Line closure - flooding at carrick on Shannon

[Jamie2k9]

I've never said that the 18:05 is lightly loaded. On the contrary it is the prime commuter service between Maynooth and Longford and I've taken it and the corresponding Intercity before it 4 days a week for 10 years. The 1715 and the old 1817 were completely pointless. The 1600 isn't a hugely useful service, but it does take a lot of student traffic on a Friday.

I'll take you word but if I remember when it changed to a 29000 recently you said it's very lightly loaded at Maynooth. I agree about the 16.00 service today and even a 4 car 29 would of done. Anyone on the 17.05 today, I have saw no complains about severe over crowding on it so IE got lucky today possibly.

It's not as if anybody who travels the Sligo route regularly hasn't seen this coming. With all of the rain over the last few weeks, it was no surprise to me that this was about to happen. Surely, somebody at Irish Rail could have made the same judgement call and started making plans to put proper bus substitutions in place and perhaps try to avoid rostering sets nearing service in Sligo over the weekend. Failing that, if the set was out of hours, they shouldn't have used it - just dropped entirely to bus substitution. It's a matter of failing to manage risk that culminated in imprisoning passengers for 4 and a half hours.

I wouldn't say it was out of hours but like everything if its not checked when scheduled then reliability of it will drop but by no means will anything happen. It seems like a major failure of the set which don't happen a lot. I would be interested to know is if there was any indications of a fault earlier during the day.

Sligo and Mayo are more less the two liens that are very isolated if there is problems. If it was on Cork, Galway or Waterford routes it's quiet easy to get rolling stock rotated.

I fully agree it's not acceptable and some bad decisions made. They have being some signs they have changed there way after what happened in July.

It's not as if anybody who travels the Sligo route regularly hasn't seen this coming. With all of the rain over the last few weeks, it was no surprise to me that this was about to happen. Surely, somebody at Irish Rail could have made the same judgement call and started making plans to put proper bus substitutions in place and perhaps try to avoid rostering sets nearing service in Sligo over the weekend. Failing that, if the set was out of hours, they shouldn't have used it - just dropped entirely to bus substitution. It's a matter of failing to manage risk that culminated in imprisoning passengers for 4 and a half hours.

If IE were to make a judgment call on the Waterford route for example last week the only section on line open would be Athy-Carlow. Thankfully the last few days have helped. As the 5.45 and 7.00 got through levels must of rose very fast and if those services hadn't got through then we would have significant problems and full bus transfers for everybody. They would not be able to supply trains to cope then.

Might also be worth saying a few train sets may be out of action from hitting trees recently. This being one:
http://www.kilkennypeople.ie/news/ki...torm-1-5888465

The problem here isn't the bus transfers but not advancing the timetable.

[joey]

Originally Posted by Jamie2k9

I'll take you word but if I remember when it changed to a 29000 recently you said it's very lightly loaded at Maynooth. I agree about the 16.00 service today and even a 4 car 29 would of done. Anyone on the 17.05 today, I have saw no complains about severe over crowding on it so IE got lucky today possibly.

I was in the 1705. It was busy with people standing, but not as per previous occasions. I think people got wind of what was going on with the route and taking previous experience made alternative arrangements

[James Howard]

I agree that what is needed is a temporary timetable. We can appreciate the impact of incidents on accidents on the running of the railway, but it costs nothing to re-organise the timetable so that passengers know when to expect a train to come.

I don't know about the 1805 right now as I haven't taken it in a couple of months as it is too uncomfortable, but I'm not the only person avoiding it now and I should think its loading past Maynooth has dropped a lot since they changed to a 29K.

If the 17:05 wasn't jammed yesterday, it must have been from people avoiding travelling. It is normally packed on a Friday and with the additional traffic from the 1600, it should have be much worse.

If any train is to go from the evening timetable, it should be the 1715. I've not taken it once in 10 years of commuting and neither has any of the regular commuters I talk to. Typical Irish Rail to have two trains leave before the normal office finishing time of 17:30.

[Jamie2k9]

Wait and see the 1600 will go off the timetable completely.
Those 2/3 hours at peak time each way are messy to say the least as in the shape of the timetable. No changes would happen before a timetable change.

No word on what the 7 car set was going between Longford and carrick on Friday evening

If it makes commercial sense then it should but it will probably be December before IE revert to a new timetable, the latest I have heard which I am happy about if its true.

