Why Are Irish Rail Failing so badly

Hilly Bill · 03-11-2012 01:51PM

gsxr1 wrote: »

kieran4003 wrote: »

If you were, you should know there are notices up in CIE depots across the country asking staff NOT to criticise the group on the internet.

Im not. So this is not my problem. I have 4gb of pics to follow if pushed.

I disagree with 100% of your post and I will deal with a few points specifically.

The Permanent Way are kept quite busy.

ARE YOU SERIOUS.. ARE YOU BLIND!!!!!!!!!! I know a good few staff who work in other departments and they are always flat out. The per way rule IR. When IR get the balls to do something about this then I will travel on the rails again. They do nothing . really. If you are IR. inspect this. Although you well know whats going on but are to afraid of the union to stir the pot.

Freight is faster by road.
Car and BUS travel is cheaper and faster by road.

Why are you even here.

IR need new management and all works to be tendered for. Get rid of wastful perway opps. All IR staff to be made redundant and people who work hard to be rehired and new staff brought on board.

CIE. good luck . You will need it.

I loved working on the railway and hope to God it can be saved.

So whats your point? You wasnt needed anymore so you want the per way lads to lose their jobs as well is that it? or you just want to their job?
There have been numerous IR staff that were taken on for the various projects and were let go once their contract had run out and they wasnt needed any more. They accepted it so why cant you when you didnt even work for IR?
To be honest, you havent a clue what you are going on about. The section that was looking after you has been closed down and the staff have either been let go due to their contract coming to an end as they were not needed anymore just like yourself or have taken the VS or have been forced to seek re-training and redeployment elsewhere . As for the per way gangs across the country, a lot of these have now been stripped down to the bear minimum due to those that took the VS and will not be replaced. Unlike you claim, the maintenance of the network is still being done and is safe so no need for the false claims and the scaremongering just to get put people off using the trains just because IR didnt need your services anymore .

Car and bus cheaper and faster? It can be in some cases but in the car you could go as fast as the car will allow you on the open road and you dont have the lives of 50 to 200 people on your hand if anything goes wrong at those speeds plus you either have to drive yourself or have limited space as a passenger.
For €18 inclusive of the booking fee , you can get to Belfast on the Enterprise. This week a family of 2 adults and 4 children could have unlimited use of the dart and some of the commuter routes for €10 for the day which is usually €15.70.

CIE · 03-11-2012 08:02PM

corktina wrote: »

in fairness you can't compare rural Ireland to Berlin to Hamburg, you can't even begin to compare Dublin to Cork or Belfast to routes such as those, never mind lines to Tralee or Sligo!. I would bet that on a rural route in Germany, the bus and car would also be quicker and cheaper.

For the traffic available and the money available, we have just about the rail service we can afford and need (and there's some bits we wouldn't even miss)

Yes you can compare the two. Aren't they being connected by motorways in the same way? What's the need of the motorways if the traffic volume is not there?

I was speaking of speed competitiveness versus sheer volume anyhow. Saying that a motorway will always be faster than a railway is not correct, especially when the government is getting in the way.

corktina · 03-11-2012 10:19PM

yes YOU can compare them, but there isn't any real grounds to do so. The volume is not there in Ireland to justify the investment.

end of the road · 03-11-2012 11:15PM

corktina wrote: »

yes YOU can compare them, but there isn't any real grounds to do so. The volume is not there in Ireland to justify the investment.

so what do we do? just leave it to slowly rot? or do we invest and give it a chance? investing is certainly what should of happened, maybe its just to late now? for me busses are just to slow, the railways are to slow, everything is to slow.

Jamie2k9 · 03-11-2012 11:37PM

the maintenance of the network is still being done and is safe so no need for the false claims and the scaremongering just to get put people off using the trains just because IR didnt need your services anymore .

Will agree 100% about the maintance and saftey of rail lines, only recently I saw how they responed to a saftey concern a passenger raised with them. Just to be clear there was no saftey issue as I know people on here would beleave there was.

corktina · 05-11-2012 05:26PM

end of the road wrote: »

so what do we do? just leave it to slowly rot? or do we invest and give it a chance? investing is certainly what should of happened, maybe its just to late now? for me busses are just to slow, the railways are to slow, everything is to slow.

