Bus Eireann - seriously poor

namloc1980

smurgen wrote: »

It's not a fair playing field.other companies are not subsidised by the government.remove government funding for bus eireann and then see who wins the biddings.

The PSO subvention will then be paid to the winning company and they will be subsidised.

namloc1980

smurgen wrote: »

How?cork isn’t the only city in the world with traffic. If I go on google maps it can predict my delay due to traffic fairly easily. Either bus Eireann is too lazy or incompetent to work such data into their time tables and plan accordingly, which is it?

That makes no sense. You of course can check Google maps and see how long your journey will take on a given day. Not a bother. But are you suggesting that a bus company should change their timetables every day based on the predicted traffic? Can you show us a city that has bus timetables built around variances in daily traffic? For example if we use traffic we could say that it takes 40 minutes to do a certain journey on a given morning in moderate traffic. But what if the traffic is really light on a given day. Should the bus sit around once it reaches a bus stop to wait for it to catch up with the timetable, shoot off to the next stop and again wait to catch up with the timetable?? And what happens on those days when traffic is much heavier than the average....??

smurgen

namloc1980 wrote: »

smurgen wrote: »

It's not a fair playing field.other companies are not subsidised by the government.remove government funding for bus eireann and then see who wins the biddings.

The PSO subvention will then be paid to the winning company and they will be subsidised.

So the bus eireann fleet and drivers wages being subsidised prior to bidding doesn't give them a competative advantage?

smurgen

namloc1980 wrote: »

smurgen wrote: »

How?cork isn’t the only city in the world with traffic. If I go on google maps it can predict my delay due to traffic fairly easily. Either bus Eireann is too lazy or incompetent to work such data into their time tables and plan accordingly, which is it?

That makes no sense. You of course can check Google maps and see how long your journey will take on a given day. Not a bother. But are you suggesting that a bus company should change their timetables every day based on the predicted traffic? Can you show us a city that has bus timetables built around variances in daily traffic? For example if we use traffic we could say that it takes 40 minutes to do a certain journey on a given morning in moderate traffic. But what if the traffic is really light on a given day. Should the bus sit around once it reaches a bus stop to wait for it to catch up with the timetable, shoot off to the next stop and again wait to catch up with the timetable?? And what happens on those days when traffic is much heavier than the average....??

Do bus eireann not to digital timetables now?

namloc1980

smurgen wrote: »

So the bus eireann fleet and drivers wages being subsidised prior to bidding doesn't give them a competative advantage?

Sure but what you want to do, strip them of their assets? Any company coming in will be a well established entity, look at Go Ahead who have taken over 10% of the Dublin Bus PSO routes.

namloc1980

smurgen wrote: »

Do bus eireann not to digital timetables now?

What's a digital timetable?

end of the road

smurgen wrote: »

It's not a fair playing field.other companies are not subsidised by the government. remove government funding for bus eireann and then see who wins the biddings.

it is the public service obligation routes that are subsidized, not bus eireann itself. it is simply paid for running the public service obligation routes, something which would continue to happen whichever company would run them.
the playing field in relation to this is very fair, as the national transport authority decides everything when it comes to what is contained within the contract in relation to how routes should be run, and all companies are treated the exact same in terms of being able to bid for a contract that becomes availible to open tender, and in terms of funding to operate these uneconomic but socially necessary and vital routes.

smurgen wrote: »

So the bus eireann fleet and drivers wages being subsidised prior to bidding doesn't give them a competative advantage?

absolutely not no . the costs for both are paid for whichever company wins the contract for routes.
the NTA own a lot of the fleet used on the public service obligation routes now, so whoever gets the contract will have the busses used on those routes transferred to them for the duration of the contract. the wages would likely come under the running costs of the service, so will be within the money paid to operate the routes.

smurgen

namloc1980 wrote: »

smurgen wrote: »

Do bus eireann not to digital timetables now?

What's a digital timetable?

Mobile apps and digital timetables at bus stops.neither of which currently work accurately for bus eireann routes in Cork.

