CIS screens to be turned on

[ThomasJ]

from community voice
http://www.communityvoice.ie/pages/CV165/CV165n10.htm

Over the past number of years, readers have contacted Community Voice to complain about the information screens at local railway stations which have lain idle since they were installed over seven years ago. Despite a number of enquiries by some of the paper’s most intrepid reporters no logical reason was ever forthcoming from Iarnród Éireann.

Some months ago following his appointment as Minister for Transport, this paper approached Leo Varadkar to see if he could throw some light on the non functioning information screens.

In a “note to the Minister” passed on to Community Voice by Minister Varadkar, the company explained that “the Customer Information System (CIS) screens were originally purchased for these stations at the same time as DART screens, for economies of scale reasons, in the knowledge that they would not be operational until signalling upgrading work was undertaken on the Maynooth line.

This work would fully integrate signalling with our Central Traffic Control. This is why the screens do not provide service information, and the signalling upgrade is a costly project which will be undertaken along with future electrification of the Maynooth line.”

Bearing in mind that the electrification of the Maynooth Line is still aspirational and no timescale has yet been put in place for it to take place, Iarnród Éireann has now decided to undertake work “to provide an interim solution.”

According to the company spokesperson, “this will require manual input of information, but will provide customers on the Maynooth line with improved information at stations.”

As to a time scale for getting the CIS screen finally up and running the company said “hardware and software will be ordered to affect this change and installation and testing will then follow.

It is anticipated that the project will take eight months to implement, and the CIS screens will be operational on the Maynooth line by the end of April 2012.”

[karlr42]

Hopefully they don't mean the displays will just show the timetable and instead they'll set up some kind of feed to the present system, so there's a semblance of real-time info.

[ThomasJ]

agreed, it is needed but needs to be realistic at the same time.

[dowlingm]

So... give the drivers Blackberrys with Google Latitude or Glympse loaded so a fella at Connolly can check where they are?

[Mark Gleeson]

It will just show the timetable nothing more

[Alan French]

Am I right in saying that the indicators at Navan Road Parkway haven't been altered to show the new timetable? They seem to ignore trains bound for M3 Parkway. This could be very misleading.

[ThomasJ]

Has anyone heard anymore on hows it going with these station refurbishment works?

Ive seen the notices but there doesn't seem to have been any action yet.

[ColmmacO]

No info displays online as of yet in coolmine or castleknock.
In coolmine they have (re)planted new bushes behind the maynooth bound platform. Also new bins and new seats like the metal ones they have in stations.
The rain shelters have also been removed but not replaced yet.
Presumably a job for the weekend. This weekend hopefully.

There was also work done out in the car park, with a new boundary wall built on one side. The bike shed has been moved up to the otherside of the station building too (further away from the road).

Mainly visual improvements. The new bike shed I'm sure is welcome for the cyclists.
To be honest, new metal seats arent worth much to me. Most people at commuter stops dont wait terribly long and you'd freeze your arse off sitting on them in winter. The old bin was as good as the new one.

If they really wanted to improve my passenger experience, some sort of quasi real time (gps or whatever) information system would have been nice.
Or even go mad and give us longer or more trains!

But I guess beggers cant be choosers.

[joey]

yip, they are ripping ashtown station apart also, hopefully they'll put in another ticket machine on the city bound platform...

[James Howard]

It's a pity the budget wouldn't stretch to resurfacing the second platform and putting a pedestrian bridge in at Enfield.

That would give real benefits in reliability for Longford and Maynooth commuters as it would allow easy unscheduled crossings at Enfield. Currently if a train gets delayed, the need to hold a train either at Killucan or Maynooth or reverse a train back out of Enfield to swap platforms.

But they would rather blow the money on putting in shiny new shelters and bins everywhere for no real passenger benefit, because these are more visible.

[Mark Gleeson]

The legal obligation to provide an accessible footbridge would be triggered at Enfield if they did that. The budget for the current works wouldn't got far in that case.

