BusConnects Dublin - Bus Network Changes Discussion

Hotblack Desiato · 19-07-2019 10:59am

devnull wrote: »

The model of ticket machine DB are using is approx 20 years old and can barely cope with functionality it has now.

They had Travel 90 tickets years ago.

devnull · 19-07-2019 11:23am

Hotblack Desiato wrote: »

They had Travel 90 tickets years ago.

Travel 90 was a completely different product, that required you to pre-purchase your tickets from a newsagent with cash, rather than getting it automatically, was valid on only one mode and applied only for 90 minutes rather than 90 minutes after each transfer.

AlmightyCushion · 19-07-2019 11:24am

L1011 wrote: »

Rather different calculation basis and realistically the machines are at their limit.

I really don't see how it's that different. The criteria stays the same, currently it discounts a transaction by €1, with this change it just doesn't charge for it at all. Don't get me wrong, I'm a developer so I have seen situations where a change seems pretty straight forward from the outside but once you start digging into the code it becomes a nightmare. However, nothing you have pointed out so far illustrates why this change is impossible.

You've said that the machines don't have the storage or processing power to work out who needs to be charged and who doesn't. It already does this.

Qrt · 19-07-2019 11:25am

devnull wrote: »

Travel 90 was a completely different product, that required you to pre-purchase your tickets from a newsagent with cash, rather than getting it automatically, was valid on only one mode and applied only for 90 minutes rather than 90 minutes after each transfer.

Not to mention the stamping machines which have been removed for a long long time now. Also, I don’t think it’s going to be 90 minutes after each transfer? I always assumed it was 90 minutes from the start of your journey.

Qrt · 19-07-2019 11:27am

TheChrisD wrote: »

For anyone who can't quite visualise the changes listed in the big post... here's a custom map: https://www.google.com/maps/d/viewer?mid=1ilVsfzuzRQ7flK6arBnXwmllnuK1uqBa

Think I have everything reported in there. Only missing the locals because the fate of most of them has not yet been reported bar my own one ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Deadly! Not to be pedantic but I think the O is missing, but the Heuston side is a mystery to us at this stage so understandable if it was left out intentionally. Thanks though, it’s really helpful!

CatInABox · 19-07-2019 11:49am

Slightly disappointed with the H spine, to be honest. I can see why they kept those buses, but I guess that I'm disappointed that they didn't do more with them than just replicate what they've already got.

If they sent them down Marlborough Street, over the bridge, onto Hawkins St, Townsend St, and then Tara St before heading back out onto their normal route northside, then they'll take in a section of the southside, with another Dart Station (which, if Metrolink is built, will be a massive interchange station), and continue to include both Bus Aras and Connolly Station.

D14Rugby · 19-07-2019 12:50pm

L1011 wrote: »

The machine needs to be able to work out whether someone is to be charged or not, store details of who has been charged and so on. They really don't have the processing power or storage to do this already yet alone another layer of complexity

It can't just take notes and charge later as the transaction has to actually be written to the card and anyway it hasn't got the storage to keep track

It can 100% do that already, it's really not a complicated thing to implement for leap cards

cgcsb · 19-07-2019 1:07pm

CatInABox wrote: »

Slightly disappointed with the H spine, to be honest. I can see why they kept those buses, but I guess that I'm disappointed that they didn't do more with them than just replicate what they've already got.

If they sent them down Marlborough Street, over the bridge, onto Hawkins St, Townsend St, and then Tara St before heading back out onto their normal route northside, then they'll take in a section of the southside, with another Dart Station (which, if Metrolink is built, will be a massive interchange station), and continue to include both Bus Aras and Connolly Station.

Agreed, Talbot/Abbey is a silly place to terminate buses from the north east, it makes interchange very awkward when coming from the opposite side of the city.

Stephen15 · 19-07-2019 1:24pm

cgcsb wrote: »

Agreed, Talbot/Abbey is a silly place to terminate buses from the north east, it makes interchange very awkward when coming from the opposite side of the city.

Thought the whole idea of the spines was that they were all cross city but this H spine is not cross city. They could have at least had it run further south perhaps to the likes of Merrion Square.

CatInABox · 19-07-2019 1:34pm

Stephen15 wrote: »

Thought the whole idea of the spines was that they were all cross city but this H spine is not cross city. They could have at least had it run further south perhaps to the likes of Merrion Square.

Yeah, it's a pretend spine, likely to just get rid of the complaints. I'd worry that the frequency is going to be exactly the same or only just improved a little. Hopefully they take on board comments about it in the second round.