Not sure what you are saying about the 7 piece between Longford and Carrick it could be for operational reasons to store the set as it may not be required until Monday or even Sunday.

I agree that what is needed is a temporary timetable. We can appreciate the impact of incidents on accidents on the running of the railway, but it costs nothing to re-organise the timetable so that passengers know when to expect a train to come.

I don't know about the 1805 right now as I haven't taken it in a couple of months as it is too uncomfortable, but I'm not the only person avoiding it now and I should think its loading past Maynooth has dropped a lot since they changed to a 29K.

If the 17:05 wasn't jammed yesterday, it must have been from people avoiding travelling. It is normally packed on a Friday and with the additional traffic from the 1600, it should have be much worse.

If any train is to go from the evening timetable, it should be the 1715. I've not taken it once in 10 years of commuting and neither has any of the regular commuters I talk to. Typical Irish Rail to have two trains leave before the normal office finishing time of 17:30.

I know this is going off topic but completely agree there is real operation inefficiencies with Sligo services. While I don't have stats for average numbers most days it's hard to make a call.

I would cancel the 16.00 service and run the set at 18.05 to Sligo and get rid of the Longford service. 4 car 22 should be sufficient and it eases pressure on the Sligo service either side and on Fridays I think it would have the most benefit as everybody wants to make the 17.05 as IMO the 19.05 gets to Sligo a little to late for many. It would be a much easier sell and have little political messing as they are not cutting Sligo services really. There is the morning issue with a service from Longford the 5,40 surly commuter traffic will be light on that until Mullingar and if that was the case it would be better to run an empty past Maynooth to cope as if its running that far in the first place they would still be making some savings. They could do some changes at Sligo end either. Even if demand is not justified keep the 18.05 to Longford only and solve the issue for morning services.

Just on the 16,00 being cancelled if it's not down to sets, could Longford cope with the 15.05, 16.00, 17.05, 17.15, 18.05 and 19.05 services overnight?

[James Howard]

They've just updated to confirm that it is to remain as is all week. It is beyond me why they can't do something about putting a temporary timetable in place.

http://www.irishrail.ie/lineclosuresduetoflooding

[James Howard]

What's especially annoying at this point is that they have obviously established an internal working timetable because they have scheduled a number of trains to cross at Enfield and announced that one of them won't be stopping.

Yet they don't see fit to share this working timetable with the passengers who could then get an extra half-hour in bed rather than standing on the platform.

Why would they not do this? Incompetence or just outright hostility towards their own customers?

[AD11]

It's ridiculous really. The 7.26 (from Mullingar) arrived there today at 7.45 as they announced it would be on the tannoy, but then got to Connolly at 8.53 only a few minutes later than the actual timetable, while other days it's arrived in Dublin much later than that.

It does go to show that the journey time is regularly much longer than it actually should be and they can make up time i.e. go faster when they really need to.

[berneyarms]

Was that a marginally irate poster on this board from Edgworthstown on Primetime last night? ;-)

[Mark Gleeson]

I made it very clear to RTE that 18:05 to Longford as the big problem train, seems like they took the advice...

[James Howard]

Mark, as a matter of interest, what do you see as being the problem with the 1805. Do you think I am off the wall with my opinion that 29Ks don't cut if for the long-haul commuter?

Anyway it wasn't me and I didn't recognise the guy and I do know all of the people/idiots who've been commuting it long-term. I'm pretty far from being marginally irate at this stage so I doubt they would have been able to broadcast anything I would have said if they'd vox-popped me. I've probably spent more time on the Sligo line than most people who work for Irish Rail at this stage and the commuter experience is worse now that at any point since they introduced the 0545 from Sligo.

I actually got a nice response about a temporary timetable from Mr. Slowey today so who knows, if it is to drag on for another week, perhaps they will adjust properly to the new reality.

It is certainly a waste of time asking @IrishRail anything which is a bit odd. I have found that most companies tend to be a lot more responsive through their twitter channel than through more traditional customer response channels.

[Mark Gleeson]

Use of 29k is the primary issue, 30 ICR's were bought and paid for specifically for outer commuter service.

The loss of the ICR had the secondary knock on as to capacity.

We are awaiting a response as to the actual plan on the Sligo line as the current approach of telling no one about the plan isn't really working.