Luas have implemented anti-social text number

It looks like they read Boards and took up our suggestion:

http://www.thejournal.ie/luas-anti-social-behaviour-3627158-Oct2017/

See anti-social behaviour on the Luas? New service offers a 'simple, discreet way' to report it

Operator Transdev has created a new text service for people to report instances of anti-social behaviour.

LUAS OPERATOR TRANSDEV has announced the introduction of a next text service it says will help to clampdown on anti-social behaviour.
If a passenger sees any anti-social behaviour, they can now send a text – beginning with the keyword LUAS to 51444. Within 90 seconds they receive an automated reply to say that Luas has received their text, while its teams can respond to the incident.
National Transport Authority CEO Anne Graham said that the new service means “Luas staff can be made aware of these incidents and respond to them quicker than ever”.
In the message sent to the number, customers are advised to state the tram number, location and a short message (a maximum of 155 characters).
Dervla Brophy, communications manager at Transdev, said that the new service will help to offer passengers a better experience travelling on the service.
She said: “Passengers have mentioned that a simple, discreet way to inform Luas of people misbehaving would be a good idea.”
Graham added that, when passengers encounter anti-social behaviour, they wanted to make sure “people have an easy and effective way of reporting it”.

Del.Monte

Should have been in operation from Day.1. - next week Luas will invent the wheel.

rebel456

Just in time for Broombridge!

Slippin Jimmy

Del.Monte wrote: »

Should have been in operation from Day.1. - next week Luas will invent the wheel.

Better late than never.

howiya

Welcome development. Hopefully the response times will be decent

serfboard

howiya wrote: »

Welcome development. Hopefully the response times will be decent

Yep, you've nailed the potential problem with it there.

Is there a dedicated person(s) on shift during Luas operating hours whose job it is to respond to these texts?

Let's hope it won't go the way of the stupid Garda Traffic Corps reporting phone number. Remember that? You could ring a number if you saw someone driving dangerously.

Except the Guards never did anything about these calls (plenty of anecdotal evidence on boards and elsewhere), the public soon lost faith in it, and the service was withdrawn.

L1011

serfboard wrote: »

Yep, you've nailed the potential problem with it there.

Is there a dedicated person(s) on shift during Luas operating hours whose job it is to respond to these texts?

Let's hope it won't go the way of the stupid Garda Traffic Corps reporting phone number. Remember that? You could ring a number if you saw someone driving dangerously.

Except the Guards never did anything about these calls (plenty of anecdotal evidence on boards and elsewhere), the public soon lost faith in it, and the service was withdrawn.

Trafficwatch still exists.

suicide_circus

Forgive me but where do I get the tram number?

ED E

suicide_circus wrote: »

Forgive me but where do I get the tram number?

Its on the outside, not sure where inside.

DMcL1971

suicide_circus wrote: »

Forgive me but where do I get the tram number?

It is printed on large yellow stickers above your head in between the sections of each tram.

boombang

serfboard wrote: »

Yep, you've nailed the potential problem with it there.

Is there a dedicated person(s) on shift during Luas operating hours whose job it is to respond to these texts?

Let's hope it won't go the way of the stupid Garda Traffic Corps reporting phone number. Remember that? You could ring a number if you saw someone driving dangerously.

Except the Guards never did anything about these calls (plenty of anecdotal evidence on boards and elsewhere), the public soon lost faith in it, and the service was withdrawn.

I don't have much faith in implementation in Ireland in general, but I have had a Garda ring to to follow up on a call I made about dangerous driving.

phenomenalcat

Inevitably You will get toe rags abusing the system . Having teams diverted elsewhere while causing carnage somewhere else

jimmycrackcorm

rebel456 wrote:

Just in time for Broombridge!

