The naming things after auld dead rebels was of its time and well past its sell-by date now.
Does anyone know where Tara St itself is?
Of course people know where it is or at least anyone who's spends time in the city - it's an important street in Dublin. Even has its own wikipedia page, btw.
Apply the same test to your proposed name as you did to the current name and see how ridiculous a suggestion it is.
"Does anyone know where Markievicz St itself is? No. Does it open onto Markievicz? No. Did it ever? Don't think so, because there's no such street with that name"
Why would you rename the station to fix those problems and then refuse to address them and make the situation worse? Doesn't make any sense.
I'd wager there's a damn sight more people know where Tara St is than know the name, even, of the street that the Markievicz centre is on, never mind where that street is……..has anyone ever even heard of Luke Street, without having lived/worked in the area?
I doubt that many of the Polish here are tourists though.
The Polish tourists will have no bother.
Well it is kinda near O'Connell Street… close enough?
Won't somebody think of all the poor tourists (and Irish people) trying to spell "markievicz" for their map app, though.
Victoria Station has no exit to Victoria St, which is considerably longer than Pearse St.
D'Oh! You're quite right.
In my defence, I was drunk.
Brian Boru? Should be Clontarf, and if that can't be done, just forget it.
Loads of people know where Tara St is. What sort of a daft question is that?
I think that's a decent name/rename proposal. I'd also suggest that the new Glasnevin station could do with a name, Brian Boru works for a: the notable pub being demolished and b: why the pub was named that to begin with
Quick google suggests that an FF TD has already suggested that.
I definitely prefer named stations for the main city terminal/interchange stations as opposed to Dublin North, Dublin South etc. It would be too easy to confuse them if you didn't have the city geography in your head.
But I think we should adopt a naming convention like Dublin Connolly, Dublin Heuston, Cork Kent, and sick to it, signs, tickets etc.
But the odd ball in this regard is Tara St. It's been my most used station all my life so I think I'm entitled to declare it an absolute kip. Totally unbecoming of one of our busiest stations. But even it's name is pants. Does anyone know where Tara St itself is? No. Does it open onto Tara St? No. Did it ever? Don't think so.
So if as part of the metro link project, it is to become a major interchange station, I hope it gets a major overhaul and finally starts to look the part. And so should the name.
And so to my proposal : Dublin Markievicz.
The metro link project is going to remove the Markievicz centre which is very close (we could keep the statue) so the name has an association with the area. She has links to the 1916 rising which kinda keeps that naming convention going. It's an opportunity to name something after a woman which is still a rarity. And given it's a Polish name, it gives a nod to the new Irish community.
There isn’t one (not in Dublin, anyway) but I’m pretty sure about ten years ago Irish Rail did manage to put up a departure list on platform 6/7 headed “Connolly Street Station”. It was a long time ago and I’ve nothing to prove it, of course.
As well as the Connolly Street clanger, Pearse Station didn't exit to Pearse Street until about a decade ago and, as quite a long street, it is really sub-par to use as a station locator too.
Tl;dr: Paris rail terminus names are all over the place. Dublin's are a model of consistency by comparison. They are all named after historical figures associated with the 1916 Rising (Pearse, Connolly, Heuston) and for places adjacent to them (Pearse St; Connolly St; Sean Heuston Bridge).
Wha'?
I've lived in Dublin all my life and never heard of a Connolly Street.
Apple and Google haven't heard of it either.
Calling the existing Castleknock station Blanchardstown would lead to more confusion rather than less. To many people who are not from Blanchardstown village or nearby, the word Blanchardstown means "Blanchardstown Centre" which is definitely not near the station. And people who are from nearby already know where the station is. Them not using it already is more a factor of frequency, routing, connections, parking, etc and DART+ might help in time with some of that.
Been thinking about a few station renamings recently and I just thought id share a few thoughts.
Heuston West could be completely renamed to Islandbridge. My thinking is, it’s much too big a walk away from Heuston Station to provide a reliable passenger transfer, and naming it after the area it’s in could attract more people to the station than otherwise…
Would renaming Castleknock to Blanchardstown have a similar effect on ridership…? It’s only 500m from the Main Street and could arguably be renamed anyway as it is closer to there than it actatlly is to Castleknock.
