New Carlow town bus service

Well with the planned conversion of 17a to N4/N6 early 2022, wonder will some of go-aheads streetlites be switched for double deckers ?

I was thinking that too. Looking at their fleetlist they have 40 streetlites. I'd imagine a small of batch of them could be transferred?

The CW1 should turn right when heading south just at the fire station, up past the railway station, then left onto the Dublin Road and into the town, passing the bus park and continue on the proposed route.

The timetable should be such that the route is at the railway station in time to make the services in the morning and back in the evening. With tweaks that the bus is not just sailing past the station as a train is rolling in.

It's a 350m walk from the bus stop to the Railway Station versus adding 1.7km to the bus route.

I wonder if NTA will do anything about the towns with existing bus services. Dundalk's town service is a circular route which is completely useless in one direction for people living near the beginning to near the end of the route because, if you live near the part of the route that's closest to the town centre, it'll be a very short journey into town, whereas to get home from town requires a tour of the whole town first.

Getting the correct route is tricky in these circumstances as inevitably someone will lose out unless you make the route so convoluted to serve everyone that it becomes less appealing to use.

By taking the route suggested above to serve the station, it would also be missing out a reasonably large housing estate along Green Lane, but it would also serve the hospital, which seems an odd location to miss out on (more so than the railway station if I’m honest).

It cannot serve the station because St John's Road does not allow a right turn and if you route into the station you cannot exit on that road. Route would have to go via Railway Road and turn back on itself to serve the core town center and require extra buses to make a schedule work. There is also a lot of congestion at peak times around the station.

The majority of foot traffic exit via St John's Rd so will be well served.

Thanks; I've attempted address that; coming back down St. Josephs Rd. would mean a left turn back onto Green Lane which does defeat purpose; you can't turn right & you end up going up the road & turn right in a filter lane onto McGamhna Rd. & then back across by Hoseys Roundabout, Accommodation Rd. & onto Green Lane to get to Barrack St. instead of going straight on if you were to omit a railway station stop as per above map.

Cllrs. had these plans shown to them in 2018; they could've made reps. to Dir. of Transport regarding traffic layout @ St. Josephs Rd./Green Lane esp. traffic island there if this was to work; this then went to public consultation & all Cllrs. would've been obliged to advertise it even if it's not in their MD/LEA (you could argue merit of a Muine Bheag/Borris/St. Mullins Co. Cllr. wanting to post this on their social media) & it would've been flagged in & on local media last Autumn too & our chocolate-teapot TD would've been all over this like a rash (it was our far better Green Party TD who secured & announced funding for it in Budget 2022 so please remember that when the routes do commence Autumn 2022) on their social media too.

Your point re foot traffic from railway station and indeed local schools too makes sense; majority will go towards Green Lane I feel but y'see, we need to connect up our public transport services (look at Rosslare Line; station & port're not near enough each other, railway line to Waterford got shut cos the trains didn't serve enough people not to mention it was quicker to drive & the ferries coming or going often didn't arrive or depart in time for incoming/outgoing passengers to get the train there or to Wexford & onwards) so it'd be ideal if a solution could be found even at this remove.

Public Consultation Period closed end of Oct. 2020; but private representations to Dir. of Transport like I've made on a few issues since this came to my attention elsewhere (more sense on Boards thankfully!!!) on & off line, might be worth doing for those like me who'll be using it?

Carlow Town Bus Services x 2 Routes & Stops Draft Plan https://www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=5466589370093555&set=a.612712168814657

If you click on the link in the post you quoted, the answer is there!

They're probably the most likely ones alright.

There are 7 WMs in Athlone and a spare VWL.

It's in the photo! :-)

Q1 2023 (which would fit with the theory discussed above which is that the Athlone buses move to Carlow).