New Carlow town bus service

Smart purchase then, not often you see that with public procurement

I see the new Port Laoise town service that will be up and running by early next year is also going to run from around 6am to midnight each day.

I wonder will this be the new standard and will the likes of Athlone's A1/A2 be upgraded from 7am-8pm to 6am-12am.

I saw reports of another WM being repainted into the yellow and green TFI livery, I would assume that's being prepped for use in Carlow. So it seems they're actively getting the buses ready for the service at least.

As per KCLR 96 FM today, Tuesday the 11th of July 2023 the wheels on the Carlow Town bus services won't be going round and round from Sunday the 16th of July 2023 as was previously announced; instead the latest date announced is Sunday the 30th of July & it's all down to driver recruitment issues..................

Taken from Facebook. It's the time table from one of the stops on the CW2. Happy to see the last bus is 12:30am and not 12am like previously mentioned.

Someone timed the route and it'll take 8mins, say max 15mins with bad traffic.

Slight issue there, re timing of route; he only timed it from Barrow Valley Retail Pk. to Carlow town bus park; the actual route is to Wexford Rd. Bus. Pk.; plus obviously it was done in a car & not on a bus with passengers boarding, disembarking and the time such things take up which will add on times.

That said I'd imagine a lot of both routes will be boarded from bus park to end points for CW1 & CW 2; the statistics from TFI, BE etc. will be quite telling in terms of demand at various stops, how many're going from where to where etc. but I sincerely think this is a positive, a game-changer for the town & I will 100% be using both routes.

1500 Leap Cards with credit will be distributed by the way; one expects some certainly will be done on the day so best get there for the launch; sure you might get into a photo op with our local Cllrs. & TD & Min. Ryan, Min. for State Malcolm Noonan etc. too (plus their fan boys, girls, social media gurus, Insta Huns/Bebo Stunnahz/Influencers etc.)

The mindset of "Why isn't it going t/here?" or "Why isn't it picking me up from, dropping me off at, my doorstep/post office/dole office/crack house/shopping centre/pub/workplace/school/college" has to change for it to be a success; I hope it does as it will lead to other routes like out Leighlin Rd., the Downs on Pollerton Rd. etc.

People had their opportunity to make FREE submissions on the routes, stops etc.; that they chose not to is on them, NOT TFI, BE or Carlow Co. Co.; it was well flagged on their socials, websites, in our local papers & on our local radio station; reliable sources for & of such information.

Now, the talking's over, the time is now to support CW 1 & CW 2! :)

I'd imagine the max is going to be considerably longer at times. Going from the post office down over the bridge can be an absolute disaster and the same in reverse will be even worse when the Tyndall traffic is back again. Also noticed the stops going through graigue and they're going to need to enforce some of the parking rules if they don't want to cause tail backs in both directions. A lot of cars constantly park on the road at that pedestrian crossing near the football pitches.

If those are the busses above they're far too big imo. Something along the lines of the city imp (some blow ins may have experienced those) would have been more suited.

I thought the date was brought forward to the 27th for the full launch? My understanding from KCLR is that it's now 27/7 as the driver issues have been sorted. They're hardly going to take their pictures, go around from Graigue out the Wexford Road once and that's it? Full launch on Sunday?

Surely not!!

Jaysus. But shur i suppose we've been waiting years for this bus service so another few days wait won't do us harm!

Good to see even on a Sunday that the last bus is pretty much at midnight!

True, yes. I suppose two things killed the direct garage mention: 59OCS handling everything and dual-garage operation once Network Direct kicked in.

I see this is marked as a trial service with routes being subject to change/cancellation in future, depending on popularity. Is this common and just the NTA covering their backs?

That's true. Just thought it was odd they're saying it's a trial service as opposed to a fully fledged service just with the potential to be altered.

Semantics I know!!