole
35- Aston Quay to Spiddal Park
36- Harristown to Kimmage
37- Baggot Street to Blanchardstown Centre
38- Burlington Road to Damastown (38)
39- Burlington Road to Ongar
40- Charlestown to Liffey Valley
41- Abbey Street to Rolestown
42- Talbot Street to Portmarnock
43- Talbot to Swords Buisness Pk.
44- Larkill to Enniskerry
45- Ballywaltrim to Hueston
46- Dun Laoghaire to Phoenix Pk.
47- Belarmine to Fleet Street
48- Burlington Road to Damastown (38a)
49- Pearse Street to The Square
50- Fleet Street to Rossmore
51- Docklands to Foxborough
52- Eden Quay to Blunden Drive
53- Abbey Street to Ferryport
54- Pearse to Kiltipper Way
55- Burlington Road to Damastown (38a)
56- Ringsend to The Square
57- Burlington Road to Damastown (38a)
58- Parnell Street to Toberburr
59- Parnell Street to Tyrellstown
60- Talbot Street to Howth (31b)
61- Eden Quay to Whitechurch
62- Merrion Square to Leixlip (Captains Hill)
63- Merrion Square to Leixlip (Castletown)
64- Poolbeg Street to Citywest
65- Poolbeg Stret to Blessington
66- Merrion Square to Maynooth (66)
67- Merrion Square to Maynooth (67)
68- Fleet Street to Newcastle
69- Fleet Street to Rathcoole
70- Burlington Road to Dunboyne

Orbital Routes
101- Dun Laoghaire to Baldoyle
102- Sutton to The Airport
103- Ranelagh to Drumcondra
104- UCD to Blanchardstown
105- Dun Laoghaire to The Square
106- Chapelizod to The Square
107- Rialto to Blackrock
108- Palmerstown to Sandymount
109- Blanchardstown Centre to Kilbarrack

Local routes
201- Dun Laoghaire to Kilmacanogue
202- Dun Laoghaire to Killiney
203- Dun Laoghaire to Kilternan
204- Clontarf to DCU
205- Brides Glen to Dun Laoghaire
206- Ticknock to Blackrock
207- Blackrock to Newcastle
208- Bray to Newtownmountkennedy
209- Bray to Enniskerry
210- Ballymun to Ladyswell Road
211- Blanchardstown to Damastown
212- Tyrellstown to Ladyswell Road
213- Blanchardstown to Liffey Valley
214- Blanchardstown to Dunboyne

I probably missed a few routes in there. Anyway thats how I would go about renumbering DB routes. I have not included routes which will be pointless after BRT is introduced such the 39a and the 41.

Stephen15

RayM wrote: »

I'm not sure how well it would look on today's buses. Although that old CIE logo was a fantastic design. Can't understand why they got rid of it.

I think it looks quite well tbh altough I'm not mad about the flying snail. I think theyd be better off using the current TFI logo. I reckon a touch of green would look well and help modernise it a bit

Spanish Eyes

Just another thing, timetables. Yes the timings on them are weird sometimes. I though ND was to iron them out.

You know what I mean, leaving at 08.03, 08.17 etc. as an example. why not on the hour and every five ten fifteen minutes afterwards for consistency. Maybe if all the buses have the same timetable they will crash bang wallop into each other every morning and evening though!

Just being a little lighthearted on this Bank Holiday Friday.

I agree that the bus numbers need to be sorted. All Northside originators that cross CC should have odd numbers like the post code, opposite on the South side.

BRT different sequence.

Orbital another. and so on.

I get that the tram system was the originator of many of DB's numbers, but the trams have been gone since 1949 or thereabouts! Shame really.

punisher5112

So is the colour going to be the one I've seen on private coaches with tfi and circles in blue and green??

LXFlyer

dfx- wrote: »

Absolutely no doubt it could be any number of key structural issues, but it sort of says it all about where the problems lie, rather than the BusConnects solutions. It is a regular problem, so it's not a particular driver or type of bus or how many doors it has (last night my bus was SG270, newest in the fleet, may as well have been an AV).

I know drivers who drive the 13 as overtime in Harristown and hate it above all other routes (slightly more than the 4 and 15) mostly being too long and too busy. God help the regular drivers.

Being honest many of the issues that arise with the Dublin Bus service are not macro ones (I accept that stuff like ticketing and consequently dwell time is a serious macro issue), but rather more micro ones like:
* getting the running times on the rosters that support the timetable wrong, and not correcting them in a timely period,
* poorly designed timetables that don't give proper headways mid-route,
* not marrying the driver Boards with the AVLC timetables (driver changes or official waiting times mid-route not reflected correctly in the latter),
* not dealing with route variations correctly on AVLC, etc

These are things that, while detailed in nature, are the very things that make the service look bad and which DB have a very poor history of getting right.

LXFlyer

punisher5112 wrote: »

So is the colour going to be the one I've seen on private coaches with tfi and circles in blue and green??

As Victor posted above, nothing has been decided yet.

Liveries, routes, fares - final decisions after consultations.

LXFlyer

Spanish Eyes wrote: »

Just another thing, timetables. Yes the timings on them are weird sometimes. I though ND was to iron them out.

You know what I mean, leaving at 08.03, 08.17 etc. as an example. why not on the hour and every five ten fifteen minutes afterwards for consistency. Maybe if all the buses have the same timetable they will crash bang wallop into each other every morning and evening though!

Just being a little lighthearted on this Bank Holiday Friday.

I agree that the bus numbers need to be sorted. All Northside originators that cross CC should have odd numbers like the post code, opposite on the South side.

BRT different sequence.

Orbital another. and so on.

I get that the tram system was the originator of many of DB's numbers, but the trams have been gone since 1949 or thereabouts! Shame really.

Bear in mind that on some corridors there are integrated timetables so oddities like you raise above will happen.

The 26, 66/a/b and 67 timetables outbound are integrated to give 8 buses an hour as far as Palmerstown (that's a bus every 7-8 minutes)(26 & 67 every 30 mins and 66/a/b combined every 15 mins). Some other corridors are similar and that's where you'll get oddball times.

Stephen15

Spanish Eyes wrote: »

Just another thing, timetables. Yes the timings on them are weird sometimes. I though ND was to iron them out.

You know what I mean, leaving at 08.03, 08.17 etc. as an example. why not on the hour and every five ten fifteen minutes afterwards for consistency. Maybe if all the buses have the same timetable they will crash bang wallop into each other every morning and evening though!

Just being a little lighthearted on this Bank Holiday Friday.

I agree that the bus numbers need to be sorted. All Northside originators that cross CC should have odd numbers like the post code, opposite on the South side.

BRT different sequence.

Orbital another. and so on.

I get that the tram system was the originator of many of DB's numbers, but the trams have been gone since 1949 or thereabouts! Shame really.

See my post. I actually believe similar routes that have numbers that are less in common are better as then people wont get confused as easily

punisher5112

lxflyer wrote: »

As Victor posted above, nothing has been decided yet.

Liveries, routes, fares - final decisions after consultations.

Ah right I thought I had missed something. Thanks.

LXFlyer

punisher5112 wrote: »

Ah right I thought I had missed something. Thanks.

Everything in the brochure is purely indicative of what *may* happen - what the final outcome is may be different.

Time will tell, as will the consultations!!