Packed 4-coach 22k this morning

[Jamie2k9]

It's 100% fact there will be to many 4 and not enough 3 piece sets. If Sligo can't manage it then other routes won't be able to at all.

I think they are going to have to come up with a 50/50 split in train sizes only realistic options to reduce costs (from current levels) but maintain a service.

[grainne whale]

Originally Posted by berneyarms

I don't necessarily disagree - but I do wonder how this is going to be sorted out, given that there will only be 18 3 piece sets to go around.

Oh for goodness sake - just go and sit on someone's knee

[maloner]

Childern & OAPs sitting on the floor in toilets.

I use the train for business & am back in the car this week - no seats from mullingar.

Midlands 103 are running a feature at 10am on it this morning.

Call in & voice your concerns.

Twitter hashtag #shorttrain

[James Howard]

What kind of numptys are Irish Rail? This train is usually packed to the rafters as a 6-car. As a daily commuter I avoid it as a matter of course between October and Christmas. But 4 cars for the 17:05 is taking the piss.

7 cars for the 0545 this morning is lovely and comfy now that they have managed to drive away enough customers. 6 was right for this train on a Monday, 4 is too short but 7 is definitely too long now.

[berneyarms]

From the outset I felt this cost cutting project would come back to haunt them, in terms of capacity.

Cost cutting is fine provided service delivery is not impacted. But when customers start to leave out of sheer frustration then "Houston we have a problem".

There are two diagrams in Connolly that simply cannot get away with anything short of a six piece set - the 0545 from Sligo and the 1705 return, and the commuter diagram on the Northern Line.

But as we've seen even the 09:00 from Sligo suffered from long distance standing last week. I don't think that any reasonable person would consider standing from Longford acceptable.

They need to monitor this very carefully as otherwise people are just going to walk away.

[berneyarms]

Originally Posted by James Howard

What kind of numptys are Irish Rail? This train is usually packed to the rafters as a 6-car. As a daily commuter I avoid it as a matter of course between October and Christmas. But 4 cars for the 17:05 is taking the piss.

7 cars for the 0545 this morning is lovely and comfy now that they have managed to drive away enough customers. 6 was right for this train on a Monday, 4 is too short but 7 is definitely too long now.

The number of three car sets available is fairly limited - so I'd not be giving out about it being a 7 piece - better to have too much room than too little!!

[JohnnyBoy]

Well, after using I.E.'s 'services' for over ten years the current moves have finally pushed me out. It is now quicker for me to drive as to get the train (probably to be expected but when I take into account journey times to and from stations it works out about 50% longer to take the train). It's now a lot more comfortable to drive (might sound like another 'to be expected' but I.E. themselves market train travel's comfort and now that they're putting woefully inadequate trains on at peak times any comfort is GONE). It's now as cheap for me the drive as get the train and that represents an EPIC fail in public transport policy. It would seem that IE are dependant on extortionate parking charges in the city to keep people on trains. Ah well, at least it won't be my problem much longer.

[James Howard]

I am not surprised that people are turning away from the train service given the massive increase in cost and the reduction in service quality. So much for Irish Rails supposed new-found customer focus.

I am hoping that the present situation is temporarily especially bad just because there are a number of sets out of service due to being reconfigured. However, Irish Rail have dealt with this situation in a typical cack-handed way. I really think they should have held onto a few 6-car units - the Sligo line could definitely do with one for running the 0545 up train and the 1705 down train although it may be difficult to find gainful employment for the set during the day. It is obvious that there are going to be far too few 3-car sets.

The 1705 on a Friday should always be a 7-car formation but this is going to be difficult given how sparse the 3-car units are. The 1705 is busy enough on most days to warrant 6 cars. From what I understand, 8-car formations are not possible on the Sligo line, yet given that Irish Rail have so many 4-car sets, this is the only easy way to provide extra capacity on a Friday.

[Jamie2k9]

Appears 17.05 is back to a 6 piece, while the 16.00 has dropped to 4.

[James Howard]

But that can only be a temporary solution given that 6-pieces are supposed to be going. This is utter madness. The 0545 is packed again this morning - a few standing from Mullingar, nobody from Enfield onwards with seats.

A friend was on the 1505 down train last Thursday after managing to get out from work early. It was a 3 car train and he stood all the way to Edgeworthstown.

These are people who get the train every day and who use the commute time to get some work done or to relax a bit on the the way to work. How can this possibly be positive Irish Rail's finances? With the fare increase, it is now getting marginal as to the difference in running cost for a cheap car if you have free parking in the city centre.

Would it be madness to suggest that this is deliberate in order to drive down the viability of the railway and so when the calls come to start shutting stuff down, people won't mind so much?

[lambo77]

As a mullingar commuter I have no intention of paying nearly 1600 Euro a year net for my annual ticket to stand for 1.5 hours in both directions. Irish rail obviously don't have any mensa members! Cutting Capacity on peak services that were already busy is ridiculus

[berneyarms]

Originally Posted by James Howard

But that can only be a temporary solution given that 6-pieces are supposed to be going. This is utter madness. The 0545 is packed again this morning - a few standing from Mullingar, nobody from Enfield onwards with seats.

A friend was on the 1505 down train last Thursday after managing to get out from work early. It was a 3 car train and he stood all the way to Edgeworthstown.

