Bus Eireann

devnull wrote: »

The government wants to allow private bus companies and Bus Eireann to tender for routes and whoever does it for lowest cost will get the route, how will this stop routes?

Not really what I was arguing: my scenrio was if BE pulled the routes and no one covered them - your scenario is that the lowest cost will cover them: lowest cost assumes that there's enough profit to attract private (no guarantee) and that BE will still cover it even if it makes a loss (current situation).

Deleted User wrote: »

I'm saying the vast majority of Bus Eireann bus drivers need to be sacked. The striking Train drivers need to be sacked. Any Dublin Bus drivers that go on strike need to be sacked. There are plenty of people available to take up those jobs.

The line in the sand should have been drawn with Luas and then Dublin Bus.

I think Bus Eireann drivers think they will get the same deal others have. They have been grossly misinformed in my opinion.

end of the road wrote: »

not anytime soon i'm afraid. the current drivers will be long retired.

Sigh your continuing with this baseless claim that you can predict the future then?

Do i really need to post this in reply to you again

http://www.popsci.com/driverless-buses-go-with-traffic-flow

end of the road wrote: »

you couldn't drive the bus.



not cost effective, there are no grounds, and there would be a shortage of experienced drivers.



they can't. only a certain caliber of person will usually pass all the relevant requirements and stick with the job long term. see dublin bus for an example, people applied for jobs when they were open but left not long after they joined. the company had problems getting staff as well so that was a double blow. the days of one going to college meaning anything or making one a bit more special then everyone else have gone.



not anytime soon i'm afraid. the current drivers will be long retired.

I was a bus driver for 40 years in 3 countries. Most people quit the job because of the shift work. One week up at 4.00am next week working till 1.00am, weekends and bank holidays.

A computer can't decide whether to call the cops when someone says a fellow passenger robbed them or deal with a drunk passenger or someone needing medical help.

Yes, most car drivers could make a reasonable attempt at driving the bus even without training but would find it harder to stick the shift work.

end of the road wrote: »

it all ready has been taken apart. in 1987, CIE became dublin bus, bus eireann and irish rail. 3 separate companies.



it's not just intercity services ran by the company. regional and local and many others. separating out services means more inefficientsy and less economies of scale. if it was workable then it would have been done in 1987 when CIE was being separated out.



it also has a lot of tendered out services. so it is still a valid comparison.



the fee has to be enough for the company to make a profit, otherwise there is no point in bothering to tender. even with lower costs the subsidy/fee would have to remain the same or increase for operators bar bus eireann to be bothered. they are entitled to make money and if we want private operators to tender we have a duty to insure they make a profit.



nope, how could you even come to the conclusion from what i wrote.

It's not about just 'making a profit' on a route. Operators have fixed costs they have to meet running their present operation and taking on extra routes can increase profitability if a vehicle would otherwise be idle at the time the service was running. They would operate with a driver on lower wages and with a bus they bought considerably cheaper than BE's vehicles.

jimmycrackcorm wrote: »

You're forgetting that BE is based largely on PSO. Any private sector operation would get the equivalent but would run it efficiently.

Britain is not a comparison. They totally deregulated, the NTA here didn't do the same. You just put the same argument forward like union shills.

As for rail fares, it's been many times cheaper to fly from Dublin to cork on Ryanair than by rail. I've done it.

Railways are price gouging because they are a monopoly and a terrible one at that. They are like a motorway but only a few people can occupy their space at any one time.

What will happen is that they disappear and be replaced by autonomous cars an buses that drive in sync with the same capacity without strikes.



