BusConnects Dublin - Bus Network Changes Discussion

That’s exactly what it looks like - it was 15 mins late getting to Blanchardstown.

That is a daft decision on a route that infrequent and not acceptable.

Far too often the operators are trying to avoid penalties by resuming mid-route without looking at the picture of people being left behind at certain stops.

Ok to be clear here.

The bus left the terminus on time. The driver did not “take it on themselves to leave 15 mins early”.

You really need to look at the map on bustimes and check the actual timestamps before making statements like that - that’s the second time you’ve accused a driver of leaving early without any foundation. Any driver doing that would set alarms off in central control.

The bus was on time per the “schedule” until Glasnevin.

The running times are wrong mid-route in Glasnevin between Ballygall Road East and Old Finglas Road creating artificially lengthy journey times.

The scheduler has put in 11 minutes to travel between three stops when it should only be 1 minute.

The timetable is therefore wrong.

The effect of this is that buses are likely to show up at stops beyond that point faster than the “schedule” because the “schedule” is wrong.

It also means that if you look for a 24 further along the route inbound than Old Finglas Road on RTPI before the next bus has passed that point, then the buses are likely to arrive at stops further along the route faster than the RTPI will have told you because the running times are wrong.

The schedule needs to be fixed as it is not fit for purpose. I suspect that this has been copped on by the bus company and the drivers have been told to keep going.

Also, a further point - there are set locations agreed with the unions along each route where buses will pull in and wait for up to 2 minutes if they are potentially ahead of schedule due to light traffic etc.

These locations are ones where it is safe for the bus to wait for a short period without causing disruption to other drivers.

What I am trying to get across here is that people are putting far too much faith in the schedule being right.

That’s the issue here - the schedule is wrong - it’s got added time mid-route that shouldn’t be there and is therefore saying that the bus should arrive at stops later than it actually will.

Again the timetable in this case is WRONG.

I don’t know how many times I can write this or how else I can put it.

You’re measuring the bus against something that is wrong because someone goofed in preparing the running times along the route.

That error needs to be fixed ASAP.

As far as punctuality is concerned, the NTA measures punctuality at every single stop - the “timing points” on Bustimes are irrelevant.

It’s a new network - that’s means things will change.

There are going to be winners and losers.

Whether people need to connect now is entirely dependent upon their particular journey - some will and some won’t.

No one is paying more money - the TFI 90 €2 fare allows you to transfer as many times as you need to within 90 mins at no extra fare.

I’m not sure what you expect?

Buses to wait at every single stop? That is simply not practical from a safety perspective from a start.

If the timetable is done properly, buses shouldn’t be waiting anywhere, but it will occasionally happen due to light traffic or light numbers using the bus.

They certainly shouldn’t need to wait for longer than 2 minutes anywhere. If they are then the timetable is badly designed.

That just gets people’s backs up who are already on the bus.

Earlier this week I was on a Dublin Bus service at 06:30 that paused to catch up time three times en route to the city centre, and is scheduled so slowly that the bus rarely exceeded 30kph, and is taking 10+ longer than it used to totally unnecessarily. That is just utterly frustrating.

There is a trade-off to be struck here. But the bottom line is that the schedules need to be right in the first place. They should be achievable but not at crawling speed.

The reality is that most bus routes don’t have enough running time to get from one end of the route to the other at peak times - in fact the 23 & 24 have that very issue at other locations.

Until the core bus corridors are rolled out with the necessary enforcement then unfortunately the bus service is subject to the vagaries of Dublin traffic.