41 new ICR centre cars

L1011 · 31-10-2019 8:14pm

60 options? Should be exercised immediately ASAP surely?

Del.Monte · 31-10-2019 8:15pm

Of course if we still had the ability to build/assemble railway vehicles in Ireland....

L1011 · 31-10-2019 8:16pm

Del.Monte wrote: »

Of course if we still had the ability to build/assemble railway vehicles in Ireland....

It wouldn't have been vaguely price competitive and tenders are compulsory.

tabbey · 31-10-2019 8:20pm

Del.Monte wrote: »

Of course if we still had the ability to build/assemble railway vehicles in Ireland....

Or even to hold on to those vehicles which were built/ assembled here.

The 124 coaches scrapped or sold to Belmond could have been retained for inter-city (Dublin - Cork, Limerick and Galway) use and the ICRs used on other mainline routes, where the ICR acceleration is most beneficial.

Del.Monte · 31-10-2019 8:20pm

L1011 wrote: »

It wouldn't have been vaguely price competitive and tenders are compulsory.

Well of course it wouldn't since the ability to build vehicles in Inchicore no longer exists. Whatever happened to the engineering centre of excellence promised by a former Chairman of CIE, Paul Conlon? They don't even build the tea-trollies.

L1011 · 31-10-2019 8:21pm

Del.Monte wrote: »

Well of course it wouldn't since the ability to build vehicles in Inchicore no longer exists. Whatever happened to the engineering centre of excellence promised by a former Chairman of CIE, Paul Conlon? They don't even build the tea-trollies.

What happened was that it wasn't vaguely economically competitive.

The old days are dead.

Del.Monte · 31-10-2019 8:27pm

The plain facts were that no serious effort was made to do anything with the Works at Inchicore but sell bits off for housing. Generations of engineering skills thrown away and, as far as I know, the only outside work that the company got after Conlon's famous announcement was the overhaul of a pair of gates for a local church. You couldn't make it up.

L1011 · 31-10-2019 8:35pm

Del.Monte wrote: »

The plain facts were that no serious effort was made to do anything with the Works at Inchicore but sell bits off for housing. Generations of engineering skills thrown away and, as far as I know, the only outside work that the company got after Conlon's famous announcement was the overhaul of a pair of gates for a local church. You couldn't make it up.

Do you want to fund the shortfall to run it out of your own pocket then?

If they were unable to successfully compete for work it was because they were too expensive. That should be blindlingly obvious to someone who likes to make that reference to them getting virtually no work repeatedly.

If you do something complicated all the time, there is limited point in outsourcing it because of the loss of control. Hence why Irish Rail even have a concrete plant for sleepers still

If you do something complicated only occasionally it is absolutely insanity NOT to outsource it. What would you have had an entire railcar plant doing for the past decade?

Del.Monte · 31-10-2019 8:47pm

An entire railcar plant, as you put it, could have been looking for export orders, maintaining the existing fleet etc. as had been done since time immemorial.

L1011 · 31-10-2019 8:52pm

Del.Monte wrote: »

An entire railcar plant, as you put it, could have been looking for export orders, maintaining the existing fleet etc. as had been done since time immemorial.

Maintenance is not done at manufacturing facilities

Irish Rails cost base would not make them competitive for export orders. Unknown providers need to be extremely cheap to get initial orders; do you want to fund that? Should also remind you we don't make any of the raw materials in this country, so you are importing everything to begin with, which further ratchets up costs.

The days of railways building (or reassembling, as most recent Irish "built" ones were) their own stock are long gone, no matter what fond memories you may have.

At "time immemorial" for railways, we used steam traction and had open fourth class carriages. Do you think that means we should still use both, ignoring the realities of the modern world?

Ireland trains · 31-10-2019 9:05pm

Is there any chance Irish rail will exercise the option for 60 more coaches.

Is the new formation likely to change because:
-there will be no 5 car sets which means there can be no lenghtening of trains to rosslare.
- if current 5 car services are lenghtened to 6 cars, will services such as off peak Dublin- Cork icr services be unnecessarily lengthened or shortened to 4 coaches.