There should be an automatic text sent every time approaching there.

bk

phenomenalcat wrote: »

Inevitably You will get toe rags abusing the system . Having teams diverted elsewhere while causing carnage somewhere else

If I'm not mistaken, the trams have multiple CCTV cameras internally that are directly linked to the monitoring/control center. I assume that a text will simply notify the staff in the monitoring center and they will then check the CCTV cameras in the tram. If they see real trouble, then dispatch help/Gardai. If it is just messing then they will ignore it.

Actually I can't see many people abusing this. Your phone number would be logged and it would be trivial for the Gardai to follow up.

serfboard

L1011 wrote: »

Trafficwatch still exists.

That proves how absolutely useless it is when I thought it was gone.

Where are the signs that used to be on the road telling people about it?

Are there any statistics for how many calls/etc. they receive in a year and how many prosecutions arise?

AnneFrank

Nothing will happen to the junkie zombies that live on the luas

XPS_Zero

AnneFrank wrote: »

Nothing will happen to the junkie zombies that live on the luas

The thing is, most of them are just being vaguely menacing by their presence, making people uncomfortable with their presence, except for situations where they actively assault someone what is there you can do?

Charge them with being junkies and arrest them?

The ones that have travel passes there are tweaks that you can make there by voiding the passes of people with a criminal conviction (which I've been saying for years should be done as part of the process of getting one), but they won't give a toss and will just fare evade like the majority of them without the pass do. So what do you do?

The only thing I can think of is having security bar individuals from the Luas the way they do from shops or bars, and toss them off on sight.

AnneFrank

AnneFrank wrote: »

Nothing will happen to the junkie zombies that live on the luas

I think I heard a Luas spokeman on the radio today talking about this service.

He mentioned something about "large groups of students", not a word about junkies.

ED E

serfboard wrote: »

That proves how absolutely useless it is when I thought it was gone.

Where are the signs that used to be on the road telling people about it?

Are there any statistics for how many calls/etc. they receive in a year and how many prosecutions arise?

It exists, works mostly, but is really labor intensive for the reporting member of the public.

Spanish Eyes

It's a positive move.

Logs should be given to NTA and the Minister every quarter. And the number of genuine incidents should be published too. Broken down between Red/green line.

Timely. But long overdue.

LXFlyer

The Minister couldn't care less.

XPS_Zero

LXFlyer wrote: »

The Minister couldn't care less.

Of course he doesn't he's an independent.  It's hard enough to get party TDs with national policies to think in a national framework and avoid too much parish pump (the desire for which is 100% the fault of the electorate for expecting their TDs to be social workers and local mayors instead of their representatives on national issues), but independents will never think nationally.
A FF/SF TD or FG TD will be very parish pump but as a minister they'd have as much of an incentive to think nationally as their party is spread all over the country, and is more likley to include people who ask policy questions at the door, and they need their party to be successfully nationwide to ensure they get to keep their place at cabinet, that's as important as being seen in their locale.  But for an independent why WOULD they care about the country as a whole?
Why do you think he's done jack all about DU or MN? They're not in his area, every cent he fights for on those or the WRC or on new rolling stock is one not fought for in his backyard.  This country gets the governments it deserves.

_Kaiser_

XPS_Zero wrote: »

The thing is, most of them are just being vaguely menacing by their presence, making people uncomfortable with their presence, except for situations where they actively assault someone what is there you can do?

Charge them with being junkies and arrest them?

The ones that have travel passes there are tweaks that you can make there by voiding the passes of people with a criminal conviction (which I've been saying for years should be done as part of the process of getting one), but they won't give a toss and will just fare evade like the majority of them without the pass do. So what do you do?

The only thing I can think of is having security bar individuals from the Luas the way they do from shops or bars, and toss them off on sight.

Yep, this is a good and welcome development, but it won't make much real difference I'm afraid both for the above reasons and the question of what the response times will be.

The only way to deal with the junkies and low-lifes is to have dedicated security on trams with powers to (if necessary by force) detain/arrest until the Gardai show up.

GM228

Noticed a new "LUAS Emergency Responce Vehicle" today, silver van/car, perhaps connected to the new text service for their security teams to use?