What needs to happen to facilitate Kildare-Grand Canal Dock services?
 

Big picture:
* Has the revised track at GCD been done?
* Where are we with the city-centre signalling system?
* A fare matrix needs to be compiled and ticket machines programmed.
* What rolling stock?
* Passenger information systems need re-doing.

Little picture:
* Do all stations from Heuston to Kildare have validators?
* Can the ticket machines at those stations sell / to-up Leap Cards?
* Route maps need re-doing.

Top two (track and resignalling works) are in progress due for completion later in the summer - latest stage was completed over June Bank Holiday.

Fare matrix is already there - the existing one will just have to be integrated into the ticket machines - full suburban destinations added on both sides (Connolly and Heuston).

Rolling stock - ICRs cascaded by re-introduction of full Mark IV fleet and return of ICR from Belfast route and some minor rejigging.

PIS - No new stations so it *should* work, but given the issues in the past who knows?

The four stations to Hazelhatch are all fully LEAP compatible given they already are within the Short Hop zone.

LEAP PAYG won't be used beyond Hazelhatch so it's not so big an issue.

Route maps would, one would hope, be in the planning stage.

There is an intercity fare matrix, the suburban matrix does not allow for single/return Hazelhatch Grand Canal Dock

Not to out knowledge. Current system insist that that at trip that covers the Connolly-Heuston gap is two trips.

It's likely that there will be some programming involved.

But it could and should be. :)

Fair point on the fares matrix.

The onboard PIS should just involve uploading the new train IDs on each ICR - something that happens whenever a new timetable is introduced.

Station PIS will be interesting.

I don't see the short hop zone being enlarged anytime soon, nor have there been any suggestions of increasing LEAP PAYG outside of it on Irish Rail.

Stations beyond Hazelhatch do not have validators or barriers active when the stations are closed. Also Sallins and Newbridge do have barriers on the upside entrances.
All stations beyond the 'hatch are firmly in the much more expensive point-to-point territory and I don't see IE giving up on that revenue soon.

Perhaps, but (a) they no longer control fares and (b) while the discount for using Leap is substantial, the number of passengers should grow. The problem is someone getting on a commuter train in Grand Canal Dock not unreasonably expecting to be able to tag-off at the other end, seeing as they can use Leap on Bus Éireann commuter services.

On BE you interact with the driver for either single or zonal ticket. Zonal would work fine too on IE since you wouldn't need to tag-off but single fares would be a problem.
Also, since one could board a Kildare train at GCD, all Leap cards would have to have a higher minimum credit than the €5 for the short-hop zone.

All a bit negative but extending Leap pay-as-you-go beyond the short hop zone without driver interaction as on BE means system wide changes to min credit and, of course, bigger penalties if you forget to tag-off. Or you would need a different Leap card with higher credit limit.

How do passengers going to stations beyond Balbriggan boarding commuter trains at Grand Canal Dock cope so?

My taxsaver leap card has a Drogheda-Lansdowne Road point-to-point ticket loaded on it. I can tag of or off stations in that range without getting charged from my Leap card balance. I can also use other routes where Leap card is accepted and those fares get deducted from the balance.

However, pay as you go cards cannot be used beyond Balbriggan, only pre-paid monthly or yearly tickets.

James

I know that!

I was making the point that people are actually able to understand that pay-as-you-go only goes as far as the Short Hop zone boundary.

Colm didn't seem to think that they could!

The thing is, the maximum fare is already in excess of the deduction made when you tag-on.I'm not so sure of this. As I understand it, validators were fitted in Drogheda from the start to allow for people who inadvertently do this.

Given that nobody actually reads anything any more due to being continuously bombarded with small print, it is quite likely that a lot of Leap users don't understand that it only works within short hop.

Three years after signing up most people will have forgotten the limits the first time they try to use a leap card to get to Kilcock and find out they can't tag off.

Yeah, I don't know what happens in that case, and would be curious to find out.

James

Here's a question?

What happens when a LEAP card with a Point-to-Point ticket and e-purse is presented at Pearse?

How does the system know that you are using the P2P (to Drogheda or Kildare) or want to take a DART to Bray or a commuter to Leixlip?
Does it depend in the tag-off point bearing in mind that many station soutside the Short-hop zone do have validator at all times?

or is this a case where separate LEAP cards are needed?

If you've tagged on inside the P2P zone, and tag off outside, it knows where you tagged on and will deduct the correct fare. My P2P is Drogheda to Lansdowne Rd. I'm gone Pearse to Dun Laoghaire and it worked fine.

What I haven't tried yet is combining a P2P journey with a PAYG journey, such as Drogheda to Dun Laoghaire. I could see this causing problems as the journey could easily be over 90 minutes.

James

But what happens if you don't tag-off? Some stations do not have active validators at all times - e.g Sallins only has validators for a few hours in the morning.

Pretty sure the system has no way of know you've left your P2P zone, and won't charge you. Certainly there have been times I haven't tagged off within Drogheda-Lansdowne Road and nothing has happened.

When you say validators "only has validators for a few hours", unless Sallins does something very different to other stations, the validators are available all the time, just with the doors open. You should always tag on when using a P2P ticket, otherwise your ticket won't show up on the RPU checkers. However, as far as I can tell, not tagging off incurs no penalty.

James

This is the flaw in the leap system

There isn't a tag on/off machine at every station, so no way to allow journeys beyond the SHZ on cash

This is the flaw in the leap system

There isn't a tag on/off machine at every station, so no way to allow journeys beyond the SHZ on cash