Also good news as presumably 12 of the 6 car ICR sets will not have premier class, which means that a current 5 car service to places such as Tralee will be extended to 6 car, and presuming no premier class, there will be an extra 102 seats, or a 33.5% increase.

All in all it is good news and hopefully it won't be the end of it.

Del.Monte · 31-10-2019 9:13pm

How is reducing the availability of so called 'Premier' class accommodation a good thing?

L1011 · 31-10-2019 9:16pm

Ireland trains wrote: »

- if current 5 car services are lenghtened to 6 cars, will services such as off peak Dublin- Cork icr services be unnecessarily lengthened or shortened to 4 coaches.

There is some demand management (read: advance ticket price manipulation) that can be done on those services to attract time insensitive customers either from the peak trains or from buses; that the extra capacity would allow. This is something Irish Rail do relatively well.

Jamie2k9 · 31-10-2019 9:28pm

Ireland trains wrote: »

Is there any chance Irish rail will exercise the option for 60 more coaches.

Is the new formation likely to change because:
-there will be no 5 car sets which means there can be no lenghtening of trains to rosslare.
- if current 5 car services are lenghtened to 6 cars, will services such as off peak Dublin- Cork icr services be unnecessarily lengthened or shortened to 4 coaches.

Also good news as presumably 12 of the 6 car ICR sets will not have premier class, which means that a current 5 car service to places such as Tralee will be extended to 6 car, and presuming no premier class, there will be an extra 102 seats, or a 33.5% increase.

All in all it is good news and hopefully it won't be the end of it.

I don't follow, Tralee will just change from a 5 car PC to a 6 car PC like it was before.

GM228 · 31-10-2019 9:38pm

L1011 wrote: »

60 options? Should be exercised immediately ASAP surely?

It was hard enough getting the DoF to cough up the €150M as it was, can't see them releasing another €220M, especially when €600M is to be found for the hybrid fleet and another €XM for the ICR hybrid and transmission conversion projects.

I understand the 60 options includes all vehicle types (i.e not just centre cars), I can't see them being taken up.

Ireland trains · 31-10-2019 10:09pm

Del.Monte wrote: »

How is reducing the availability of so called 'Premier' class accommodation a good thing?

More seats

Geuze · 31-10-2019 10:45pm

L1011 wrote: »

The days of railways building (or reassembling, as most recent Irish "built" ones were) their own stock are long gone, no matter what fond memories you may have.

Does IE have the in-house skills to refurbish the 2700 class?

Del.Monte · 31-10-2019 11:18pm

Ireland trains wrote: »

More seats

Same argument could be used to remove some standard class seats too - more standing room. Removal of the already poor 1st/Premier class offering will further lead to the downgrading of the entire service to something below the existing standard class. All of Irish Rail's inter-city services should benchmark themselves against Belmond's train and aspire to continually improve their offering instead of staggering from crisis to crisis.

L1011 · 31-10-2019 11:23pm

Geuze wrote: »

Does IE have the in-house skills to refurbish the 2700 class?

No. And they never had.

Zaph · 31-10-2019 11:25pm

L1011 wrote: »

60 options? Should be exercised immediately ASAP surely?

Given that this thread was started 3 years ago and it's taken until now to order the 41 cars for delivery in 2 years, it defies any sort of logic to hold off on exercising the options. It's not like they aren't needed, so why not try to have them available as soon as possible after the initial order is completed? Although of course this is Irish Rail we're talking about, so logic probably isn't a factor.

Vic_08 · 01-11-2019 1:08am

Del.Monte wrote: »

Same argument could be used to remove some standard class seats too - more standing room. Removal of the already poor 1st/Premier class offering will further lead to the downgrading of the entire service to something below the existing standard class. All of Irish Rail's inter-city services should benchmark themselves against Belmond's train and aspire to continually improve their offering instead of staggering from crisis to crisis.

You post some nonsense here but this is off the wall even for you.

IE should benchmark their trains against a company charging the super rich €15k for a 6 day railtour? So when IE remove 95% of their seats so (you?) can be whisked around the country in luxury where do you suggest the rest of the public go when they want an affordable journey?