Enfield is clearly in need of being sorted out ASAP but it will need to be a separate source of funding.

There is a lot of political image games being played currently, the total budget available is tiny really. To be fair shelters do come up over and over again.

[ColmmacO]

Originally Posted by Mark Gleeson

The legal obligation to provide an accessible footbridge would be triggered at Enfield if they did that. The budget for the current works wouldn't got far in that case.

Enfield is clearly in need of being sorted out ASAP but it will need to be a separate source of funding.

There is a lot of political image games being played currently, the total budget available is tiny really. To be fair shelters do come up over and over again.

As far as I know this is minister varadkar looking after his constituency with whatever change he could find down the back of the couch.
Hence it is confined to Ashtown, castleknock, coolmine and clonsilla afaik.

Shelters going up yesterday and today, being erected during the morning rush hour on a narrow platform .

That said they do have sides...so a slight improvement on before.

[ThomasJ]

Originally Posted by ColmmacO

As far as I know this is minister varadkar looking after his constituency with whatever change he could find down the back of the couch.
Hence it is confined to Ashtown, castleknock, coolmine and clonsilla afaik.
.

maynooth, Leixlip Louisa, Leixlip convey and drumcondra are getting the improvements as well and are advertising it

[m3parkway]

What about Broombridge Surprisingly it doesn't seem to be vandalized anymore. All the graffiti was painted over a while back and has not been re-sprayed yet. Defiantly needs new station signs and lamps on the street lamp poles.

[ColmmacO]

Originally Posted by ThomasJ

maynooth, Leixlip Louisa, Leixlip convey and drumcondra are getting the improvements as well and are advertising it

Good to hear. You can tell I dont travel the other way very much

[ThomasJ]

Originally Posted by m3parkway

What about Broombridge Surprisingly it doesn't seem to be vandalized anymore. All the graffiti was painted over a while back and has not been re-sprayed yet. Defiantly needs new station signs and lamps on the street lamp poles.

I read a labour PR somewhere that said that broombridge is getting the treatment as well.

Only stations not getting this is Clonsilla (has its own works going on) and the m3 parkway stations (practically brand new)

[Colm Moore]

Actually, there are lots of stations receiving minor improvements at various levels.

[sean]

Originally Posted by m3parkway

What about Broombridge Surprisingly it doesn't seem to be vandalized anymore. All the graffiti was painted over a while back and has not been re-sprayed yet. Defiantly needs new station signs and lamps on the street lamp poles.

FYP.

[ThomasJ]

Just to give you an update on whats going on at clonsilla station at the moment

In the station i was looking down at the new platform and track being constructed at the moment, its a bit of a mess at the moment but it does like the platform has been built. No sign of work starting on the new entrance or the overbridge as of yet or any other major work to the station as of yet.

(One side note: with regards to the pis screens i see that the one on the citybound platform of ashtown station has being turned on and states testing ongoing. This wasnt the case before, it was the maynooth bound pis screen turned on before at ashtown.)

Outside the station the work is almost complete. There is more space on both roads heading towards the bridge. There is a large yellow box in the area before you cross the bridge and the way the road markings is setup tells me there is a signallised junction coming.

A bus shelter has now been put in place on the city bound side back where it was before the works but take note that it is still not in effect as of yet and buses are stopping at the temporary bus stop further down. Based on the road markings, it looks like the bus stop for the ongar bound side moves up to opposite the city bound bus stop, much closer to the station although it could cause problems for people getting buses up to the station if there is a signalised junction could hold up traffic.

There are car park spaces now on the opposite side further down towards ongar, not many. I suppose that will make up for the loss of spaces on the other side.

[ColmmacO]

I have a wonderful photo from this morning in Coolmine of 20 odd people huddling underneath the footbridge trying to get shelter from heavy rain, while a beautiful new (and finished) shelter stands idle as it is fenced off from use.

Its been like that a few days too.

I think it just wonderfully sums up the Irish rail passenger experience.

I havent got the camera cable in work but can text it to someone if they want to upload or will do it tonight.