Early services to Cork
 

So, I've to spend a day in Cork towards the end of the month. I vehemently oppose internal air travel and go on frequent, passionate rants about how unsustainable and pointless it is. (Ryanair's new Dublin-Shannon service provoked such grumbling this week). And therefore, my default position is to travel by train (I neither know how to drive nor hold a driving licence). I'm prepared to pay a little more for train where necessary.

But what's this?

First train leaves Cork - 5.30am.
First train leaves Dublin - 7.00am.

Therefore, it's absolutely impossible to be in Cork for a 9am or 9.30am start - indeed, given the trek across town from the station, even 10am is pushing it. And I'm sure I'm not the first person to have had a need to be in Cork at the start of the business day...

Therefore, it seems likely that I'm going to end up flying with Ryanair. Or travelling the night before (although for practical and financial reasons that might not be possible).

Daft or what?

Yup. Been through the same problem myself way too many times. On the plus side the last train leaves Dublin later than it leaves Cork. There used to be an early train on Mondays from Dublin i think but not any more.

When i do need to be in cork early i usually just come down the night before accomodation in corks pretty cheap and its your safest bet since Cork Airports not the most reliable in the morning being on top of a hill. If only we had Belfast style overnight buses if an early train is defined "impossible".....

This is an interesting problem, cleary a 6am service is needed

Normally the first train of the day from Heuston to an intercity destination would be Ax00, x representing the destination but the first to Cork is A202 (even away from Dublin odd towards) which suggests there is a train ahead of the 7am, there is a clear path for it clearly something they thought about but didn't implement.

If a 6am from Dublin was implemented it would require a balancing movement from Cork which would be either the currently missing 8:30 by moving the Tralee train back or forward 10 minutes or adding a 21:30 to Dublin

But this is Ireland and all business takes place in the capital - what reason would anyone have to travel to Cork or Belfast for a 09:00 meeting?

Actually, the Enterprise could really do with an earlier service in both directions. The first southbound service only arrives in Dublin at 9:00, so it isn't possible to get from the train to a meeting or place of work in time for normal business hours.

It's a pain alright.

The 7am will also only get you into Limerick for 9:15am, which while not so bad, means 9:30am or so is the earliest you can arrive for meetings. An early train to Cork would solve that as well.

While long-distance commuting is not as prevalent in the South as it is in Dublin, it also means that Mallow is the furthest away for practical train-commuting into Cork. There are certainly a number of people who commute in from Charleville, either by car or bus, so a stop there would be handy.