2004 Rail Passenger Development Survey

Originally posted by Brian Hanson
2004 Rail Passenger Development Survey

Catering – Vending Machines/Trolley Service Only on Intercity Trains
Clockface Inter-City Departures
Cork – Improved Commuter Service
Cork – Midleton Reopening
DART – Extension to Dublin Airport
DART – Extension to Maynooth
DART – Phoenix Park Tunnel Route (increased GDR integration and capacity)
Integrated Ticketing
Late Night Trains on DART and Commuter Routes
Limerick Commuter Rail Services
LUAS – Connect Lines A and B
LUAS to Cherrywood/Shanganagh
Mayo Link (Westport-Castlebar-Ballina Regional Service)
Metro to Swords (via Dublin Airport)
Navan Commuter Rail Service (reopening Clonsilla-Navan line)
Open Access for Other Passenger Operators on Irish Rail Network
Park n’ Ride at Commuter Train Stations
WRC – Athenry-Ennis Reopening
WRC – Athenry-Tuam Reopening (Galway Commuter Service)

Considering an inevitable bias in favour of the East coast and the services I use, and a lack of knowledge of some of the other routes, I don’t think I’m in a position to decide what is or isn’t important, taking the whole country into account.

Can I ask Brian what you think of the new Commuter trains?
I have not a single decent word to say of them. It is infuriating to see Min Brennan cutting ribbons and exclaiming the supposed wonders of these new trains, not to mention newspaper articles and Iarnrod Eireann advertising, all from people who never have to use them.
They are horrible, uncomfortable, glorified cattle trains.

The windows are positioned too high to get a comforable view out

The seating is not positioned in a fashion conducive to a decent view, often a chunk of plastic wall in your face.

Worst of all, it would appear that the engines are now under each carriage, rather than in the form of an engine-car pullling the train along. The noise of them is terrible, often unbearable if sitting right over them. And whatever about not being able to hear a radio or walkman – as long-suffering commuters use – you can barely even hear someone speaking.

The interiors are as bland as is possibly concievable, with the usual suspect – as Rory calls – vomit n blue identikit seating.

Wheras I appreciate that the romanticism of the train journey is now long gone (not that it should be) the sheer unpleasantness and blatent practicality of this model leaves a lot to be desired. Undoubtedly IR would argue that these are only commuter trains, with people only being on them for distances of 10-20 miles. But when that’s translated into actual time, and when you are travelling to the furthest reaches of the service, say down into Wicklow on the new line, or to Dundalk, it is most unpleasnat to be sitting in an uncomfortable seat, looking at a comparitively blank wall, not being able to listen to the radio, with an engine roaring benaeth you, for an hour and a half!
Obviously if you get a decent window seat, (assuming you get one at all) things are a little better.
They are also designed to maximise standing room, to the detriment of comfortable seating. And standing for 3/4 of an hour in one of these is less than pleasant too.
It’s such a shame that rail travel has nearly lost whatever special quality it had, as a result of these, crass, pile em high, cheap and very uncheerful trains.
And to think that 80 cars have been bought with ‘more on the way’…

Uniting the existing systems and ports and airport through:

Integrated ticketing

Phase one integrator via the Park Tunnel

Phase two integrator (spencer Dock to Heuston via St Green)

All of the others on a phased basis.

The Enterprise should be the standard for all rail journeys >50kms

Value for money is essential in implementation and cheaper larger foreign contractors are vital. The cartel has outlived its shelf life

Originally posted by Diaspora
The Enterprise should be the standard for all rail journeys >50kms

You mean gross unreliability, dodgy track and hygiene standards that would get a restaurant shut down?
http://www.kellstransportmuseum.com/index.html

Also, access to the dining car for 1st class passengers only?

As a regular user of the “new” trains, I find it very frustrating and and often quite sickening that one cannot get a view out of the trains when standing (which is quite often the case).

I suspect the trains as designed in Japan were designed for an typically smaller framed passenger.

Hopefully IR will take this into account in future procurement.:mad:

Cork – Improved Commuter Service
Cork – Midleton Reopening
DART – Extension to Dublin Airport
Integrated Ticketing
Late Night Trains on DART and Commuter Routes
Limerick Commuter Rail Services
Park n’ Ride at Commuter Train Stations
Shannon Airport Rail Link

These are some of the areas I think IE should be prioritising. i think there should be a rail link to the 3 main airports Dublin, Shannon and Cork. Park and Ride facilities should be available at stations to encourage people to keep cars out of the cities

Finally stations should be modernised. Great work has been done in Houston but there are other stations around the country that haven’t been touched in 50 years.

