Dublin Bus May End Some Nitelink Service

GerardKeating

spacetweek wrote:

It's news to me too. I didn't even know there ever had been a Mon-Wed service.

which might explain the lack of patronage.

Time Magazine

http://www.darrenscully.ie/statements/dsp_Statement_details.cfm?Statement_Key=34

Good boy.

John R

chewy wrote:

they combined the 31n and the 29n a while back, they didn't tell anyone though, no replacement of signs on the busstop or anything people didn't know what the hell was happening?

couldn't they use single deckers or imps for nitelink sun to wednesday

surely the fuel costs etc would be lower and it lose less money...

The imp minibuses are gone bar a few for routes unsuitable for full size buses.

Single deckers are not much cheaper to run than double deckers.

chewy

but single deckers would be and look less empty! surely that fits into the economies somewhere...

even the slightest reduction in cost is worth it every penny counts

i said this yonks ago but why the gap between 11:30 and 12:30 ??? why? no reason?

if they had buses at 12:00 and 12:30 people could leave the pubs when they close rather then having to dash off at 11-ish to catch the last bus, it so rude ya know...:)

John R

chewy wrote:

but single deckers would be and look less empty! surely that fits into the economies somewhere...

even the slightest reduction in cost is worth it every penny counts

i said this yonks ago but why the gap between 11:30 and 12:30 ??? why? no reason?

if they had buses at 12:00 and 12:30 people could leave the pubs when they close rather then having to dash off at 11-ish to catch the last bus, it so rude ya know...:)

There is not the demand for the services they are running at the moment, how can more services be justified.
Even on thu/fri/sat the early nitelinks are regularly virtually empty.

The last time I got a nitelink, on a Friday night in mid Jan there were 4 people on the whole bus (00.50 46N) and several others departing at that time were similarly vacant.

atlantean

AlienGav wrote:

It's Dublin Buss's private investors that are forcing them into ending the nightlink service :mad:

Private Investors? Who the hell are they? :eek:

cdebru

atlantean wrote:

Private Investors? Who the hell are they? :eek:

they don't have any dublin bus is a part of cie and wholly owned by the state

cdebru

chewy wrote:

but single deckers would be and look less empty! surely that fits into the economies somewhere...

even the slightest reduction in cost is worth it every penny counts

i said this yonks ago but why the gap between 11:30 and 12:30 ??? why? no reason?

if they had buses at 12:00 and 12:30 people could leave the pubs when they close rather then having to dash off at 11-ish to catch the last bus, it so rude ya know...:)

how in the name of jaysus would a bus looking less empty be more economical

gap between 1130 and 1230

1 no real demand
2 staff finishing one duty before starting another

Flukey

There is a demand between 11:30 and 12:30. There are people on the streets at that time, many coming out of the pubs or other places or whatever. The Nitelink doesn't make money because it refuses to take passengers. It should run more like a normal service taking passengers on at any stop and bringing passengers towards town. It is hardly going to work if it only takes people on at a few stops around Trinity and then one or two more as they head out. The vast majority of the travelling public at night are not near Trinity College. There is a high demand for taxis because people think there are no buses. The buses are empty because they won't let passengers on. If they ran a proper service, in the normal way then people would use them.

Traffic

I dont understand the point Darren Scully is trying to make here re. nitelink services:
'they are telling Dublin Bus to get creative and secure buses by shutting down existing routes, such as the Kildare Nitelink service, which are well used and badly needed by Kildare commuters'

How would shutting down of the kildare nitelink services free up buses, as the vast majority of the fleet are all tucked up in bed when the nitelink services are being operated

Is this the same guy who came out with the suggestion to build another west link bridge in order to give motorists a 'choice'?

ClareBear

Thinking of cutting the Nitelink to Maynooth?

Nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!!!!!!!! :eek: There goes my social life when college closes if that goes ahead.

I don't understand if he (Darren Scully) means the Nitelink to Kildare is underthreat entirely or if it's just the weekday ones....?

John R

Traffic wrote:

I dont understand the point Darren Scully is trying to make here re. nitelink services:

"Look at me I am a champion of the people so I am" would seem to be it. The unsubtle art of bandwagon jumping.

John R

ClareBear wrote:

Thinking of cutting the Nitelink to Maynooth?

Nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!!!!!!!! :eek: There goes my social life when college closes if that goes ahead.

I don't understand if he (Darren Scully) means the Nitelink to Kildare is underthreat entirely or if it's just the weekday ones....?

It would seem that they are looking at cutting all the Monday-Wednesday services, nothing specifically targeted at Kildare services.
Suggesting that it is affecting only one small area is just your typical politicial constiuency-centric statement designed to rile up voters against the atrocities being commited against THEM personally and drum up support for the crusading politician.

ClareBear

John R wrote:

It would seem that they are looking at cutting all the Monday-Wednesday services, nothing specifically targeted at Kildare services.
Suggesting that it is affecting only one small area is just your typical politicial constiuency-centric statement designed to rile up voters against the atrocities being commited against THEM personally and drum up support for the crusading politician.

