BusConnects Dublin - Bus Network Changes Discussion

AlekSmart

Bray Head wrote: »

If Dublin Bus's colour scheme is so important to its branding then why does it use its buses as moving advertising campaigns?


I was upstairs on one of these a few years ago (branded as a 7UP bottle I think). They had a kind of green hatching all over the upper deck windows making it hard to see out. It made me slightly nauseous.

As ever with Dublin Bus, the passenger experience put last.

Do you use public transport regularly ?

The use of Buses and light-rail vehicles as Advertising Space is both long lived and universal.

To suggest that Dublin Bus is somehow or other unique in this is incorrect,whether uninientionally so,or simply being obtuse in order to underline some strongly held pov on the company.

I'm sure some of the Photography minded contributors here will be able to provide ample evidence of the practice Worldwide,much of which will prove that Dublin Bus is in the h'apenny place when it comes to advertising.

All of That being said,the use of "Contravision" on all over bus advertising has long been a bone of contention between passengers and companies,and will continue to be so as long as Transport Companies persist with the ill advised concept.

My personal view is that it should be banned,Full-Stop as it flies counter to the very idea of having glass windows at all.

antoinolachtnai

Well that is a bit of a side-trip. But the value of outdoor advertising has fallen a lot, which is why we see less of it.

The reason why Dublin Bus is protecting its brand is simple: it is commercialism, and it has now been laid naked for all to see. Dublin Bus is protecting its own interests and putting its interests ahead of the interests of the transport system as a whole and the public generally.

The theory of public enterprise is supposed to be that this doesn't happen. The public good is supposed to be put ahead of purely commercial interests. The problem is that in the case of Dublin Bus, the theory has now been proven wrong.

When the crunch comes, DB puts its own interests ahead of the interests of transport generally and ahead of the very public it is supposed to serve.

dublinman1990

I read a reply on that Flickr link which showed the bus in the blue livery at Wrights. It said it was going to be used for the rebranding of the Airlink. Dublin Bus were apparently planning to allocate new SGs on the routes for months. I don't mind the colour of the bus as it looks like a nice shade of blue on it. Have plans been shelved for this move at all?

Have the official results of the NTA livery survey have been released yet? It has been closed for a fair bit of time now.

devnull

dublinman1990 wrote: »

I read a reply on that Flickr link which showed the bus in the blue livery at Wrights. It said it was going to be used for the rebranding of the Airlink. Dublin Bus were apparently planning to allocate new SGs on the routes for months.

I'm confused, on one hand Dublin Bus are saying that they have a strong brand but on the other hand if that is right they are trying to change their branding for one of the services to be closer to their only competitor on said service who also have a similar name to their said service which could land them in hot water.

Lets also remember that last year Dublin Bus also were said to have forced Dublin Coach to change the colour of their Tour buses from Green to Yellow because Dublin Bus felt that the Green colour would lead to confusion with it's own green open top tour despite the fact the colour green was different.

Also they cannot use government funded vehicles against a private company as it would almost certainly lead to a complaint to the European Commission on what could be reasonably considered as state aid against a commercial competitor. However of course it's possible that Dublin Bus would fund their own vehicles to get around this.

punisher5112

The whole way about this and the nta set up is just wrong.

Its going to cost more and also going to flush more money out of the country.

Keep irish jobs and money in Ireland.

xper

Evil-1 wrote: »

The Dublin Bus position on branding ignores the fact that the Transport For Ireland (TFI) brand is also a state asset and is also growing in value.

It also conveniently ignores the fact that they have completely changed their brand multiple times.

You're not in charge anymore guys, get over it.

brokenarms

punisher5112 wrote: »

The whole way about this and the nta set up is just wrong.

Its going to cost more and also going to flush more money out of the country.

Keep irish jobs and money in Ireland.

By the looks of it, they want British jobs not Irish.

Stephen15

brokenarms wrote: »

By the looks of it, they want British jobs not Irish.

Surely growing the bus market is good for Irish jobs. DB employs the same number GA employs new staff in the country.

devnull

punisher5112 wrote: »

The whole way about this and the nta set up is just wrong.

Its going to cost more and also going to flush more money out of the country.

Keep irish jobs and money in Ireland.

brokenarms wrote: »

By the looks of it, they want British jobs not Irish.

I'm not really that much bothered by nationalism, political interests or ideology and I would say a large number of public transport users are the same.

I just want a good, properly integrated transport system that delivers a better service to the public and firmly puts them first.

brokenarms

Stephen15 wrote: »

Surely growing the bus market is good for Irish jobs. DB employs the same number GA employs new staff in the country.