TheChrisD · 19-07-2019 2:05pm

Qrt wrote: »

Not to be pedantic but I think the O is missing

It is there, but since it's a looping route I accidentally turned it into a polygon rather than a line, and to undo that I have to remake the entire line at some point

CatInABox wrote: »

Slightly disappointed with the H spine, to be honest. I can see why they kept those buses, but I guess that I'm disappointed that they didn't do more with them than just replicate what they've already got.

I think a better implementation for them would be to basically merge the G and H spines into one long spine, offering more options for cross-city journeys and increasing the potential for interchange through the central area.

cgcsb · 19-07-2019 2:11pm

TheChrisD wrote: »

I think a better implementation for them would be to basically merge the G and H spines into one long spine, offering more options for cross-city journeys and increasing the potential for interchange through the central area.

Capital idea

CatInABox · 19-07-2019 2:16pm

TheChrisD wrote: »

I think a better implementation for them would be to basically merge the G and H spines into one long spine, offering more options for cross-city journeys and increasing the potential for interchange through the central area.

Yes, that's a great idea.

MJohnston · 19-07-2019 2:32pm

It looks to me like there's not much in that network preventing a College Green plaza - the A spine could be reconfigured to follow the diversion routes that will be used for the trial closures, and the non-spine routes like the 16 could be sent to the Quays/Winetavern Street instead.

The North-South routes through College Green could stay.

cgcsb · 19-07-2019 2:44pm

I think the routing via wine tavern street is a good thing. This will surely mean a bus gate at the top of the hill which will have a traffic calming affect. They must be pretty confident about the height of the arch being able to accommodate double deckers turning a sharp corner.

cherryghost · 19-07-2019 2:50pm

Anything changing on the W2/W4? There was a lot of shouting by locals in Lucan/Clondalkin, espec over the W4

dublinman1990 · 19-07-2019 3:06pm

Hello again cgcsb. I'm very pleased in hearing about the new 98 route going from Mountjoy Sq to Loughlinstown Drive. What I would like to know is how does it take the route from Rock Rd to Glenageary Rd? It didn't mention Dun Laoghaire in the routing at all. I would assume here that it is like the 4 again along with the new B4 although most of the new 98 route is like the current 7a from Loughlinstown Pk into Mountjoy Sq. Also; do you know what frequency is available for the 98? Thanks.

cgcsb · 19-07-2019 3:18pm

dublinman1990 wrote: »

Hello again cgcsb. I'm very pleased in hearing about the new 98 route going from Mountjoy Sq to Loughlinstown Drive. What I would like to know is how does it take the route from Rock Rd to Glenageary Rd? It didn't mention Dun Laoghaire in the routing at all. I would assume here that it is like the 4 again along with the new B4 although most of the new 98 route is like the current 7a from Loughlinstown Pk into Mountjoy Sq. Also; do you know what frequency is available for the 98? Thanks.

Through Dún Laoghaire and on to Glenageary rd.

cgcsb · 19-07-2019 3:21pm

cherryghost wrote: »

Anything changing on the W2/W4? There was a lot of shouting by locals in Lucan/Clondalkin, espec over the W4

Slight change in Clondalkin with the W2 taking Laurel Park/New Rd instead of the Boot Rd. Other than that, identical

dublinman1990 · 19-07-2019 3:50pm

cgcsb wrote: »

Through Dún Laoghaire and on to Glenageary rd.

Oh. That sounds really good. The 98 basically just mirrors the current 7a from Loughlinstown into Mountjoy Sq. It will probably also share most of it's route with the new B3 from Dun Laoghaire out to Jury's Hotel in Ballsbridge which is even more good news. Although what I trying to understand is that when in Loughlinstown Pk, the new 229, from Brides Glen to Dun Laoghaire DART Stn, has a poor frequency of roughly 45 to 60 minutes per bus. Does the 98 get better frequency than the 229? What I understand from reading the google map from one of the other posters here; the B3 will remain on the Blackrock by-pass in both directions. The 98 will probably take the longer illogical route around Newtown Avenue in Blackrock when heading into town. And then from town; it will go through the Blackrock Main St like the current 7 & 7a routes. Is that correct?

CatInABox · 19-07-2019 6:08pm

TheChrisD wrote: »

I think a better implementation for them would be to basically merge the G and H spines into one long spine, offering more options for cross-city journeys and increasing the potential for interchange through the central area.