TheChizler

namloc1980 wrote: »

But what if the traffic is really light on a given day. Should the bus sit around once it reaches a bus stop to wait for it to catch up with the timetable, shoot off to the next stop and again wait to catch up with the timetable?? And what happens on those days when traffic is much heavier than the average....??

I remember in Vancouver 9 years ago they had three coloured lights above the driver's face, speed up, ok, and slow down that lit up based on how the journey was progressing relative to the timetable. Seemed to be quite good at keeping the driver to time. They must have timetabled to bad traffic and seemed to dawdle at stops if traffic was light. I wouldn't mind that at all here if it meant they were more predictable.

smurgen

end of the road wrote: »

smurgen wrote: »

It's not a fair playing field.other companies are not subsidised by the government. remove government funding for bus eireann and then see who wins the biddings.

it is the public service obligation routes that are subsidized, not bus eireann itself. it is simply paid for running the public service obligation routes, something which would continue to happen whichever company would run them.
the playing field in relation to this is very fair, as the national transport authority decides everything when it comes to what is contained within the contract in relation to how routes should be run, and all companies are treated the exact same in terms of being able to bid for a contract that becomes availible to open tender, and in terms of funding to operate these uneconomic but socially necessary and vital routes.

smurgen wrote: »

So the bus eireann fleet and drivers wages being subsidised prior to bidding doesn't give them a competative advantage?

absolutely not no . the costs for both are paid for whichever company wins the contract for routes.
the NTA own a lot of the fleet used on the public service obligation routes now, so whoever gets the contract will have the busses used on those routes transferred to them for the duration of the contract. the wages would likely come under the running costs of the service, so will be within the money paid to operate the routes.

You still don't get it. Bus Eireann have a head start on any company by the subsidises they've received to date. Any company entering the market will be at a disadvantage regarding driver training and infrastructure received by bus eireann to date due to governement subsidising. Making up for this by any company looking to compete will put them at a cost disadvantage.

namloc1980

smurgen wrote: »

Mobile apps and digital timetables at bus stops.neither of which currently work accurately for bus eireann routes in Cork.

That's RTPI. You're anger is misguided at Bus Eireann. RTPI is the National Transport Authority.

smurgen

namloc1980 wrote: »

smurgen wrote: »

So the bus eireann fleet and drivers wages being subsidised prior to bidding doesn't give them a competative advantage?

Sure but what you want to do, strip them of their assets? Any company coming in will be a well established entity, look at Go Ahead who have taken over 10% of the Dublin Bus PSO routes.

Make the playing field fair. Bus eireann does not like competition.they are a protected species.when aircoach first started they completely opened up the cork dublin market and now dominate it.the daily amount of busses shot of for consumers and prices came down. Bus Eireann were seriously disgruntled and tried to block them from using any of the bus stops on their shared routes. During the 2017 bus eireann strike i also remember them stopping aircoarches from leaving cork by physically standing in front of them while picketing. Sore losers.

namloc1980

smurgen wrote: »

Make the playing field fair. Bus eireann does not like competition.they are a protected species.when aircoach first started they completely opened up the cork dublin market and now dominate it.the daily amount of busses shot of for consumers and prices came down. Bus Eireann were seriously disgruntled and tried to block them from using any of the bus stops on their shared routes. During the 2017 bus eireann strike i also remember them stopping aircoarches from leaving cork by physically standing in front of them while picketing. Sore losers.

How do you propose making it fair?

smurgen

namloc1980 wrote: »

smurgen wrote: »

Do bus eireann not to digital timetables now?

What's a digital timetable?

Did you google digital timetable? I just did,shows exactly what i was on about. I advise End of the Road who liked your comment to google it too.

smurgen

namloc1980 wrote: »

smurgen wrote: »

Make the playing field fair. Bus eireann does not like competition.they are a protected species.when aircoach first started they completely opened up the cork dublin market and now dominate it.the daily amount of busses shot of for consumers and prices came down. Bus Eireann were seriously disgruntled and tried to block them from using any of the bus stops on their shared routes. During the 2017 bus eireann strike i also remember them stopping aircoarches from leaving cork by physically standing in front of them while picketing. Sore losers.

How do you propose making it fair?

