Rail Users Ireland Forum - View Single Post - Dublin - Sligo and Sligo

James Howard · 04-09-2013, 19:10

That's the problem with Irish Rail - they don't have enough flexibility. I think that it is a bit ridiculous at weekends in that the first train to Dublin is extremely late - particularly on Sunday when you can't get to Dublin before mid-day. This is kind of fair enough when it comes to doing the whole run - not many people are going to get onto a train at 6am on a Saturday in Sligo. But you would certainly have a reasonable level of business for getting on a train at 7:30 in Longford or 8 in Mullingar.

Irish Rail have valuable assets (a 6-car 22k cost something along the lines of 10 million euro) sitting around all weekend and there is an issue with these assets being needed elsewhere and for the lack of a driver at Longford, people are putting up with a sub-standard service both in terms of using inadequate trains and the very late first train to Dublin at weekends.

I think it is likely that Irish Rail are doomed in the long-term if they can't get out of this mind-set. There are private operators, who faced with the lack of an operator for a 10 million euro vehicle that is probably idle for about 75% of the week would just hire somebody and be able to let them go if the service wasn't profitable. The only reason Irish Rail and Bus Eireann can compete is that they are effectively getting the capital equipment for free. The only reason that this hasn't been stopped by the EU competition authorities is because the Germans and French are worse.

By comparison, look at the Aircoach service. They are running services all night with extremely light loads. I occasionally have a early flight and end up taking an Aircoach to the airport at about 10 at night. Only once or twice have I gotten on the bus to see more than three or four passengers. Yet, the combination of the sunk cost in the vehicle and the advantages of providing a reliable service that you can get home on if your flight is delayed by 4 hours means it is worth their while providing unprofitable individual journeys. The key point here is that the cost of the vehicle is built into their business plan and they must extract as much use as possible from that asset.

04-09-2013, 19:10	#67
James Howard Really Really Regluar Poster Join Date: Aug 2009 Location: Sligo Line Posts: 1,115	That's the problem with Irish Rail - they don't have enough flexibility. I think that it is a bit ridiculous at weekends in that the first train to Dublin is extremely late - particularly on Sunday when you can't get to Dublin before mid-day. This is kind of fair enough when it comes to doing the whole run - not many people are going to get onto a train at 6am on a Saturday in Sligo. But you would certainly have a reasonable level of business for getting on a train at 7:30 in Longford or 8 in Mullingar. Irish Rail have valuable assets (a 6-car 22k cost something along the lines of 10 million euro) sitting around all weekend and there is an issue with these assets being needed elsewhere and for the lack of a driver at Longford, people are putting up with a sub-standard service both in terms of using inadequate trains and the very late first train to Dublin at weekends. I think it is likely that Irish Rail are doomed in the long-term if they can't get out of this mind-set. There are private operators, who faced with the lack of an operator for a 10 million euro vehicle that is probably idle for about 75% of the week would just hire somebody and be able to let them go if the service wasn't profitable. The only reason Irish Rail and Bus Eireann can compete is that they are effectively getting the capital equipment for free. The only reason that this hasn't been stopped by the EU competition authorities is because the Germans and French are worse. By comparison, look at the Aircoach service. They are running services all night with extremely light loads. I occasionally have a early flight and end up taking an Aircoach to the airport at about 10 at night. Only once or twice have I gotten on the bus to see more than three or four passengers. Yet, the combination of the sunk cost in the vehicle and the advantages of providing a reliable service that you can get home on if your flight is delayed by 4 hours means it is worth their while providing unprofitable individual journeys. The key point here is that the cost of the vehicle is built into their business plan and they must extract as much use as possible from that asset.