What's the deal with the TFI brand ?

I think it's intended to be a leaf cos public transport = green stuff, it's an anaemic unmemorable logo.

Supposedly the NTA are in the process of replacing this design guide with a more up to date version. Makes sense as that is over 10 years old now and already we've strayed in a lot of places compared to what was part of that guide (For example it doesn't take bus connects into account at all)

The TfL branding works and is recognized (despite being only 25 years old, compared to the CIÉ nostalgia here…), so it should come across as no surprise that its success is being copied…

Except they didn't go with the full impact from the very beginning. Fares weren't fully integrated from the very beginning (just because they can be paid for with the same e-purse card it doesn't meant that they are integrated if every mode has its own price list – I'm of course talking about the pre-TFI 90 Minute situation). Network information is still fragmented and requires some local knowledge to get the full details. Signage still has not been unified, and what has been unified has also kept some of the differences where not necessary (such as splitting DB and GAI into separate operators on stop flags where they should be a single Dublin City network).

Transport authorities adopting separate brands to their legal naming isn't necessarily the most common thing in Europe, but it can be useful, as long as it's done properly, effectively and in a manner that stays in users' minds. You can't have a network that is made up of a thousand entites advertise itself as a single network unless you override those thousand entities' branding. There was no way for the network to function as one unless the IÉ/DART, Transdev/Luas, DB, BÉ, and GAI brands were all made secondary to the overall brand, such as TfI.

You have gone into a big long thing about signage at stations. That is totally different to whether or not the train says "TFI" on the side which is what was said earlier.

Personally I have never seen these terminus only signs. Any bus timetables on the rare occasion a stop has kne had the full list and stations always had a bank of leaflets also showing the full list. My experience is Limerick so maybe different in other places.

Should copy TFL and use the logo and font but say "Luas" or "DART" inside the green logo instead.

As for CART it sounds insulting in English and CACR sounds too much like "caca" to me.

I would say about 2% of Londoners even know that the buses have different operators. In 10 years there the odd time it came up most people were surprised.

It's an absolute disaster in the rest of England though where buses within a city all have separate timetables and livery.

I just don't believe this. So if I went to a bus stop at the Four Courts it would only tell me what time it left Busarus up until post 2020.

Any stop side timetable I have ever seen in Ireland has the full list like you will see on the TFI site or Bustimes.org. There was always a map like with little or no times but a full list on the flip side.

Problem is that it's nearly impossible to estimate what time a bus is going to be at particular stop. When there can be the guts of 80+ bus stops on some routes. So putting 14:07 on a bus stop timetables is fck all use if the bus goes past at 14:04.

Here's a picture of a Dublin bus stop timetable I took in January.

Here you can see that the 13 and 123, which are pre-BusConnects routes, still have the "buses leave the terminus at x time" style of timetable, which means that you need to know how long each bus would've taken to get to your stop (this stop is towards city centre).

The G1, G2, and S2 meanwhile are BusConnects routes, so they have the new style of timetables which show when the bus will stop at this particular stop.

Although the particular times may be useless for long routes, as the buses can be 10-20 minutes late by the time they get to the other side of town, it is generally more useful than the old style of timetable. I'd rather know that the bus should show up somewhere around 14:07 than know that the bus departed god-knows-where at 13:00.

It's not as much of an issue for frequent routes where you can just show up to the bus stop and something will arrive within the next ten minutes. But when the route operates every 30 minutes or less, I'd rather know when I should be at the bus stop to actually catch it.

Not TFI, but NTA. TFI is just a branding. NTA is the National Transport Authority. It's not a company, they not for profit. However, operator companies are for profit.

Re

we have 6 different types of bus service in Ireland all with their own fare structure

Nope, we have vastly more than that.

Without even stretching my mind, there's Burkes (Tuam), Healys (Loughre), Bus Feda ( Donegal), City Direct (Galway and Kilkenny - they are now on PSO contracts and fare structure but their own branding in Galway and rules), CityLink, AirCoach, Dublin Coach, JJ Kavanagh ...and Lots more.

There has been zero privatisation of water.

I'm not saying Local Link has not been a success I'm just saying the services should be integrated with the rest of the network there's no need for a separate brand.