Any sort of higher class accommodation on public transport is only viable if it pays it's way, subsidising it from the public purse or general fares is in no way justifiable, especially when the space could be used to alleviate overcrowding.

If a higher spec of 1st class can bring in better revenue at higher fares to justify it then yes but if all it does is increase the cost base while carting around fresh air on otherwise packed trains then it cannot be supported.

The same goes for enhanced catering provision, using fares or tax revenue to subvent a small number of people reliving the "golden age" of rail travel is not on.

If you want to experience the Belmond so much then quick, book yourself on it's selling out fast.

Del.Monte · 01-11-2019 9:03am

@ Vic 08

Pity that you can't read what I wrote rather than what you think I wrote and I'm not being drawn by your smart comments.

Jem72 · 01-11-2019 9:11am

Is it just me or is that a very strange layout for an Intercity Railcar. Knowing Irish Rail, this will be used a standing space which is just wrong on an Intercity service. I get the rationale of removing the toilet - 3 toilets on a 4 car set is plenty leaving it as open space is a bit strange.

It would be great if they were to use the space to improve catering services on trains with no premier car but I wouldn't expect that to happen.

DoctorPan · 01-11-2019 10:28am

Jem72 wrote: »

Is it just me or is that a very strange layout for an Intercity Railcar. Knowing Irish Rail, this will be used a standing space which is just wrong on an Intercity service. I get the rationale of removing the toilet - 3 toilets on a 4 car set is plenty leaving it as open space is a bit strange.

It would be great if they were to use the space to improve catering services on trains with no premier car but I wouldn't expect that to happen.

It's meant to be for bike storage like NIR's DMUs.

Geuze · 01-11-2019 12:02pm

If the overcrowding is on commuter trains around Dublin, then why not order more of the 29000 class?

Is is because it's easier to order more ICR because options already exist in the original contract to order more?

DoctorPan · 01-11-2019 12:26pm

Geuze wrote: »

If the overcrowding is on commuter trains around Dublin, then why not order more of the 29000 class?

Is is because it's easier to order more ICR because options already exist in the original contract to order more?

The option existed in the original contract for a further order of ICR centre cars so that's why we're getting more ICRs. Should have been some off lease class 185s.

devnull · 01-11-2019 12:28pm

Geuze wrote: »

If the overcrowding is on commuter trains around Dublin, then why not order more of the 29000 class?

Is is because it's easier to order more ICR because options already exist in the original contract to order more?

The 29000 class hasn't been built for 15 years and is no longer avaliable to order.

MrAbyss · 01-11-2019 2:25pm

Jem72 wrote: »

Is it just me or is that a very strange layout for an Intercity Railcar. Knowing Irish Rail, this will be used a standing space which is just wrong on an Intercity service.

It's for commuter services as there is a chronic overcrowding issue in the GDR. People from provincial regions will already have their seat before the train reaches the outskirts of big smoke. I think it is an excellent compromise and everyone wins.

If it was up to me I would have made the standing/tip-up seating twice as much as what they ordered.

IE 222 · 02-11-2019 2:00am

I think it's a big mistake doing away with the 5 car formations. A lot of them 3&4 cars will likely have to work in pairs, drastically reducing the number of available sets. 5 cars are perfect for the likes of Waterford, Sligo, Westport and even PPT with the extra standing room.

Will they be able to turn some of the new cars so they could have one large standing area in the centre instead of 2 separate areas.

60 options are good, be interesting to see if they'll pursue this. Maybe creating options for a future Enterprise replacement/expansion. I think they could of negotiated for 45 cars, extra 4 driving cars, with the extra €50 million especially as they've the 60 options which includes driving cars.

Jem72 · 02-11-2019 10:16am

I can't see a single standing area on a relatively log train working well at all. Passengers tend to distribute themselves relatively evenly along platforms so only a small proportion of them will be in the right place to get on at the standing area and the trains will be too packed to move along the corridors.

It's also of relatively little use to long-distance commuters in the evenings. The real solution to overcrowding on these services is proper stopping patterns and to use real commuter trains for the shorter journeys. Ripping a heap of seats out of an extremely expensive intercity railcar just ends up wasting a quarter of the space in the unit when it is used for its intended purpose.

41 new ICR centre cars

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