Dublin Airport to stop cars picking up passengers outside terminals

Simpler solutions, create a location at one of many spots there is land as a drive through if it's that bad, buses running to car parks anyway...

Drop off or collect from bus point.

Gets people away from the terminal.

How would the 15 minute free period be monitored and charged for us you go over time. Will it scan you going through an entrance barrier and then an exit barrier charging on exit?

[Deleted User] wrote: »

I took that service from Blanch and it was less than ideal. Fair dues to them for having tried at least but it just wasn't a service which could ever work.

It went all over the place. It's quite frustrating to think that somewhere so close has no bus service to the airport unless you take at least two buses.

"There, the first 15 minutes are free."
- Grand. In this era of mobile phones, just rock up when the person lands.

LXFlyer wrote: »

BusConnects will finally improve direct links and offer connections across the north city with DART through the following route network:

A2 - Airport-Drumcondra-City Centre-Rathmines-Terenure-Rathfarnham-Ballinteer-Dundrum

19 - Airport-Ballymun-Glasnevin-Drumcondra-Parnell Square East

24 - Airport-Charlestown-Glasnevin-Phibsborough-City Centre (Merrion Square)

N8- Blanchardstown SC-M50-Airport-R139-Clongriffin DART

L81 - Airport-River Valley-Swords-Malahide-Portmarnock-Baldoyle-Sutton DART

L83 - Airport-Swords-Donabate-Portrane

L85 - Airport-Swords-Lusk-Rush-Skerries-Balbriggan

I would still like to see the D4 spine route extended to the Airport, which would connect Beaumont, Artane and the Malahide Road directly to the Airport.

I look forward to seeing some of these services in action, in particular the N8. A little worried that the journey times won't decrease by much, but it will be great to have options.

For example the L81 seems to be a replacement for the 102. I caught that one evening at half five and it took me until half six to get to Malahide.

Chris_5339762 wrote: »

At Cork this happens. You go through an entry barrier which opens automatically. PResumably it scans your registration.



If you approach the exit barrier within 15 minutes it simply opens and you go on your merry way.


If you approach the exit barrier after 15 minutes the barrier won't open and you have to deposit €5 in coins in the coin bucket next to you for it to open. All displayed on signs.


It works. Though you do get people mooching about up at the nearby roundabout at the long term carpark waiting for the call from their passenger to come pick them up!

Same system in Knock,works a treat.

AndrewJRenko wrote: »

17A, then switch to the 41 or 16.

Not practical, not regular, not reliable and not Bus Eireann or Aircoach as the post I replied to specified.

Pat Dunne wrote: »

The Airport Hopper service from Tallaght and Maynooth appeared to performing quite well prior to Covid.

It does however serve several different areas en route:
Liffey Valley for Palmerstown, Lucan, Leixlip, and Maynooth
Liffey Valley for Palmerstown, Clondalkin and Tallaght

That's more likely to succeed as a commercial service than a single suburb service to Blanchardstown.

The 17a in theory is every 20mins. In practice I regularly waited 45mins in Santry for an eastbound one when commuting home from the airport.

LXFlyer wrote: »

When roughly (in terms of years) are you talking about out of curiosity?

There have been quite a few changes lately in the bus service (as in the last couple of years).

March 2020. I used cycle the warmer months, and take the 16/41 then 17a home for the winter months.

EDIT: Just checked my records (I kept records). 14th Jan 2020 was my last 40min wait for the bus.

Brian CivilEng wrote: »

March 2020. I used cycle the warmer months, and take the 16/41 then 17a home for the winter months.

EDIT: Just checked my records (I kept records). 14th Jan 2020 was my last 40min wait for the bus.

That sounds like a departure didn't operate for whatever reason - that could happen on any route to be fair. Are you saying that was the norm? To be honest, having commuted on orbital routes over the years, I always would check the RTPI whilst still on the first bus before getting off to avoid precisely that scenario.

But there are major changes planned.

In addition to the N8 (Blanchardstown-Airport-Clongriffin service every 30 minutes) mentioned above, BusConnects envisages a big increase in frequency on the other main orbital routes - the N4 (Blanchardstown-Finglas-Collins Avenue-Docklands) and the N6 (Finglas-Ballymun-Santry-Coolock-Howth Road) routes are planned to operate every 10 minutes throughout the day.

The full list of planned routes and frequencies can be found here:
https://busconnects.ie/initiatives/new-dublin-area-bus-network/

Brian CivilEng wrote: »

It would regularly happen on the 17a that two of them caught up with each other. Particularly at am or pm peak. Sometimes they'd run in convoy the whole way home, other times if the bus wasn't busy they'd take one out of service and combine the passengers on the other one.

It also didn't help my journey time that the stop for the 41 was a 7minute walk from the stop for the 17a, 3mins of which was along the road the 17a was on so you could see it passing you.

I only started keeping records in Dec 2019, I had planned to record my commute time for a year but that didn't happen. Otherwise I'd have a nice graph to present But looking back at the three months I do have, the typical wait was 15mins, with 25mins encountered at least once a week. RTPI was inaccurate, as the bus could be stuck in traffic on Santry Ave. that one day would take a minute to clear, other days 10mins.

I only have three instances of >35min wait recorded, but when you wait that long at a bus stop you remember it. Especially since my house was a 45min walk from Santry.

By the way, for obvious reasons I haven't had to take this bus in 12months, just looked it up on Google Maps there now. Has the route been renamed the 171?

(I'm doing research into airport surface access for work, I didn't just record my commute times for fun. Although it was fun).

No the service is still the 17A. It's a data error on some feeds apparently on GoAhead operated routes (A becomes 1).

I do get that people remember long waits, but in my experience that can often mean that they unfairly remember those over all the times that it did actually work.

You are right in that for connections to work at locations such as Santry, the stops need to be close to one another. The current set-up is appalling.

To be fair the RTPI cannot tell how long a bus will take if it is stuck randomly in traffic. The RTPI journey times are based on applying the stop-by-stop schedule to the GPS location of the bus, updated every 30 seconds. But if something stops the bus from moving, it will continue to display the same expected time until it gets going again.

I was really referring to RTPI where it would tell you that there wouldn't be a bus for 40 mins before you got off the 16 or 41, in which case it would probably be best going into town and back out. Incidentally the map on the NTA Journey Planner app now shows the physical location of Dublin Bus vehicles (not GoAhead sadly) which is helpful, especially if you know that there's an unpredictable junction between the bus and your location.

Anyways, hopefully the info at the link above will help in seeing the planned improved access to/from the airport, either directly or with connections.