I meant the money isnt there to justify investment on a German scale, ICE and all that. Improvements are being made on a fairly sensible scale upgrading the Cork line (for instance ) to 100 mph. It's not really fast enough, but better than
nought and abut all we can afford.

cabincrewifly · 05-11-2012 05:32PM

When are the new and improved journey times from Cork to Dublin coming into effect?

sligotrain · 05-11-2012 06:11PM

corktina wrote: »

For the traffic available and the money available, we have just about the rail service we can afford and need (and there's some bits we wouldn't even miss)

Are you promoting the truncation of the rail network as a good thing? If so we are moving into fantasy territory.

corktina · 05-11-2012 06:35PM

sligotrain wrote: »

Are you promoting the truncation of the rail network as a good thing? If so we are moving into fantasy territory.

Fantasy is it? OK time will tell....

Losty Dublin · 05-11-2012 07:50PM

cabincrewifly wrote: »

When are the new and improved journey times from Cork to Dublin coming into effect?

Proposed timetables are to be released in the next 2 weeks or so.

Hilly Bill · 05-11-2012 08:08PM

cabincrewifly wrote: »

When are the new and improved journey times from Cork to Dublin coming into effect?

Once they get the funding to start the project which wont be before 2015. Part of it could be done over a weekend here and there in the meantime.

bk · 05-11-2012 08:17PM

Hilly Bill wrote: »

Once they get the funding to start the project which wont be before 2015. Part of it could be done over a weekend here and there in the meantime.

Most of the work for 100mph runnin I Cork is already done. They have been running trial trains at these speeds for the past few weeks.

Really this should have happened years ago. Irish rail are totally reactive rather then proactive.

CIE · 05-11-2012 08:25PM

corktina wrote: »

Fantasy is it? OK time will tell....

Fifty years isn't long enough?

corktina wrote: »

yes YOU can compare them, but there isn't any real grounds to do so. The volume is not there in Ireland to justify the investment

Childish and false. If the volume is not there for the railways, it certainly is not there for motorways either and the motorway expenditure cannot be justified (never mind that motorways need a footprint about five times wider to carry the same volume of traffic).

And there continues to be zero justification for the state holding onto the railways like some kind of miser, never mind the motorways. But thanks to the EU, the "social market economy" has been bought into, which stipulates government involvement in and distortion of the economy, and the Irish government is taking things to extremes when no need exists to do so.

bk wrote: »

Most of the work for 100 mph running I Cork is already done. They have been running trial trains at these speeds for the past few weeks.

Really this should have happened years ago. Irish rail are totally reactive rather then proactive

Decades ago. 100 mph with diesels is a benchmark achieved over a half-century ago. But the right engine is needed, not a retrofitted freight engine that was not designed for sustained operation at such speeds. 125 mph with diesels is a benchmark that's 37 years old, even. But if you notice, the state usually has the more modern road vehicles for mass transport (they had the Atlantean right when it came out after all).

dukedalton · 05-11-2012 08:41PM

I live in the greater Dublin area and have to travel to Wexford on a regular basis. I had always driven up and back, but a couple of months ago, with petrol prices going through the roof, and living close to a rail line connecting to Dublin, I decided to look into going by rail.

Time-wise, travelling by train was just about the same as travelling by car. Price-wise, the car journey cost me about e20. If I booked in advance the rail price was cheaper, but by the time you add in the "transaction fees", the difference in price was not significant. The car is just so handy that the train would have to be significantly cheaper for it to be a realistic alternative for me. With their being so little in the difference, the convenience of the car wins out every time.

I found the experience of travelling by train was not great. I thought that by going by train I would be able to get some work done on the journey, or even just relax, but I was thwarted by the noise of unruly kids and somewhat inebriated fellow travelers. On trains in the UK, for example, their is usually a designated "Quiet Coach", where people who don't want to contend with a wall of noise for the entire journey can sit. Sadly, Irish Rail offer no such option. So, experience-wise, the train loses out here too.