Clockface Inter-City Departures
Cork – Improved Commuter Service
Cork – Midleton Reopening
DART – Extension to Dublin Airport
DART – Phoenix Park Tunnel Route (increased GDR integration and capacity)
Direct Dublin to Derry Service
Electrify Belfast-Dublin Route
Electrify Dublin-Cork Route
Integrated Ticketing
Late Night Trains on DART and Commuter Routes
Limerick Commuter Rail Services
Mayo Link (Westport-Castlebar-Ballina Regional Service)
Metro – Orbital
Metro to Swords (via Dublin Airport)
Mullingar-Athlone Reopening (for improved Dublin-Galway service)
Open Access for Other Passenger Operators on Irish Rail Network
Park n’ Ride at Commuter Train Stations
Shannon Airport Rail Link
Western Rail Corridor (WRC) – Entire Reopening

Ewan, that perfectly sums up the Enterprise and Connolly.

And considering that each of the Enterprises have supposedly undergone an overhaul over the past 6 months (to the detriment of losing a much needed carriage on every train) is pathetic.
And the electronic lock on one of the toilet doors has been broken for months, resulting in it continuously beeping loudly on every journey. The intercom system is either way too quiet or blares loudly, waking up every sleeper on the train in the mornings.
All staff are incredibly rude and brash.

As for Connolly – the new terminal needs to be leveled.
The toilets beggar belief – no water, no light, no locks on half the doors (assuming there’s doors at all) and not nearly enough facilities. And these are virtually new!
The quality of finish, and layout of the terminal could have been planned better by a five year old. The cheapest, low budget job ever.
Saying that, the Victorian rail-shed part & platforms are always immaculate.

Originally posted by Graham Hickey
Ewan, that perfectly sums up the Enterprise and Connolly.

And considering that each of the Enterprises have supposedly undergone an overhaul over the past 6 months (to the detriment of losing a much needed carriage on every train) is pathetic.
And the electronic lock on one of the toilet doors has been broken for months, resulting in it continuously beeping loudly on every journey. The intercom system is either way too quiet or blares loudly, waking up every sleeper on the train in the mornings.
All staff are incredibly rude and brash.

I will accept that you gentlemen are accustomed to higher standards. The other routes I use reasonably regularly are Kilkenny and Westport. Personally I find the enterprise less congested more comfortable and more punctual.

But I would have no objection to improvement which is always possible. Just out of interest what are your two benchmarks that you mark the Enterprise against?

Catering – Restaurant Coach/Trolley Services on Intercity Trains
Catering – Vending Machines/Trolley Service Only on Intercity Trains
Clockface Inter-City Departures
Cork – Improved Commuter Service
Cork – Midleton Reopening
DART – Extension to Drogheda
DART – Extension to Dublin Airport
DART – Extension to Kildare Town
DART – Extension to Maynooth
DART – Phoenix Park Tunnel Route (increased GDR integration and capacity)
Direct Dublin to Derry Service
Electrify Belfast-Dublin Route
Electrify Dublin-Cork Route
Integrated Ticketing
Late Night Trains on DART and Commuter Routes
Limerick Commuter Rail Services
LUAS – Connect Lines A and B
LUAS to Cherrywood/Shanganagh
LUAS to Docklands
LUAS to Lucan
Mayo Link (Westport-Castlebar-Ballina Regional Service)
Metro – Orbital
Metro to Swords (via Dublin Airport)
Mullingar-Athlone Reopening (for improved Dublin-Galway service)
Navan Commuter Rail Service (reopening Clonsilla-Navan line)
Navan-Drogheda Line Passenger Upgrade
Open Access for Other Passenger Operators on Irish Rail Network
Park n’ Ride at Commuter Train Stations
Shannon Airport Rail Link
Sligo Suburban Service (Sligo-Ballymote)
The Dublin Rail Interconnector (maximum GDR integration and capacity)
Waterford Suburban Rail Service
Western Rail Corridor (WRC) – Entire Reopening
WRC – Athenry-Claremorris Reopening
WRC – Athenry-Ennis Reopening
WRC – Athenry-Tuam Reopening (Galway Commuter Service)
WRC – Claremorris-Collooney Reopening

any of the above would be good. most important to me would be;
the midleton line reopening,
electrify dublin to cork route,
Open Access for Other Passenger Operators on Irish Rail Network,
late night darts.

On top of that, replace network catering with a decent private service. And fire all those miserable, rude, gum-chewing bints that serve food in an awful condition for inflated prices.