I still think they are going to have to hire UK drivers. I can't see how hiring 300 drivers with no experience or training is going to work for them. Unless they import the work.

Stephen15

brokenarms wrote: »

I still think they are going to have to hire UK drivers. I can't see how hiring 300 drivers with no experience or training is going to work for them. Unless they import the work.

Perhaps there does seem to be a number of UK drivers working for Aircoach (FirstGroup) but they still have mostly Irish drivers anyway they are still paying taxes and contributing to the Irish economy if they are living here. I would it will be a mixture of private bus drivers, new recruits and UK based drivers should they have to make up the numbers applying for the jobs.

Evil-1

And lets not forget Northern Ireland which is just a short hop skip and a jump up the various motorways heading north out of Dublin, if the T&C's are good enough you may attract a few recruits from there.

dublinman1990

When talking about GA's recruitment process; people who want to change from other private operators here to work for them could be welcome. That decision though rests with the employees who work with said companies. However realistically we don't know who have applied for these jobs with GA at all. That information really is scarce at the moment because the ongoing recruitment process in GA has not finished yet. Whoever gets a job with GA hopefully will become a very good employee with them in their future. We will probably be quite happy with any Irish people who applies for a job with GA. But whoever will get these jobs will be like a lottery selection for people based on their relevant experience who, in turn, applied for these positions.

Bray Head

AlekSmart wrote: »

To suggest that Dublin Bus is somehow or other unique in this is incorrect,whether uninientionally so,or simply being obtuse in order to underline some strongly held pov on the company.

I clearly showed a bus clad top to bottom as part of an advertising campaign with barely any Dublin Bus branding visible.
I am not sure how this is consistent with claims from management that their colours are valuable to to tune of tens of millions.

punisher5112

Bray Head wrote: »

I clearly showed a bus clad top to bottom as part of an advertising campaign with barely any Dublin Bus branding visible.
I am not sure how this is consistent with claims from management that their colours are valuable to to tune of tens of millions.

Its only a very small amount of buses.

Seriously all private companies do exactly the same including the luas, dart etc.

antoinolachtnai

If it’s no big deal, then what’s the big deal with painting the buses a different color if that’s what the NTA wants (and which they are entitled to require under law).

Alternatively why don’t DB bestow the national treasure that is the Dublin Bus livery back to the people so it can be used on all the buses.

liger

brokenarms wrote: »

I still think they are going to have to hire UK drivers. I can't see how hiring 300 drivers with no experience or training is going to work for them. Unless they import the work.

There was a waiting list of 18months to get into DB when they were recruiting. Also GA will be training up B licence holders. People seem to think this crowd are a bunch of amateurs who have never done this before.

punisher5112

Dublin bus colours are something that should be kept as they stand out and incorporate the Dublin colours which is a good thing.

Why is everyone hell bent on change which really isn't change at all apart from giving away anything owned by the Irish people.

Why do we need transdev to run the luas? As whoever runs it still has to do everything the nta says which is another quango as it is just an umbrella of the department of transport.

Why do we need go ahead to run buses which have been running which will not change at all when they take over.

Seriously just because the UK did it why do we have to do the same.

The UK may well do some things good that we could follow or look into but they have major issues over there I would not wish to see happen here.

Why do we need the rich and powerful telling us all how to live and we should in general be paid less for high stress jobs and very hard labour when they sit living it up in plush homes and nice cars and have money to spend on holidays, nights out, meals out etc etc.

Come on see things for what they are and see they are selling off our the Irish people's assets.

AlekSmart

Bray Head wrote: »

I clearly showed a bus clad top to bottom as part of an advertising campaign with barely any Dublin Bus branding visible.
I am not sure how this is consistent with claims from management that their colours are valuable to to tune of tens of millions.

It is totally consistent with the "claims",particularly as,in this case,the vehicle is an Airlink VG,which is under the aegis of the Commercial Department,and not part of the PSO allocation.

All-Over Bus advertising remains a useful promotional tool,although less popular these days.

It is in use Worldwide,even in the home of the Big Red Bus itself, London,where TfL maintain a very tight grip on it's universally recognised Redness.

Bus Atha Cliath's management position simply seeks to protect one of it's unique assets,which if it failed to do,would leave it open to equally strident allegations of mismanagement,perhaps from it's own shareholder,The Minister.

The sole arbiter of the issue will be the National Transport AUTHORITY (;)),so until they announce the result of their deliberations,we'll all have to sit and wait ?