Remove subsidies from Bus Eireann.

namloc1980

smurgen wrote: »

Remove subsidies from Bus Eireann.

That means PSO routes will not be operated. Are you ok with removing loss making bus routes from rural communities and many city routes? I don't think you understand what PSO routes are.

smurgen

namloc1980 wrote: »

smurgen wrote: »

Remove subsidies from Bus Eireann.

That means PSO routes will not be operated. Are you ok with removing loss making bus routes from rural communities and many city routes? I don't think you understand what PSO routes are.

Allow prices to rise and discount the commuters passes. Then private companies with reduced driver cost and operating costs will be better able to compete for all routes.

smurgen

namloc1980 wrote: »

smurgen wrote: »

Remove subsidies from Bus Eireann.

That means PSO routes will not be operated. Are you ok with removing loss making bus routes from rural communities and many city routes? I don't think you understand what PSO routes are.

I don't think you understand that the current service offered by Bus Eireann in Cork is not up to scratch and is hindering the development of the city.

namloc1980

smurgen wrote: »

I don't think you understand that the current service offered by Bus Eireann in Cork is not up to scratch and is hindering the development of the city.

Again your anger is misdirected. The NTA manage the PSO routes, the frequency etc. Bus Eireann operate the PSOs. But the NTA are responsible for them.

end of the road

smurgen wrote: »

You still don't get it. Bus Eireann have a head start on any company by the subsidises they've received to date. Any company entering the market will be at a disadvantage regarding driver training and infrastructure received by bus eireann to date due to governement subsidising. Making up for this by any company looking to compete will put them at a cost disadvantage.

1. the subsidies paid to bus eireann are to operate the routes, not to subsidize bus eireann itself. they are route subsidies, not company subsidies. any company bidding for routes will receive subsidies to operate the routes.
2. any company setting up from scratch, such as many of the international operators setting up an irish presence, or a new operator, will have to train drivers whether they are operating a tendered service or a commercial service. that is nothing to do with subsidies or bus eireann but the realities of operating a new business.
3. the depot facilities bus eireann have are in a lot if not most cases, facilities inherrited from the old pre-nationalised bus and rail companies, others being capital investment, something which can easily be done by the NTA if they so choose. so realistically, there isn't a disadvantage to other companies, as go ahead have proven that they can and will build a depot to service the routes they have won tenders for, and i suspect going forward the companies won't be expected to find/build their own depot facilities.

smurgen wrote: »

Make the playing field fair. Bus eireann does not like competition.they are a protected species.when aircoach first started they completely opened up the cork dublin market and now dominate it.the daily amount of busses shot of for consumers and prices came down. Bus Eireann were seriously disgruntled and tried to block them from using any of the bus stops on their shared routes. During the 2017 bus eireann strike i also remember them stopping aircoarches from leaving cork by physically standing in front of them while picketing. Sore losers.

the playing field is very fair, as fair as it can be . no company likes competition, bus eireann have had it for a very long time however, whether it be small local operators or more recently commercial operators. do note though that while tendering is a form of competition, it is not user-based competition, so unless the NTA specify certain criteria in the contract that will bring about changes to make things better, you won't notice anything different on the ground apart from a change of operator, where a different operator may win a tender.

smurgen wrote: »

Allow prices to rise and discount the commuters passes. Then private companies with reduced driver cost and operating costs will be better able to compete for all routes.

these routes are not commercial routes. nobody is going to compete to run routes which are not economically viable, where there is no chance of payment for operating them. no subsidy means the fare payers end up paying in full, which drives them away, which means no route. so what have you achieved, apart from driving more people into the car? certainly not the level playing field you are after, which currently exists.

smurgen

end of the road wrote: »

smurgen wrote: »

You still don't get it. Bus Eireann have a head start on any company by the subsidises they've received to date. Any company entering the market will be at a disadvantage regarding driver training and infrastructure received by bus eireann to date due to governement subsidising. Making up for this by any company looking to compete will put them at a cost disadvantage.