And finally I never really understood why Kishogue wasn’t called Clonburris ahead of the brand new giant development going in there…
I was in Kent the other day and the announcement actually said "Dublin Hueston". I looked closer and the large digital displays showing up coming trains show Dublin (Hueston), as does the digital display next to the train. On the train's external digital display, it says Dublin (Heuston). In the older trains, the voice over now says Dublin Heuston, while the newer trains say Heuston Station. The signs at intermediate stations like Thurles say "towards Cork" and "towards Heuston". The blue plaques in the station all say "Hueston Station". Not one of the Irish translations include Dublin, except on the old trains when they pull into the station. They all just say Heuston Station in Irish. On the digital displays in the commuter stations up to Portaloise it says Heuston Station only. On the Cork commuter stations, it only says Cork or Cork (Kent), never just Kent.
Meanwhile, for Kent, it's all Cork (Kent) on digital displays in stations, while blue plaques say Cork Kent. The digital displays outside and inside the trains just say Cork, except for when you just pull into Cork and the announcement says Kent Station Cork.
Basically, there seems to be zero rhyme or reason as to which is used or not. I'm also surprised that the Irish isn't the same as the English. I wonder if there is some law that is breaking
Exactly that.
P = Peak only routes that serve all stops.
X = Express routes.
What are the P routes? Peak?
If so what is the difference between X and P?
Do X have fewer stops?
I dont see why they shouldn't be named, as long as both the name and destination are shown. For regular rail users it might not mean much but for newer or occasional users, or especially tourists it would be helpful. Now that assumes the naming system is easy to understand, but I definetly don't think it could hurt the network. Honestly DART SW, W, N, and S, aren't too bad for names, just maybe if they went with that option having a name for services between Malahide/Howth and Bray/Greystones, to seperate them from north and south services terminating at connolly. (at least its my understanding not all services would operate the full length?)
The Gare du Nord was build by the Chemin de Fer du Nord company, right enough but Gare de l'Est was built by the Compagnie du Chemin de Fer de Paris à Strasbourg. All of the principle termini in Paris predate the SNCF and were build by different companies; that's partly why the naming conventions are not consistent.
But of course the same is true of Dublin; the termini were all built before anybody thought of CIÉ. Pearse was built by the Dublin and Kingstown Railway and was orginally called "Westland Row Station"; Heuston was built by the GSWR and was called "Kingsbridge Station"; Connolly was built by the Dublin and Drogheda Railway and was originally called "Dublin Station", despite the fact that there were already other stations in Dublin. It was renamed "Amiens St Station" ten years after it opened. Broadstone, now closed, was built by the MGWR; Harcourt St, also closed, by the Dublin, Wicklow and Wexford Railway Company; and North Wall, still open (just) for freight but closed to passengers since 1922, by the LNWR.
Despite the diversity of railway companies, the naming convention is pretty uniform; all of the termini were named to indicate where in the city they were, although it took about 10 years for the Dublin and Drogheda Railway to come to that particular party.
I really don't see the need for line numbers on the Dart - the destination tells you where the train is going, it's not like there's a load of alternative routings.
Gare Du Nord, Gare de l'Est were originally built by and named for the old pre SNCF railway companies. Austerlitz is named after the nearby Quai d'Austerlitz, in turn named after the battle.
Names should have the location - something permanent.
Not like the Luas, where the Blackhorse stop is called after a pub that no longer exists!
That’s not a 29000, it’s a 22000 ICR.
And no they’re not the same! The format of announcements various widely between different rolling stock…there’s no “Iarnrod Eireann welcomes you on board…” on the the 29000s.
This recording suggests otherwise. The English announcement says “Pearse Station” but then “Dublin Connolly” which is weirdly inconsistent. And more inconsistent again is that the Irish announcement uses “Stáisiún Uí Chonghaile” (Connolly Station).
https://youtube.com/shorts/iHEdd8C3Lag?feature=shared
I agree with preferring names that show off a bit of character but let’s be honest, recent “namings” have become political hobby horses.
I suspect it is a bit inconsistent but, as you can hear, in that clip I linked it just says “Heuston Station”.
The point here being that everyone is supposed to just know that Heuston Station is in Dublin. Consider the Dublin bound visitor with poor English who changes train in Mallow or Limerick Junction and then hears an announcement saying that the train is going to Heuston Station. Their ear is hearing “blah blah blah” and hoping to discern “Dublin” but doesn’t.