XPS_Zero

punisher5112 wrote: »

Dublin bus colours are something that should be kept as they stand out and incorporate the Dublin colours which is a good thing.

Why is everyone hell bent on change which really isn't change at all apart from giving away anything owned by the Irish people.

Why do we need transdev to run the luas? As whoever runs it still has to do everything the nta says which is another quango as it is just an umbrella of the department of transport.

Why do we need go ahead to run buses which have been running which will not change at all when they take over.

Seriously just because the UK did it why do we have to do the same.

The UK may well do some things good that we could follow or look into but they have major issues over there I would not wish to see happen here.

Why do we need the rich and powerful telling us all how to live and we should in general be paid less for high stress jobs and very hard labour when they sit living it up in plush homes and nice cars and have money to spend on holidays, nights out, meals out etc etc.

Come on see things for what they are and see they are selling off our the Irish people's assets.

Couple of things:
I wish i could do this point by point but this new quote system makes it impossible.
First, they are not selling off the Irish peoples assets, we still own all the stuff it's just being managed by a private company
Second, the reason we are doing it this way is because we've learned, through experience, that the best model is private management but public ownership, the reason we know this is because we tried it the fully public only route (CIE) and CIE is a basket case of sloth, inefficiency, outdated and absurd work practices and waste.
Third, the "rich and powerful" didn't tell us how to do this, that's ideology talking, our democratically elected govt (and the majority of political parties) decided this was the best policy , again due to experience.
Fourth, wages and T&C of jobs is a separate issue.

We should run public policy based on what's the most effective model not ideology alone, principles for how to operate are all well and good, and important, but we should not let them become a cage, where instead of asking ourselves"will this work" we ask "is this policy really socialist/capitalist?"

Stephen15

punisher5112 wrote: »

Dublin bus colours are something that should be kept as they stand out and incorporate the Dublin colours which is a good thing.

Why is everyone hell bent on change which really isn't change at all apart from giving away anything owned by the Irish people.

Why do we need transdev to run the luas? As whoever runs it still has to do everything the nta says which is another quango as it is just an umbrella of the department of transport.

Why do we need go ahead to run buses which have been running which will not change at all when they take over.

Seriously just because the UK did it why do we have to do the same.

The UK may well do some things good that we could follow or look into but they have major issues over there I would not wish to see happen here.

Why do we need the rich and powerful telling us all how to live and we should in general be paid less for high stress jobs and very hard labour when they sit living it up in plush homes and nice cars and have money to spend on holidays, nights out, meals out etc etc.

Come on see things for what they are and see they are selling off our the Irish people's assets.

It may have been a case of EU regulations on monopolies and competition etc.

_Kaiser_

I still say just make the current DB colours standard with the operator logo placed above the doors/window as in the First example previously. It'd also save a fortune on unnecessary repaints and choosing from the awful NTA options.

DB is a state-owned company, with the NTA being another State-body.. all this whinging about brands and corporate identity is irrelevant. The same would apply to depot-sharing as these are all assets bought from public money.

If we end up with another mess of different liveries and "exceptions" the entire point of this exercise will have been lost IMO.

GM228

_Kaiser_ wrote: »

I still say just make the current DB colours standard with the operator logo placed above the doors/window as in the First example previously. It'd also save a fortune on unnecessary repaints and choosing from the awful NTA options.

Was it something considered in the livery survey I wonder?

devnull

_Kaiser_ wrote: »

I still say just make the current DB colours standard with the operator logo placed above the doors/window as in the First example previously. It'd also save a fortune on unnecessary repaints and choosing from the awful NTA options.

The fact that the Chairman of Dublin Bus has now recently stated that the brand is worth €28m and they are going to protect that brand suggests they would ask the NTA to pay a similar amount to take ownership of it.

The thing about Dublin Bus is they appear to want the best parts of being a private company and the best parts of being a public company with the downsides of neither which is going to make the whole thing dysfunctional.

Whilst Dublin Bus are happy with their brand and think it has an excellent image and the company does, I doubt that the other operators would agree and wouldn't want their name to be associated with Dublin Bus directly so I doubt they would agree either.

Best way is a simple neutral livery, the problem is that the NTA in it's examples has gone for stuff overly complicated which is not what is needed, instead they should go for something more classical as other cities use.

Plus keeping the DB would do nothing for integration.

_Kaiser_

devnull wrote: »

The fact that the Chairman of Dublin Bus has now recently stated that the brand is worth €28m and they are going to protect that brand suggests they would ask the NTA to pay a similar amount to take ownership of it.

The thing about Dublin Bus is they appear to want the best parts of being a private company and the best parts of being a public company with the downsides of neither which is going to make the whole thing dysfunctional.