These are people who get the train every day and who use the commute time to get some work done or to relax a bit on the the way to work. How can this possibly be positive Irish Rail's finances? With the fare increase, it is now getting marginal as to the difference in running cost for a cheap car if you have free parking in the city centre.

Would it be madness to suggest that this is deliberate in order to drive down the viability of the railway and so when the calls come to start shutting stuff down, people won't mind so much?

It should be perfectly possible to retain either 6pce or 7pce operation on the 05:45 from Sligo and 17:05 return with the stock available - while the sets are being reformed there may be an issue.

What was the 05:45 formed of this morning?

The 15:05 has always been a 3-car train, except on Fridays when it was extended to a 6 piece. So nothing has changed about that.

[ThomasJ]

According to boards.ie the 5.40 Longford pearse is leaving people on the maynooth line behind due to being unable to board. That is a 4 coach 22k set.

Worrying to say the least!

[Jamie2k9]

IMO IE management should do the following with the fleet.

37 3 piece
15 4 piece
10 6 piece

All the high capacity 6 piece sets dropped into sets of 4. This way they would get savings, not quiet as much but savings all the same. There is no other way IE will reduce costs and keep customers at the same time.

[Inniskeen]

I would imagine that a four-car 22k formed 0540 is more than adequate for traffic between Longford and at least Maynooth. Would it not be better to run this train non-stop from Maynooth (or Clonsilla) to Connolly and recast other services accordingly to accommodate intermediate traffic ?

[James Howard]

That would be an excellent solution for both of the early Longford services - just run a stopping train immediately behind them. It is crazy running stopping commuter trains from as far Longford especially when one of them is an ICR which makes getting on and off extremely difficult. However, I would think that you would find that these services would end up very popular with Maynooth commuters as they would be about 15 minutes quicker than the other train on the line and so would end up jammed anyway.

Something is going to have to give with this on the Sligo line. The main issue is that probably 75% of the daily up traffic is on the first two trains and they really can't get away with running these as 4 cars without causing serious passenger discomfort.

They may have given up on 4 cars for the 0540 from Longford - the 1805 was 7 cars yesterday. So in effect, they have basically added an extra car to a train that was already fairly generously provisioned with 6 cars. This train was 4 cars on Monday and while crowded to Maynooth, wasn't that bad for most of the journey.

This whole thing has a whiff of new management coming in from England where crazy levels of peak-time overcrowding due to lack of capacity is completely the norm. In one week they have managed to turn the Sligo line into UK mode by putting the fares up 10% and cutting capacity so that everyone is crammed in like sardines.

[ThomasJ]

Originally Posted by James Howard

That would be an excellent solution for both of the early Longford services - just run a stopping train immediately behind them. It is crazy running stopping commuter trains from as far Longford especially when one of them is an ICR which makes getting on and off extremely difficult. However, I would think that you would find that these services would end up very popular with Maynooth commuters as they would be about 15 minutes quicker than the other train on the line and so would end up jammed anyway.

Something is going to have to give with this on the Sligo line. The main issue is that probably 75% of the daily up traffic is on the first two trains and they really can't get away with running these as 4 cars without causing serious passenger discomfort.

They may have given up on 4 cars for the 0540 from Longford - the 1805 was 7 cars yesterday. So in effect, they have basically added an extra car to a train that was already fairly generously provisioned with 6 cars. This train was 4 cars on Monday and while crowded to Maynooth, wasn't that bad for most of the journey.

This whole thing has a whiff of new management coming in from England where crazy levels of peak-time overcrowding due to lack of capacity is completely the norm. In one week they have managed to turn the Sligo line into UK mode by putting the fares up 10% and cutting capacity so that everyone is crammed in like sardines.

But from what people on boards.is were saying, people were unable to board the train at ashtown yesterday.

The 5.40 indeed was a 7-coach this morning.

Just to point out the 5.40 originally started in maynooth. If they had expected these problems maybe they shouldn't have extended it to Longford.

But seriously the 05.40 is a commuter service, maybe the 8-coach 29k needs a return!

[James Howard]

Part of the original justification for the massive 22k order was that no train journeys longer than one hour should be on commuter rolling stock. While Longford is technically a commuter run, it is a very long journey (2 hours 10 minutes to Pearse) to be making every day on noisy drafty commuter rolling stock where the tables are too small for more than one person in 4 to use a laptop. It is also an unacceptably long journey time for a run of around 75 miles.

If Irish Rail want to make efficiency savings on these runs, it would make a lot of sense to properly segregate Intercity, Regional and Local services on the Sligo line. The services have different rolling stock needs and it degrades the attractiveness of the Longford service to have the journey time extended in order to make something like 12 stops between Maynooth and the city. They could probably make massive fuel savings by cutting both early Longford trains to 4 cars and avoiding stops between Maynooth and the city.

Personally, I would switch back to an earlier train if it were a 22k and they could get the running time from Edgeworthstown down to 1'40 by making it express from Maynooth

[finnyus]

A 4-car was introduced on the Mallow - Tralee line this morning, operating the 06:45 Cork to Tralee service.

[lambo77]

4 car 29k this evening - the 6:05.pm to Longford. Packed to Kilkock