Also, replace the entire Kent Station complex with a decent modern station. And straighten the platform to avoid long jumps onto and off the train.

Diaspora, regarding the Enterprise, reliability is so unbelievably laughably pathetic. It is a standing joke with all of the commuters, many of whom complain continuously to IE and Translink.

In the 3 years I have used it, never ever ever has it arrived on time, and between 2 and 3 of the 5 mornings in the week it will be 10 minutes late or more, often 20 minutes. And this is the flagship service to get commuters to the capital by 9.00am.

It doesn’t even leave Connolly on time, where they have direct control over what time it departs.
Coupled with bomb scares, landslides, ‘a problem with the doors’ ‘a problem with the engine’ ‘a problem with the wheels’ (my personal favorite) and an equal lack of efficency at the Belfast end, results in a very very poor service.

Certainly I’d agree that it is a very comfortable train, the best in the country, and comparable with top European models, but that’s just the basic infrastructure. What makes a ‘flagship’ service, what Translink and IE claim it is, is the that service provided: punctuality, reliability, maintainance and courteous staff.

The train itself embodies the unrivalled charm of rail travel, the service does anything but.

I used the enterprise about 10 times in each direction and it was late only three times by more than 2-3 mins, on one occaision it was 10 mins late another about 20 minutes and my worst experience was 45 minutes when track works were being done near Portadown.

My biggest gripe was the total smoking ban on the train, but as we all know trains are not the only places.

Sure that’s the same on every train isn’t it?

I appreciate it’s very easy to exaggerate issues such as this, and that for example my calling the service pathetic doesn’t exactly correlate with it being 10 minutes late or more 2/3 times a week.

What must be factored into account however is the utter frustration commuters feel when experiencing this – at times – three times in a row, or rushing to get to the station and then finding it’s delayed.
Or much more importantly, the total unreliablitity of the service.
If you have to be in Dublin for a meeting at a designated time, and it’s late, you get off steaming and fuming at Connolly threatening deep revenge. And if it’s more than 15 mins late leaving Belfast in the mornings, it misses its Dublin suburban/DART slots, meaning it’s half an hour late arriving at Connolly after crawling in from Malahide

Essentially, in the mornings, if you have to be somewhere at a designated time, you’ve to get a train nearly an hour earlier, that stops at every flippin station along the way. That earlier train thrives on the inefficency of the Enterprise, it’s packed by the time it reaches Drogheda, let alone Balbriggan or other busy stations.

The afternoon Enterprises are more reliable and punctual, but even then, they always leave Connolly 3 mins late – where they have direct control over closing the gates etc.
They really need to get their act together, but this type of thing has been complained about at length for the past 3/4 years now, directly to the companies, to staff, and in passenger surveys etc – all to no avail.

Originally posted by Diaspora
Just out of interest what are your two benchmarks that you mark the Enterprise against?

I have always said (given that I am known up to Board level in CIE and Irish Rail as an antagonist against them) that when DB, the German State Railway complains to the effect that Irish Rail is making them look slack, I can stop complaining. At 30, I’m planning to be active in this field for at least another five decades, miracles aside.

I think VR in Finland is a good benchmark – similar population densities and distributions in the two countries, VR operates high speed services regularly on a big network, and makes a profit, albeit without having responsibility for the rails themselves.

Originally posted by Diaspora

My biggest gripe was the total smoking ban on the train, but as we all know trains are not the only places.

Ahahahah!! You’re shagged now arent you? Ahahaha

On the trains between belfast and dublin can you smoke til the border then is it no smoking the rest of the way? Its probably only a matter of time before the ban spreads to the britons.

Originally posted by Brian Hanson
the reults of the survey are posted here:

http://www.platform11.org/dev_survey.html

thanks for all who took part

Can it be taken that this survey has given rise to Platform 11’s withdrawal of support for the WRC?

Originally posted by ewanduffy

Can it be taken that this survey has given rise to Platform 11’s withdrawal of support for the WRC?

This is the reason why:

http://www.platform11.org/gal_ennis_lim.html

I’m already aware of Platform 11s turncoat philosophy, I don’t need a lecture on it, least of all one that is delivered 2 months after my original post.

On the trains between belfast and dublin can you smoke til the border then is it no smoking the rest of the way? Its probably only a matter of time before the ban spreads to the britons

There has always been a smoking ban on the enterprise both north & south of the border. And the last train on a Friday (8:45pm) from Connolly always runs on time, but then something goes arseways at Howth Junction. A former neighbour of mine was trapped on the malahide viaduct on an enterprise for 1.5 hours before anarchy practically broke out and people opened the doors to walk back to Malahide station