I've thought about this a bit more, and while I'd love it to happen, I don't think it will. Pretty sure that the H has been left as it currently is because there's no real need for the increased frequency that the G spine would have. There just isn't the population in the catchment area, a fair bit of it is the sea, and there's a dart line running most of the length as well.

Still think they can do something with the end in the city centre, but I don't think they're going to combine it with a high frequency spine.

AlekSmart · 19-07-2019 7:22pm

Qrt wrote: »

Not to mention the stamping machines which have been removed for a long long time now. Also, I don’t think it’s going to be 90 minutes after each transfer? I always assumed it was 90 minutes from the start of your journey.

The Travel 90 ticket remains available from the Vending Machines at Dublin Airport.

AlekSmart · 19-07-2019 7:25pm

Qrt wrote: »

Not to mention the stamping machines which have been removed for a long long time now. Also, I don’t think it’s going to be 90 minutes after each transfer? I always assumed it was 90 minutes from the start of your journey.

The current Leap Transfer 90 discount rolls on with each use...so you can get significant useage out of that €1 rebate function

TheChrisD · 19-07-2019 10:08pm

CatInABox wrote: »

I've thought about this a bit more, and while I'd love it to happen, I don't think it will. Pretty sure that the H has been left as it currently is because there's no real need for the increased frequency that the G spine would have. There just isn't the population in the catchment area, a fair bit of it is the sea, and there's a dart line running most of the length as well.

Still think they can do something with the end in the city centre, but I don't think they're going to combine it with a high frequency spine.

I'm not sure there's going to be much of a massive difference in the frequency of the main G and H spines in the end. I mean, as it is the G spine is already planned to be the least frequent of them all at 7.5 minutes off-peak/6 minutes at peak.

If we take the current DB timetables for the equivalent H-spine routes:

H1 = 29a, 20m off-peak;
H2 = 32, 60m off-peak - but very likely to get boosted as it will be the only main bus service to Malahide following the shortening of the D2, so let's instead go with the 30m off-peak service of the 42;
H3 = 31/a, 20m off-peak

then the main H-spine could easily get to a similar frequency as the G-spine, making an even better reason to connect them into one.

A2000 · 21-07-2019 11:30am

Will the 95 serve spiddal psrk and what will the route be in Ballyfermot. Any idea of frequency?

dublinman1990 · 21-07-2019 2:22pm

Hi cgcsb. Do you know how many extra routes were made in this upcoming consultation?

Polar101 · 22-07-2019 12:39am

AlekSmart wrote: »

The current Leap Transfer 90 discount rolls on with each use...so you can get significant useage out of that €1 rebate function

This works pretty well actually, I managed to extend it 5 times on Saturday (without actually trying to!) - only missed out by 4 minutes on the 6th time. But then I reached the daily cap anyway.

Now the €1 "discount" is useful, because one often needs to take about three buses to get to a destination, hopefully with Busconnects a single 90 minute ticket will actually be enough.

elmoslats · 24-07-2019 2:15pm

L1011 wrote: »

The machine needs to be able to work out whether someone is to be charged or not, store details of who has been charged and so on. They really don't have the processing power or storage to do this already yet alone another layer of complexity

It can't just take notes and charge later as the transaction has to actually be written to the card and anyway it hasn't got the storage to keep track

The machines don't need to store that information, it is stored on the card.
That is how the leap 90 discount works. It reads the card to see when your last trip was and if it was within the last 90 minutes it gives you the discount.
I'm sure there is work needed to get it to work but I don't see why they would need to replace the readers on the buses.

Sam Russell · 24-07-2019 3:00pm

elmoslats wrote: »

The machines don't need to store that information, it is stored on the card.
That is how the leap 90 discount works. It reads the card to see when your last trip was and if it was within the last 90 minutes it gives you the discount.
I'm sure there is work needed to get it to work but I don't see why they would need to replace the readers on the buses.

They are too slow.

D14Rugby · 24-07-2019 3:09pm

Sam Russell wrote: »

They are too slow.

Probably more to do with the connection speed than the actual readers

pclive · 24-07-2019 3:19pm

D14Rugby wrote: »

Probably more to do with the connection speed than the actual readers

They are not connected. they download info at night when they get back to the garage.

They are woefully SLOW!

AlmightyCushion · 24-07-2019 4:28pm

Sam Russell wrote: »

They are too slow.

Yes they are but they don't need to be replaced to do free transfers within 90 minutes as L1011 claimed.

D14Rugby · 24-07-2019 4:30pm

pclive wrote: »

They are not connected. they download info at night when they get back to the garage.

They are woefully SLOW!

Thats a weird way to do it.