I think this in a nutshell is why Irish Rail is losing money. For some people living in the suburbs, rail is a viable alternative to the traffic gridlock of town. But for people travelling from city to city, the train service is, at best, just as costly as the car, without the obvious convenience of the latter.

Judgement Day · 05-11-2012 08:48PM

A 'quiet' carriage would be an impossibility on the Rosslare train now that they are reduced to three-car sets. On the odd occasion that I escape from the Sunny South East I like to take the train - stress free, and more beautiful scenery than you can shake a big stick at. It would be better still if we had dining cars and 1st class accommodation but we should be grateful that the train has wheels I suppose.

CIE · 05-11-2012 09:24PM

Judgement Day wrote: »

A 'quiet' carriage would be an impossibility on the Rosslare train now that they are reduced to three-car sets. On the odd occasion that I escape from the Sunny South East I like to take the train - stress free, and more beautiful scenery than you can shake a big stick at. It would be better still if we had dining cars and 1st class accommodation but we should be grateful that the train has wheels I suppose.

If other countries are not settling for bare-bones minimum even in this age of austerity (but not for the preachers of austerity), then why should Ireland?

Looks like the adage "Socialism is for the people, but not for the socialists" is ringing true again.

Hilly Bill · 05-11-2012 09:34PM

bk wrote: »

Most of the work for 100mph runnin I Cork is already done. They have been running trial trains at these speeds for the past few weeks.

Really this should have happened years ago. Irish rail are totally reactive rather then proactive.

Is it? where abouts?

corktina · 05-11-2012 09:35PM

CIE wrote: »

Fifty years isn't long enough?Childish and false. If the volume is not there for the railways, it certainly is not there for motorways either and the motorway expenditure cannot be justified (never mind that motorways need a footprint about five times wider to carry the same volume of traffic).

And there continues to be zero justification for the state holding onto the railways like some kind of miser, never mind the motorways. But thanks to the EU, the "social market economy" has been bought into, which stipulates government involvement in and distortion of the economy, and the Irish government is taking things to extremes when no need exists to do so.Decades ago. 100 mph with diesels is a benchmark achieved over a half-century ago. But the right engine is needed, not a retrofitted freight engine that was not designed for sustained operation at such speeds. 125 mph with diesels is a benchmark that's 37 years old, even. But if you notice, the state usually has the more modern road vehicles for mass transport (they had the Atlantean right when it came out after all).

we arent building any more motorways or havent you noticed?

I have been extolling 125 mph running dfor ages...good to see you on board with it

Hilly Bill · 05-11-2012 09:40PM

dukedalton wrote: »

I live in the greater Dublin area and have to travel to Wexford on a regular basis. I had always driven up and back, but a couple of months ago, with petrol prices going through the roof, and living close to a rail line connecting to Dublin, I decided to look into going by rail.

Time-wise, travelling by train was just about the same as travelling by car. Price-wise, the car journey cost me about e20. If I booked in advance the rail price was cheaper, but by the time you add in the "transaction fees", the difference in price was not significant. The car is just so handy that the train would have to be significantly cheaper for it to be a realistic alternative for me. With their being so little in the difference, the convenience of the car wins out every time.

I found the experience of travelling by train was not great. I thought that by going by train I would be able to get some work done on the journey, or even just relax, but I was thwarted by the noise of unruly kids and somewhat inebriated fellow travelers. On trains in the UK, for example, their is usually a designated "Quiet Coach", where people who don't want to contend with a wall of noise for the entire journey can sit. Sadly, Irish Rail offer no such option. So, experience-wise, the train loses out here too.

I think this in a nutshell is why Irish Rail is losing money. For some people living in the suburbs, rail is a viable alternative to the traffic gridlock of town. But for people travelling from city to city, the train service is, at best, just as costly as the car, without the obvious convenience of the latter.