1. the subsidies paid to bus eireann are to operate the routes, not to subsidize bus eireann itself. they are route subsidies, not company subsidies. any company bidding for routes will receive subsidies to operate the routes.
2. any company setting up from scratch, such as many of the international operators setting up an irish presence, or a new operator, will have to train drivers whether they are operating a tendered service or a commercial service. that is nothing to do with subsidies or bus eireann but the realities of operating a new business.
3. the depot facilities bus eireann have are in a lot if not most cases, facilities inherrited from the old pre-nationalised bus and rail companies, others being capital investment, something which can easily be done by the NTA if they so choose. so realistically, there isn't a disadvantage to other companies, as go ahead have proven that they can and will build a depot to service the routes they have won tenders for, and i suspect going forward the companies won't be expected to find/build their own depot facilities.

smurgen wrote: »

Make the playing field fair. Bus eireann does not like competition.they are a protected species.when aircoach first started they completely opened up the cork dublin market and now dominate it.the daily amount of busses shot of for consumers and prices came down. Bus Eireann were seriously disgruntled and tried to block them from using any of the bus stops on their shared routes. During the 2017 bus eireann strike i also remember them stopping aircoarches from leaving cork by physically standing in front of them while picketing. Sore losers.

the playing field is very fair, as fair as it can be . no company likes competition, bus eireann have had it for a very long time however, whether it be small local operators or more recently commercial operators. do note though that while tendering is a form of competition, it is not user-based competition, so unless the NTA specify certain criteria in the contract that will bring about changes to make things better, you won't notice anything different on the ground apart from a change of operator, where a different operator may win a tender.

smurgen wrote: »

Allow prices to rise and discount the commuters passes. Then private companies with reduced driver cost and operating costs will be better able to compete for all routes.

these routes are not commercial routes. nobody is going to compete to run routes which are not economically viable, where there is no chance of payment for operating them. no subsidy means the fare payers end up paying in full, which drives them away, which means no route. so what have you achieved, apart from driving more people into the car? certainly not the level playing field you are after, which currently exists.

Bus Eireann should be told to share their depos with other companies.it's part of national infrastructure as far as i'm concerned.
The company has an unfair strangle hold over public transport in the city and it's damaging a good example of this was the 2017 strike of 20 days. Done alot of damage to the company the city was incredibly quiet and it done nothing but inconvenienced commuters.
Anyone who wants to be on time cannot use bus eireann,it's not fit for purpose.i believe those strongly supportive at this stage have to be management or drivers as that's the only people who could be supporting the extremely poor service on offer.
Removing the subsidy at the company side would mean the operators would need to become leaner and more efficient.the fare would need to rise until it became commercially viable.to pay this higher fare a discount could be given to the customers to offset the increase.this would see the government money being used by the comutter rather that being used to pay over inflater wages at bus eireann.

end of the road

smurgen wrote: »

Bus Eireann should be told to share their depos with other companies.it's part of national infrastructure as far as i'm concerned.

there is nothing stopping other companies looking to co-locate with bus eireann where there is room to do so. bus eireann would gladly be happy with the rent. however in reality, there is no room, because in an area where bus eireann lose a tender for routes, there will be expansions in service elsewhere where bus eireann may have won a tender, so the depot facility will still be used due to no room at other depots. also, i suspect a lot of the DEPOTS are owned outright by CIE, which from what i understand is an entity in it's own right even if it's main shareholder is the state. so i'd imagine it's not that easy to force it to allow others use it's property if it chooses not to.

smurgen wrote: »

The company has an unfair strangle hold over public transport in the city and it's damaging a good example of this was the 2017 strike of 20 days. Done alot of damage to the company the city was incredibly quiet and it done nothing but inconvenienced commuters.
Anyone who wants to be on time cannot use bus eireann,it's not fit for purpose.

the company has no strangle hold on transport at all. a strike is irrelevant, given it can happen at any company if the conditions are right for it. bus eireann simply operate the services, if the services are unreliable, then that is DOWN to the NTA not insuring proper frequencies and other measures, and the local authorities not implementing more bus priority measures.

smurgen wrote: »

i believe those strongly supportive at this stage have to be management or drivers as that's the only people who could be supporting the extremely poor service on offer.

