Quote:
Originally Posted by Mark Gleeson
Curiously enough the key complaints is not the early starts
Its the 18:50 Howth Bray, 22:00 Heuston Portlaois and so on
Irish Rail seem to want to both ways, when they got caught spending €70,000 per annum on taxis to Longford, they relocated the drivers to Longford problem solved
Curiously the solution isn't workable elsewhere. Until IE place staff in Gorey a late evening service isn't a runner
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How many crews are at Longford - and how many trains start there? A Gorey starter is only likely to require two shifts - a morning and an evening. Factor in spare cover for rest days, leave, sickness, training etc, and you would need at least 4 crews to cover those two shifts - three if it was Monday - Friday only, although even this would probably require additional cover from Dublin. Less, and reliability will be poor. Cost is too great for the amount of traffic likely to be on offer.
There are (I believe) crews at Portlaoise. I share the frustration about the evening train which runs empty, but suspect that as the trains worked by the new units has varied during the introduction period so has the time of movements to and from the new depot - as well as the effect of the KRP works. As the letter in Metro says, this will be consolidated when the new fleet is fully up and running. Having said that, driving down the N7/M7 at about that time in the evening it is near empty after Naas, so again how much of a market is there is open to debate.
LC