Sam Russell · 24-07-2019 4:41pm

AlmightyCushion wrote: »

Yes they are but they don't need to be replaced to do free transfers within 90 minutes as L1011 claimed.

Well, they currently can hardly process the Leap card - taking an age to validate one.

Could they not just upgrade the memory and up the processor speed? They have thousands of them so it would be a worth someone's while to do it - keep everything the same, just upgrade memory and processor.

devnull · 24-07-2019 4:46pm

D14Rugby wrote: »

Probably more to do with the connection speed than the actual readers

The readers are an input/output device that is connected to the ticket machine, they cannot work without the ticket machine as they depend on the ticket machine for all of their functionality. The readers are not as sophisticated as you seem to think, they are a device that links to a ticket machine rather than one that acts on it's own.

elmoslats wrote: »

The machines don't need to store that information, it is stored on the card. That is how the leap 90 discount works. It reads the card to see when your last trip was and if it was within the last 90 minutes it gives you the discount.

Of course they need to store that information, because the upload of that information is how statistics are calculated by the operators and form the basis of deciding how the operators get paid and what revenue is allocated to what operator based on the usage of the LEAP Card.

You have to remember that when you purchase LEAP Credit it goes to a central pot and how that pot is divided up is based on the actual usage of LEAP cards.

Could they not just upgrade the memory and up the processor speed? They have thousands of them so it would be a worth someone's while to do it - keep everything the same, just upgrade memory and processor.

This isn't modern tech where you can just sling more memory in and upgrade the CPU easily. These ticket machines are based on RAM and processors from the early 1990s and the motherboards and hardware support list for these things is very much limited, they're nowhere near like today's ticket machines.

These machines are well life expired and should be consigned to the dustbin, they have already been pushed well beyond their means and design capacity, there is no financial sense at all in keeping them on, they should be consigned to history. They were good machines in the 90s and at the turn of the decade but their time is long gone now.

L1011 · 24-07-2019 5:05pm

elmoslats wrote: »

The machines don't need to store that information, it is stored on the card.
That is how the leap 90 discount works. It reads the card to see when your last trip was and if it was within the last 90 minutes it gives you the discount.
I'm sure there is work needed to get it to work but I don't see why they would need to replace the readers on the buses.

The machines also have to store and upload the info as well.

The existing leap90 calculation is done on an subtly but importantly different basis and the same routines could not be used as is

AlmightyCushion · 24-07-2019 6:36pm

L1011 wrote: »

The machines also have to store and upload the info as well.

The existing leap90 calculation is done on an subtly but importantly different basis and the same routines could not be used as is

What is this difference? As far as I know the only difference is instead of discounting the fare by a euro, it just doesn't charge for it at all. That doesn't require a massive increase in storage or computational power to accomplish.

D14Rugby · 24-07-2019 6:54pm

devnull wrote: »

The readers are an input/output device that is connected to the ticket machine, they cannot work without the ticket machine as they depend on the ticket machine for all of their functionality. The readers are not as sophisticated as you seem to think, they are a device that links to a ticket machine rather than one that acts on it's own.

They aren't as they go about doing everything a weird way but they're still plenty sophisticated enough to cope with free 90 minute travel.

L1011 wrote: »

The machines also have to store and upload the info as well.

The existing leap90 calculation is done on an subtly but importantly different basis and the same routines could not be used as is

It really could be

L1011 · 24-07-2019 7:02pm

AlmightyCushion wrote: »

What is this difference? As far as I know the only difference is instead of discounting the fare by a euro, it just doesn't charge for it at all. That doesn't require a massive increase in storage or computational power to accomplish.

The current one will continue discounting "forever"* if you keep transferring within 90mins. The new fare is 90mins first board to last board.

D14Rugby wrote: »

They aren't as they go about doing everything a weird way but they're still plenty sophisticated enough to cope with free 90 minute travel.

It really could be

Vast amount of assumptions from someone who doesn't know much to anything about how limited the platform is there.

The new ticketing is not a direct replacement for Leap90. The ticket machines have no ability to upload/download data during a journey nor can this be refitted. They are similar spec to home computers from 1992 with the addition of a 2mbit or so wireless card for data transfers in the depot.

The card readers are an interface - nothing else. All the computation is done by the Wayfarer; the card reader does the crypto and actual air interface alone.

*lack of services overnight would prevent that!

devnull · 24-07-2019 7:09pm

D14Rugby wrote: »

They aren't as they go about doing everything a weird way but they're still plenty sophisticated enough to cope with free 90 minute travel.