Whilst Dublin Bus are happy with their brand and think it has an excellent image and the company does, I doubt that the other operators would agree and wouldn't want their name to be associated with Dublin Bus directly so I doubt they would agree either.

Best way is a simple neutral livery, the problem is that the NTA in it's examples has gone for stuff overly complicated which is not what is needed, instead they should go for something more classical as other cities use.

Plus keeping the DB would do nothing for integration.

But all of that is irrelevant in regards the actual purpose of this exercise - a common brand that is easily recognizable. The current DB scheme is that and the vast majority of existing vehicles are in those colours already.

Joe Public won't give a toss whether the vehicle that shows up is operated by DB or GA, and is that not the point also? That there SHOULD be no difference in practise?

Did the operators in London complain that a red livery (owned by presumably the original LT) was foisted on them? Did it ultimately matter? Even if it did.. so what? Why do we need to slavishly copy the model if there's a better way.

DB is a state company "owned" by the Minister and funded by the taxpayer. The NTA is another state body. The Minister (or whoever) just issues an edict to solve the petty squabbling and everyone moves on and the taxpayer is saved money and confusion.

DB is not a private company, no matter what its CEO and management may think.

devnull

_Kaiser_ wrote: »

But all of that is irrelevant in regards the actual purpose of this exercise - a common brand that is easily recognizable. The current DB scheme is that and the vast majority of existing vehicles are in those colours already.

The original plan was for a common brand over all modes and all types of literature, street furniture, websites and so on. Essentially allowing the bus to have an opt out of this essentially segregates the bus from the rest of the system since it will be allowed to have it's own identity.

Where do you draw the line? The bus is yellow and blue, should it also have it's own website in those colours? What about the stops? Should they be those colours too and should all advertising be those colours also? Where does the TFI logo go? should we also change the colour of that?

We need integration, not segregation of the bus and everything else.

Joe Public won't give a toss whether the vehicle that shows up is operated by DB or GA, and is that not the point also? That there SHOULD be no difference in practise?

You're talking about bus only and essentially segregating the bus from the rest of the TFI brand, I don't believe we should do that, I believe that everything should be one brand rather than simply cutting the bus adrift so it looks like it's on a totally different system to everything else just to please DB.

Did the operators in London complain that a red livery (owned by presumably the original LT) was foisted on them? Did it ultimately matter? Even if it did.. so what? Why do we need to slavishly copy the model if there's a better way.

In 1989 London Bus operations were divided into a number of companies and London Regional Transport itself ceased to operate services directly but remained as an overarching body that retained the ownership of the livery and corporate identity. After 1989 the services were technically and legally operated by each of the newly formed divisions that were set up in advance of being sold off.

Between October 1994 and January 1995 the formed companies were sold off to the private sector, one by one which did lead to a 3 month period where some of the operators that had been sold were wearing the same livery as the ones that had not been sold but none of these companies were London Regional Transport as that company ceased to operate services in 1989 and by this point was a transport authority and a regulator.

What would happen is in 1999 the bus side of London Regional Transport, essentially now a regulator of buses in the city and a transport authority was merged into a new entity called London Buses in preparedness for the establishment of an overall Transport body for the City of London which was founded in 2000 called Transport for London which would become the parent of London Buses and therefore inherit all of it's assets.

This is completely different to what is happening in Ireland because Dublin Bus has not been broken up, split up and sold off and the regulator does not have ownership of the brand that Dublin Bus uses.

The big difference between Dublin and London would be that Go-Ahead would have to wear a brand of it's competitor whereas that issue never occurred in London and DB wouldn't allow it anyway unless the NTA acquired the brand which DB appear to have put a €28m price on.

The Minister (or whoever) just issues an edict to solve the petty squabbling and everyone moves on and the taxpayer is saved money and confusion.

Unfortunately in theory yes, but multiple parties would not let that happen easy.

Of course the simplest solution is for Dublin Bus to start acting like a public service and stop looking after it's private interests, but I can't see that happening anytime soon but no doubt it'll continue to play the "public service" card when it suits it but also play the "Commercial Interests" card when it doesn't.

dfx-

_Kaiser_ wrote: »

But all of that is irrelevant in regards the actual purpose of this exercise - a common brand that is easily recognizable. The current DB scheme is that and the vast majority of existing vehicles are in those colours already.

Joe Public won't give a toss whether the vehicle that shows up is operated by DB or GA, and is that not the point also? That there SHOULD be no difference in practise?