this guff may work with other posters but not on me i'm afraid. i certainly do not support the service having issues and i believe all involved need to sort it out. however what i'm not supportive of, and by the looks of it others aren't either, is your ideas of removing subsidies and expecting other operators to run routes for nothing.

smurgen wrote: »

Removing the subsidy at the company side would mean the operators would need to become leaner and more efficient.the fare would need to rise until it became commercially viable.to pay this higher fare a discount could be given to the customers to offset the increase.this would see the government money being used by the comutter rather that being used to pay over inflater wages at bus eireann.

there is no subsidy at the company side. this has already been explained to you twice at this stage and now for a third time. the subsidies are to pay the company for operating the routes, not to subsidize the company. any company who bids for routes will receive that subsidy should they win whether state or private. removing these subsidies isn't going to force operators to become leaner or more efficient, as all operators are as lean and efficient as they can be given their operations. what it will do however, is insure the route no longer exists, because no operator is going to operate them for nothing.
the fare rising until it became commercially viable is unviable for public service obligation routes. that is the whole point. the routes don't have the users, or in other cases have lots of users, but who will go to their cars if the fares are to high, which in turn causes issues elsewhere, mainly in terms of congestion on the roads, which in turn causes issues for those who have no option but to use the roads. giving a discount to the customer to offset the increase means the increase is invalid because there will be nobody to pay the higher fare, and it means either a subsidy being paid to operate the routes, which is what is happening currently, or it means the company state or private loses out, meaning they in all likelyhood walk away, for which they would be correct to do so, given they are not a charity.
there are no overinflator wages at bus eireann, the wages are simply at the higher end of the market.

Mardyke

Where do ye get time to post these essays!? *

* must be waiting for a 220

smurgen

end of the road wrote: »

smurgen wrote: »

Bus Eireann should be told to share their depos with other companies.it's part of national infrastructure as far as i'm concerned.

there is nothing stopping other companies looking to co-locate with bus eireann where there is room to do so. bus eireann would gladly be happy with the rent. however in reality, there is no room, because in an area where bus eireann lose a tender for routes, there will be expansions in service elsewhere where bus eireann may have won a tender, so the depot facility will still be used due to no room at other depots. also, i suspect a lot of the DEPOTS are owned outright by CIE, which from what i understand is an entity in it's own right even if it's main shareholder is the state. so i'd imagine it's not that easy to force it to allow others use it's property if it chooses not to.

smurgen wrote: »

The company has an unfair strangle hold over public transport in the city and it's damaging a good example of this was the 2017 strike of 20 days. Done alot of damage to the company the city was incredibly quiet and it done nothing but inconvenienced commuters.
Anyone who wants to be on time cannot use bus eireann,it's not fit for purpose.

the company has no strangle hold on transport at all. a strike is irrelevant, given it can happen at any company if the conditions are right for it. bus eireann simply operate the services, if the services are unreliable, then that is DOWN to the NTA not insuring proper frequencies and other measures, and the local authorities not implementing more bus priority measures.

smurgen wrote: »

i believe those strongly supportive at this stage have to be management or drivers as that's the only people who could be supporting the extremely poor service on offer.

this guff may work with other posters but not on me i'm afraid. i certainly do not support the service having issues and i believe all involved need to sort it out. however what i'm not supportive of, and by the looks of it others aren't either, is your ideas of removing subsidies and expecting other operators to run routes for nothing.

smurgen wrote: »

Removing the subsidy at the company side would mean the operators would need to become leaner and more efficient.the fare would need to rise until it became commercially viable.to pay this higher fare a discount could be given to the customers to offset the increase.this would see the government money being used by the comutter rather that being used to pay over inflater wages at bus eireann.

there is no subsidy at the company side. this has already been explained to you twice at this stage and now for a third time. the subsidies are to pay the company for operating the routes, not to subsidize the company. any company who bids for routes will receive that subsidy should they win whether state or private. removing these subsidies isn't going to force operators to become leaner or more efficient, as all operators are as lean and efficient as they can be given their operations. what it will do however, is insure the route no longer exists, because no operator is going to operate them for nothing.
the fare rising until it became commercially viable is unviable for public service obligation routes. that is the whole point. the routes don't have the users, or in other cases have lots of users, but who will go to their cars if the fares are to high, which in turn causes issues elsewhere, mainly in terms of congestion on the roads, which in turn causes issues for those who have no option but to use the roads. giving a discount to the customer to offset the increase means the increase is invalid because there will be nobody to pay the higher fare, and it means either a subsidy being paid to operate the routes, which is what is happening currently, or it means the company state or private loses out, meaning they in all likelyhood walk away, for which they would be correct to do so, given they are not a charity.
there are no overinflator wages at bus eireann, the wages are simply at the higher end of the market.