The readers are still limited to what is powering them, as they are essentially slave machines of the ticket machines. All of the data they log has to be written to the ticket machine and processed by it which is the bottleneck right now.

What is this difference? As far as I know the only difference is instead of discounting the fare by a euro, it just doesn't charge for it at all. That doesn't require a massive increase in storage or computational power to accomplish.

There is more calculations required, the existing programming simply looks at the last fare and f it's within 90 minutes on a supported mode. This is a very simple query, you'd need more conditionals and a more complex one for a 90 minute ticket since it would need to look at the first validation for the current journey.

D14Rugby · 24-07-2019 7:55pm

devnull wrote: »

The readers are still limited to what is powering them, as they are essentially slave machines of the ticket machines. All of the data they log has to be written to the ticket machine and processed by it which is the bottleneck right now.

There is more calculations required, the existing programming simply looks at the last fare and f it's within 90 minutes on a supported mode. This is a very simple query, you'd need more conditionals and a more complex one for a 90 minute ticket since it would need to look at the first validation for the current journey.

It's just 2 if statements compared to current one, hardly going to cause the thing to blow up.

p_haugh · 24-07-2019 8:00pm

https://www.lothianbuses.com/contactless/

On the topic of ticketing, Lothian have just made contactless available on all their city services.

L1011 · 24-07-2019 8:02pm

D14Rugby wrote: »

It's just 2 if statements compared to current one, hardly going to cause the thing to blow up.

Again you fail to realise just how constrained the equipment is.

Its nearly 30 year old technology. It has extremely limited storage and RAM. The spec sheet isn't online anymore but I've some memory that the largest program ROM size available is 512k. There is 1MB of RAM available. Neither of these is upgradable.

You try write code the way a college kid writes code and you'll have trouble getting Hello World on screen. Adding control handling for a different calculation mechanism is not guaranteed to be possible seeing as they are really pushing the limits already.

devnull · 24-07-2019 8:05pm

D14Rugby wrote: »

It's just 2 if statements compared to current one, hardly going to cause the thing to blow up.

It's not just the extra queries, it is also going to have to read and write more data in order to carry them out. The ticket machines already struggle with their current workload, hardly surprising when they're based on a processing chip that has it's roots in the 1980s. (see here)

There's extra information to store because of it and the ticket machines can hold less information than a floppy disk can, you have to bear that in mind. This is extremely old tech, it was never designed for these kind of things, it's hundreds of times slower than even a budget PC these days.

devnull · 24-07-2019 8:07pm

p_haugh wrote: »

https://www.lothianbuses.com/contactless/

On the topic of ticketing, Lothian have just made contactless available on all their city services.

Aircoach have had it for about a year, they bought new machines for it and Dublin Bus will have to do the same.

Stephen15 · 24-07-2019 8:24pm

devnull wrote: »

Aircoach have had it for about a year, they bought new machines for it and Dublin Bus will have to do the same.

Would that not be up to the NTA? As such a system would have to be rolled out on both DB and GAI buses aswell as probably BE aswell

elmoslats · 24-07-2019 8:30pm

L1011 wrote: »

The current one will continue discounting "forever"* if you keep transferring within 90mins. The new fare is 90mins first board to last board.

*lack of services overnight would prevent that!

Actually the daily cap would prevent that. Once you reach the daily cap they're capable of charging nothing.

L1011 · 24-07-2019 8:36pm

elmoslats wrote: »

Actually the daily cap would prevent that. Once you reach the daily cap they're capable of charging nothing.

Hadn't thought of that - yes, that'll stop it after a few goes, but it could still be stretched to a stupid length of time.

elmoslats · 24-07-2019 8:46pm

L1011 wrote: »

Hadn't thought of that - yes, that'll stop it after a few goes, but it could still be stretched to a stupid length of time.

Well just 3/4 trips before the daily cap sets in.

I'm not going to pretend I know much about the hardware on the buses, but I'm not convinced that the 90 minute fare would be more complicated than the leap 90 discount.

The cards and machines are capable of dealing with leap 90, auto top up, daily/weekly caps etc.

I bet you all they'll implement the 90 minute fare without changing the card readers/ticket machines.

Hotblack Desiato · 25-07-2019 11:30am

L1011 wrote: »

The spec sheet isn't online anymore but I've some memory that the largest program ROM size available is 512k. There is 1MB of RAM available. Neither of these is upgradable.

We put men on the moon with far less.

No reason to persist with these machines though, why aren't NTA replacing them?

BusConnects Dublin - Bus Network Changes Discussion

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