I hope so....or else Clare Bear will be dishing out slaps! :mad:

Metrobest

Has Dublin Bus forgotten who pays its wages? It's citizens like ClareBear. There is a clear need for the nitelink. Public Transport is already useless enough as it is, without shutting it down entirely during the night.

If DB shuts down the weekday nitelink, the company will attract a lot of poisonous enemies. And the sting in the tail will be rapid privatisation.

Dub13

Metrobest wrote:

Has Dublin Bus forgotten who pays its wages? It's citizens like ClareBear. There is a clear need for the nitelink. Public Transport is already useless enough as it is, without shutting it down entirely during the night.

If DB shuts down the weekday nitelink, the company will attract a lot of poisonous enemies. And the sting in the tail will be rapid privatisation.

If only life were so simple.... :rolleyes:

I think your forget that the Government owen Dublin Bus and they have told them to make money this year or else

Victor

Metrobest wrote:

Has Dublin Bus forgotten who pays its wages? It's citizens like ClareBear. There is a clear need for the nitelink. Public Transport is already useless enough as it is, without shutting it down entirely during the night.

However if the service isn't being used ....

Mimikyu

This post has been deleted.

Mimikyu

This post has been deleted.

Iób

Solitaryman666 wrote:

This post has been deleted.

Unfortunately the service they are there to provide in the eyes of the decision-makers is not the service of getting people from A to B. It is the service of reducing demand on the roads, so that the decision-makers don't have to sit in traffic jams. All public transport investment in Dublin is justified by the impact it will have on road traffic. Sad but true.

This is the reason that the economically superior Ballymun Luas was dropped in favour of the Dundrum luas.

The promise to put in the Ballymun line straight off when the others were done was of course forgotten.

Flukey

All those lines should have been built at the same time. Ballymun will have to wait a long time to get it by the looks of things. There is a lot of scope for this kind of development. When it does, lets hope it runs at decent hours. The current Luas lines go to 12:30am, which is more than Dublin Bus do, given their hour off from 11:30pm.

Victor

Solitaryman666 wrote:

This post has been deleted.

I get the impression Imps are more or less kept for 200-series routes these days.

John R

Victor wrote:

I get the impression Imps are more or less kept for 200-series routes these days.

There are only 5 or so left, kept primarily for the 239 route which is not really suitable for anything bigger.

Mimikyu

This post has been deleted.

bazzer

Deckers have been occasionally used on the 239 in the past, whenever an Imp was not available.

Mimikyu

This post has been deleted.

Dub13

The Government steeped in and insisted dublin bus kept the mid week nightlinks going.

shoegirl

Nitelink is a good service - if of course, you are going from and to places actually served by it.

You must remember that much of the initial trigger for the Nitelink was the utter chaos of taxi ranks around 1998-2000. Now things have calmed a little with taxi services, and later opening hours has spread the rush a bit. (Many a memory of just giving up and walking home, fortunately lived in Ranelagh/Rathmines in that period).

The problem I see is all this talk of demand and economics when the local authority are putting in 24 hr bus lanes for 24hr bus services which don't exist. As I said before there is very little short term route planning happening in DB, and even less co-ordination with other services. Hence the criticism about buses picking up only at College Green/Westmoreland St (though I'm fairly sure that most services have at least one other pickup point). There is a lack of foresight, and much of it is down to a sheer lack of proper market investigation. For example, building a 24hr bus lane which is going to be empty from 3am to 6am every day, and barely utilised between 11pm and 3am/6am to 7:30am is no better economics than running a bus service with 5 people on it . . .

As I pointed out before, you only have to look at the fiascos regarding the Lucan and Swords services (both actually suffered large increases in journey times AFTER bus lanes were added). The reasons for this have never really been investigated.

Lastly, and a point which hasn't been made, it is often forgotten that aside from the BMW region, Dublin has the lowest level of car ownership in Ireland. (I was pretty shocked when I first moved to Cork to notice that even people who I would have considered to be pretty poor still had cars, quite unlike the situation in Dublin). This means that a large segment of the population are dependent on public transport at least some of the time (unless they are lucky enough to live in Dublin 2/4/6 or 1/3/7 and can realistically walk or cycle to many surrounding areas). Therefore "its not economical" is not a good enough excuse.

Dublin already has the worst congestion in Europe and the second worst congestion in the world. This has a cost in terms of extra transportation costs of for goods - no wonder the price of a basket of goods is so high in Ireland. It has a social cost as it limits mobility. We are very quick to, for example, criticise the unemployed person or single parent for being economically inactive - but with many out of town developments happening some of the potential workforce may be unable to access employment opportunities because of a lack of transportation. And as we always hear, supporting single parents or unemployed people costs taxpayers money. It is unfair to place vulnerable people in a vicious circle and then vilify them for being "lazy" when in fact you have made it difficult for them to be anything else.

Anyway thats my rant for the day . . .

Victor

Nitelinks first operated at Christmas in 1991.

Other than contra-flows, 24hr bus lanes only exist where there are at least 2 other traffic lanes in that direction, typically on dual 3-lane carriageways, where they were formerly hard shoulders.

cdebru

beat me to it victor

yeah 24 hour buslanes are usually because they do not want trafic driving in it any way because for example it used to be a hard shoulder or it is contra flow