There's no subsidy on the company side? Tell me then how come the tax saver ticket is directly connected to Bus Eireann monthly tickets? The governent is literally giving people a tax deduction only if they use bus eireann's busses. How is this fair? If the taxsaver system could be applied in an easy to trasfer ways to other operators it would drastically alter the competitave advantage bus eireann enjoys.

end of the road

smurgen wrote: »

There's no subsidy on the company side? Tell me then how come the tax saver ticket is directly connected to Bus Eireann monthly tickets? The governent is literally giving people a tax deduction only if they use bus eireann's busses. How is this fair? If the taxsaver system could be applied in an easy to trasfer ways to other operators it would drastically alter the competitave advantage bus eireann enjoys.

the tax saver applies to irish rail, dublin bus, bus eireann, the privately operated luas, and i'd imagine the private operator go ahead's routes and other tendered PSO routes. presumably there just isn't enough money there to roll it out to commercially operated routes where they do exist, i believe the ftp also has this issue, commercially operated routes haven't been able to join it since 2010 i think.
i'd imagine to implement a system where a tax saver could be simply transferred to another operator where they do exist would cost quite a bit, all though perhapse that may come in due course i don't know. as it stands though, renewal time is the best opportunity to change to another operator where it exists and where tax saver is valid, as long as your employer agrees.

smurgen

end of the road wrote: »

smurgen wrote: »

There's no subsidy on the company side? Tell me then how come the tax saver ticket is directly connected to Bus Eireann monthly tickets? The governent is literally giving people a tax deduction only if they use bus eireann's busses. How is this fair? If the taxsaver system could be applied in an easy to trasfer ways to other operators it would drastically alter the competitave advantage bus eireann enjoys.

the tax saver applies to irish rail, dublin bus, bus eireann, the privately operated luas, and i'd imagine the private operator go ahead's routes and other tendered PSO routes. presumably there just isn't enough money there to roll it out to commercially operated routes where they do exist, i believe the ftp also has this issue, commercially operated routes haven't been able to join it since 2010 i think.
i'd imagine to implement a system where a tax saver could be simply transferred to another operator where they do exist would cost quite a bit, all though perhapse that may come in due course i don't know. as it stands though, renewal time is the best opportunity to change to another operator where it exists and where tax saver is valid, as long as your employer agrees.

So for the purpose of cork city you agree the taxsaver gives bus eireann an unfair advantage?

end of the road

smurgen wrote: »

So for the purpose of cork city you agree the taxsaver gives bus eireann an unfair advantage?

i don't, no .

Stephen15

smurgen wrote: »

So for the purpose of cork city you agree the taxsaver gives bus eireann an unfair advantage?

It applies to PSO services that includes state operators such as IE, BE and DB but also private operators such as Transdev (Luas) and Go-Ahead.

smurgen

Stephen15 wrote: »

smurgen wrote: »

So for the purpose of cork city you agree the taxsaver gives bus eireann an unfair advantage?

It applies to PSO services that includes state operators such as IE, BE and DB but also private operators such as Transdev (Luas) and Go-Ahead.

No Luas in Cork,Go Ahead is dublin DB is Dublin and IE doesn't apply except for one line to East Cork.So yes it's a monopoly for BE.

namloc1980

smurgen wrote: »

No Luas in Cork,Go Ahead is dublin DB is Dublin and IE doesn't apply except for one line to East Cork.So yes it's a monopoly for BE.

No it isn't. Do you understand what taxsaver actually is? Cobh Connect has taxsaver so can we drop this nonsense about taxsaver monopolies.