Guessing you live in Dublin maybe?

be run the PSO efficiently, they can't be ran any more efficiently due to the nature of the routes. in fact PSO is going from strength to strength every year thanks to be. britain actually is a comparison because there are lots of tendered/contracted out services as well as the de-regulation. many councils are tendering/contracting however others have had to stop due to the huge costs of subsidies to private operation. railways won't be going anywhere as they have the potential for faster transport then any automated car, they can also cary a hell of a lot more people then the road network with automated cars ever could. for the most part while a bit expencive our rail fares are a hell of a lot cheeper then britain's rail fares.

omega man wrote: »

I don't get the argument that BE provide an essential public service. Is it not as simple as tendering out routes as PSO's? Surely private operators would jump at the opportunity for guaranteed income routes avoiding the usual commercial risks.....

I appreciate the airline industry is somewhat different but Aer Lingus was transformed following privatisation and all to the benefit of the travelling public by means of an open and competative market.

it's not as simple no, as evidence shows that tendering out routes pushes costs up hugely long term. of course the private operators would jump at the chance of operating the routes as they would be getting paid to do so but realistically it is better they are left to develop their own routes and the subsidized routes remain with a state owned company with it's economies of scale and which can operate routes on little in the toughist of times as has been proven. Aer Lingus could have been transformed without privatization. only commercial bus routes would ever have an open market, the subsidized routes would just have 1 operator on one's route whoever would operate it.

Dr Martin wrote: »

If it's such an 'essential' service, then fire the workers who are holding the company to ransom. Plenty have no access to Bus Eireann but get on with their lives. I never used the service when I needed a bus, always used private services. Better roads means a better economy meaning more jobs and more lives saved.

The car is king. If you can't drive then learn to.

there are no workers holding the company to ransom, and there are no grounds to fire the workers. not the job of people to learn to drive when a bus service exists that costs pittence compared to spending money on unnecessary roads when we have enough road space for the traffic that would ever be on offer. car is king so car can pay for it's costs and if those who will use nothing but car want more roads so badly then they have to pay more road tax and higher fuel taxes. car is king so it has to pay king prices for to cover it's costs. those of us who have a car but who find public transport less cost can continue spending as little as we can.

Boaty wrote: »

Do BE provide a breakdown on the running costs /profits of each particular route?

i don't know. have you tried looking at the accounts? i think you can get them online but i'm not sure.

devnull wrote: »

The idea is economies of scale should reduce bloat and make a company more efficient because the number of staff makes the company more flexible for dealing with things which reduces the cost of overheads.

Since you appear to not know what it means, I've included a link for you:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economies_of_scale

As we can see quite clearly, it doesn't apply with BE or we wouldn't be in this sitution.

i know what it means and be are effectively meeting the requirements. overtime and rosters are an issue and that is being dealt with.

devnull wrote: »

There are very little tendered out services and it's a completely different system there to what it is here and you are just trying to smokescreen that with one line claims.

In the UK since deregulation services are provided by operators commercially and if they do not pick them up commercially they are sent out to tender by local authorities and anyone can bid for the tender That is not how it works in Ireland, both you and I know that but you are playing ignorant.

In Ireland all commuter, stage carriage and Town and city services by default were said to be nonviable and given to an operator without any tender or any chance of an operator applying to run them and the incumbent has a protected monopoly on those routes and the power to bring crippling strikes.

their tendering model is what we are basing our model on. councils have had to cutback hugely on tendered routes due to the costs involved because there is no state alternative.

devnull wrote: »

If that is the case then why are the unions so against tendering and the drivers the same? If the case was that private operators could do it no easier and BE was a great example of a well run operation, they would win the tender and no privates would be winning them because the privates couldn't be any cheaper and they have nothing to worry about it.

because they fear tendering is only being done as a way to get rid of be, that be will be shoved out and destroyed.

devnull wrote: »

Also nobody has a duty to ensure that a private makes a profit, that is up to them at the end of the day, there is nothing in law that requires that at all and that is before we challenge your strange belief that a cost of operating a service has no connection with the viability of it, which is quite frankly absurd and shows your complete lack of basic economics and business knowledge.

if we are expecting private operators to operate our routes, we have a duty to insure they make a profit from them. it's the decent thing to do. they aren't charities.

Cork Lass wrote: »

Are the busses running today?

No