Did the operators in London complain that a red livery (owned by presumably the original LT) was foisted on them? Did it ultimately matter? Even if it did.. so what? Why do we need to slavishly copy the model if there's a better way

It's obvious isn't it? But the NTA are so determined to have the service separate from any connection with DB, that they are not even considering this simple solution. They would rather waste Joe Public's time and money consulting, repainting it and redesigning the current fleet livery.

The only thing of importance to them in livery terms is for it not to be blue and yellow, so they won't be mentioning it to any minister any time soon.

devnull

dfx- wrote: »

It's obvious isn't it? But the NTA are so determined to have the service separate from any connection with DB, that they are not even considering this simple solution.

Because Dublin Bus is not important in the grand scheme of things, this countries transport system as a whole is far more important than the little bits that make it up and what easy of the companies want and as the Chairman of Dublin Bus has shown, they are far more concerned with what is good for them than what is good for the bigger picture.

The NTA plan is to integrate things. Leaving Dublin Bus how they are will essentially simply allow Dublin Bus to keep all the power and act like a commercial company that is more interested in protecting it's brand, power and commercial interests above the greater good of the travelling public in this country, the recent transport committee discussion lays that bare for all to see.

What we need is a proper integrated system, a single brand, a single website for DART, LUAS and Bus, with a single journey planner, with single tickets valid on all modes rather than the system we have now where all the individual parts are pushing their own agenda about what is best for them with huge amounts of duplication because they're more concerned about making their own operation more important than a coherent brand covering everything.

Unfortunately even if the NTA wanted the existing brand Dublin Bus would most likely make them pay for it and appear to have suggested it will cost at least €28m for the NTA to do that, which is laughable and shows for all to see that these days Dublin Bus is a commercial company that dresses up as a public service.

AlmightyCushion

devnull wrote: »

Because Dublin Bus is not important in the grand scheme of things, this countries transport system as a whole is far more important than the little bits that make it up and what easy of the companies want and as the Chairman of Dublin Bus has shown, they are far more concerned with what is good for them than what is good for the bigger picture.

The NTA plan is to integrate things. Leaving Dublin Bus how they are will essentially simply allow Dublin Bus to keep all the power and act like a commercial company that is more interested in protecting it's brand, power and commercial interests above the greater good of the travelling public in this country, the recent transport committee discussion lays that bare for all to see.

What we need is a proper integrated system, a single brand, a single website for DART, LUAS and Bus, with a single journey planner, with single tickets valid on all modes rather than the system we have now where all the individual parts are pushing their own agenda about what is best for them with huge amounts of duplication because they're more concerned about making their own operation more important than a coherent brand covering everything.

Unfortunately even if the NTA wanted the existing brand Dublin Bus would most likely make them pay for it and appear to have suggested it will cost at least €28m for the NTA to do that, which is laughable and shows for all to see that these days Dublin Bus is a commercial company that dresses up as a public service.

Unless I'm missing something how does using the colours and livery that Dublin Bus currently use (with some modifications of course) prevent all that from happening. I don't think they're arguing that Dublin Bus should be completely separate to all this just that NTA should use the existing Dublin Bus livery over the ones they've designed themselves because the ones they've designed themselves are shíte.

devnull

AlmightyCushion wrote: »

Unless I'm missing something how does using the colours and livery that Dublin Bus currently use (with some modifications of course) prevent all that from happening. I don't think they're arguing that Dublin Bus should be completely separate to all this just that NTA should use the existing Dublin Bus livery over the ones they've designed themselves because the ones they've designed themselves are shíte.

I agree that the current liveries proposed by the NTA are not fit for purpose, no question about that at all, but I believe the idea of having a fully integrated brand to cover all forms of public transport is the right especially when the current operators are more interested in commercial brand management than an integrated system that would benefit the public.

The problem is that the whole Transport for Ireland brand is going to be Green and blue mostly, if we start using a totally different system for the buses with their own color palette it is going to give people the impression that the buses are not part of Transport for Ireland and one of the whole points of the Transport for Ireland brand is to stop this segregation where each operator has and promotes it's own brand and start promoting the overall system instead.

The fact is that this is all academic anyway because Dublin Bus will never allow it to happen since they are basically appear to be saying that whatever happens they will not allow their brand to be eroded which gives the impression that they want to continue to use it for themselves, the mention of the brand being worth €28m may well be Dublin Bus naming it's price for the acquisition of that brand.

Personally I don't believe that the taxpayer should be forced to stump up €28m for a transport authority to purchase an asset of another public company, especially when said company has spent the last number of years arguing it is a public service and not like a commercial company.