Great post, e-mail that to Irish Rail as customer feedback.

horsemaster · 05-11-2012 09:43PM

The stations are clean and the staff are very nice and polite. But I think the issue with me with the trains is just simply the price. Most countries price of a train ticket is very cheap and competitive but Irish Rails price can get quite expensive. Maybe the price is high as not many people take, Maybe they can get more money by increasing business for transporting goods as well as passengers. The food in the train is not good either. I do like the trains themselves though. Maybe Irish Rails can read all our comments and see if they can do something about this.

Hilly Bill · 05-11-2012 09:55PM

Single online prices are very good if bought at least 3 days in advance.

httpete · 05-11-2012 10:12PM

The prices for trains are a complete joke, Galway to Dublin return is 40 quid if you 'buy online'...god forbid you go down to station and buy a ticket, it must be around 50 quid+. Buses cost 20 quid, take the same amount of travel time if not less, and dont stop at 10 stations along the way and blare out an intercom telling you that you are on the 'Galway to Dublin train, stopping at a, b, c...etc...' as if people don't know what ****ing train they are on after paying a fortune for the ticket. Those loud intercoms really pissed me off, no chance of getting to sleep with those things blaring out completely unnecessary information every 15-20 minutes..before and after the train comes to each stop, and in both English and Irish, such a pain in the hole, totally put in just for the sake of it.

But the price is by far the main reason people would have to be mad to take the train over the bus...compared to what you pay in other countries to use the trains the pricing is an absolute scandal here.

Hilly Bill · 05-11-2012 10:25PM

Galway to Dublin is €14.99 each way on line if booked 3 days in advanced. Thats not bad at all. The announcements are handy for any visual impaired passengers to know when their stop is coming up.

LeftBlank · 05-11-2012 10:29PM

httpete wrote: »

compared to what you pay in other countries to use the trains the pricing is an absolute scandal here.

Rather than use the word "scandal" how about providing some figures to back this up.

Walk up train fares (particularly in Britain) are much, much higher than what you would pay here, in my experience.

hatrickpatrick · 05-11-2012 10:31PM

Perhaps the fact that ticket prices seem to increase every single January in the middle of a recession has something to do with it?
I remember when a ticket from Sandycove to town cost less than €2. Prices should be going down in a financial crisis, not up. It's nonsensical.

The standardization of dart times is another issue. Every 15 minutes is fine during the day, but at peak times, seriously? Number of times you can't get on a dart because it's full, and/or because for some reason it's operating as a 4 carriage dart.

I'm not sure what the actual cause of these issues is, but they're discouraging to users, no doubt

dukedalton · 05-11-2012 10:43PM

Hilly Bill wrote: »

Galway to Dublin is €14.99 each way on line if booked 3 days in advanced. Thats not bad at all. The announcements are handy for any visual impaired passengers to know when their stop is coming up.

But another thing that frustrates me about Irish Rail is their seemingly illogical pricing structure. A few years ago (before I had a car) I had to go to Galway and Clonmel from Dublin in successive weeks. The journey time to both is similar, yet the day return to Galway was e20, the day return to Clonmel was e64!

We are in the middle of a recession and petrol prices are sky high. If Irish Rail can't turn a profit now, they never will!

Hilly Bill · 05-11-2012 10:58PM

The Clonmel price does look expensive alright.

end of the road · 05-11-2012 11:01PM

a quiet carrage on the rosslare line would be fantastic, but i suppose were lucky to have a train service never mind a 3 piece cattle train if were lucky or (as much as i like the engine grumble) a 2900 if were not so lucky while 22000s are being sent to dumplands (sorry docklands)

CIE · 05-11-2012 11:02PM

WADR to all, when did the word "fares" drop out of use referring to how much it is to ride a train from one station to the other, and get replaced with "prices"...? They were never called "prices" back in my day; a "price" would be how much it costs to buy the rolling stock from a builder.

Hilly Bill · 05-11-2012 11:07PM

The Fare is how much it Costs and the Cost of the Fare is the Price that you have to pay for it

Why Are Irish Rail Failing so badly

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