National Express 890 London to Cork withdrawn

Yesterday marked the withdrawal of the National Express 890 London to Cork service (managed a photo of the last journey as it departed Bristol Bus Station).

Quite a disappointment to see it go although presumably the numbers dropped to a point where it was no longer commercially viable?

Does anybody know anything more about the history of this route?

Slattery's of Tralee were the long time operator of this route before National Express and Bus Eireann.

Bernard Kavanagh of Urlingford have been the contractor for NX on this for many years, Bus Eireann also provided coaches and drivers for a spell until the mid 2000s.

Slattery's and CIE/Bus Eireann both ran competing services via Holyhead for some years before the booming low cost airlines took most of the custom with Slattery's eventually withdrawing in the 90s but I am not up on the details of the southern route.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/bristol-re/4094798075

It now makes the Bus Eireann overnight 871 Dublin - London route as the only remaining Ireland-GB through service with Megabus providing a shipside connection and through ticketing from Pembroke only at weekends.

I took a trip on the 890 recently and the numbers were very low, single figures throughout although the opposite working which meets in Pembroke had a better load on.

One of the drivers suggested it may return as a seasonal route, no idea if this likely to happen though. He also suggested that there were ongoing issues due to the poor reliability of the ferry service, particularly with Wales-London passengers being left waiting for extended times and missing connections, etc.

Martin2012 said:

Yesterday marked the withdrawal of the National Express 890 London to Cork service (managed a photo of the last journey as it departed Bristol Bus Station).

Quite a disappointment to see it go although presumably the numbers dropped to a point where it was no longer commercially viable?

Does anybody know anything more about the history of this route?

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Have you got a photo of it?

I guess its hard to compete with the airlines.

Didnt know this service existed.

Do the London to Dublin coaches just go to Holyhead?

route101 said:

Have you got a photo of it?

I guess its hard to compete with the airlines.

Didnt know this service existed.

Do the London to Dublin coaches just go to Holyhead?

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They are through coaches to Dublin Busaras Station. When it was more heavily used there was more than one coach per departure via Dublin to Galway, Ballina and other destinations. Until last year there was also a separate through service from Dublin to Liverpool, Manchester and Leeds, it was dropped with a National Express connection off the London route at a service area provided instead.

I wondered why I saw an Irish coach in NX livery in London Abellio the other day while waiting time

Eyersey468 said:

I wondered why I saw an Irish coach in NX livery in London Abellio the other day while waiting time

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Whats LOndon Abellio?

Flying Snail said:

They are through coaches to Dublin Busaras Station. When it was more heavily used there was more than one coach per departure via Dublin to Galway, Ballina and other destinations. Until last year there was also a separate through service from Dublin to Liverpool, Manchester and Leeds, it was dropped with a National Express connection off the London route at a service area provided instead.

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I thought it would be easy for them just to bus you to Holyhead then provide a bus connection at Dublin to Bus Station.

route101 said:

Whats LOndon Abellio?

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London Abellio Battersea garage that provides coach operators inc NX with coach parking facilities:
https://www.abellio.co.uk/coach-parking/

route101 said:

Whats LOndon Abellio?

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Abellio's London depot in Battersea, I drive National Express coaches now and we sometimes layover there.

Does anyone know why it was dropped? My partner used to take this service for yeas, last time around Christmas. It was never empty and quite often a lot of seats were actually taken...
Information about dropping the service was also very poorly communicated. Basically at some point you just couldn't book for certain dates. When she emailed National Express she just got the standard reply "please keep checking on our website"

Only when she complained on Twitter she got some info that the route is "suspended". When she asked why and if it might come back they dropped half arsed comment that "things might get different after Brexit". Which is silly because nothing material has yet changed.

If you go to Waterford or Cork you now have to now go via Dublin, which takes a few hours longer. One could say there are cheap airlines but competition on London - Cork route seems to be poor as prices are quite high for most dates. I can fly to Poland for £20-30 this January and March while when my partner was checking flight to Cork it was hard to find anything below £100.

She is really annoyed that the service is gone...

NX seem to like to run services to fit in with the rest of their timetable.

Geogregor said:

Does anyone know why it was dropped? My partner used to take this service for yeas, last time around Christmas. It was never empty and quite often a lot of seats were actually taken...
Information about dropping the service was also very poorly communicated. Basically at some point you just couldn't book for certain dates. When she emailed National Express she just got the standard reply "please keep checking on our website"

Only when she complained on Twitter she got some info that the route is "suspended". When she asked why and if it might come back they dropped half arsed comment that "things might get different after Brexit". Which is silly because nothing material has yet changed.

If you go to Waterford or Cork you now have to now go via Dublin, which takes a few hours longer. One could say there are cheap airlines but competition on London - Cork route seems to be poor as prices are quite high for most dates. I can fly to Poland for £20-30 this January and March while when my partner was checking flight to Cork it was hard to find anything below £100.

She is really annoyed that the service is gone...

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Is it just Aer Lingus on the route to Cork?

Geogregor said:

while when my partner was checking flight to Cork it was hard to find anything below £100.

Click to expand...

Even if that's the case chances are there is a cheap flight to Dublin. The combined journey time with a coach from Dublin to Cork would probably be less compared to the 890.

radamfi said:

Even if that's the case chances are there is a cheap flight to Dublin. The combined journey time with a coach from Dublin to Cork would probably be less compared to the 890.

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Possibly. But it was convenient connection. She could catch bus after work and be home (around Dungarvan) in the morning. If you now have to go to Stansted or Heathrow, be there early, fly to Dublin, go into town, change for bus, you won't be home there before mid afternoon. For short trips it just doesn't make sense.

Aer Lingus and Ryanair both fly to Cork but for some reasons prices are not particularly competitive, comparing to where they were some time ago.

Interesting that Brexit has been suggested as a reason for the withdrawal of the service.

Of course in the transition period nothing has changed concerning travel and I thought bus and coach services abroad could still operate anyway regardless of a "No Deal".

Is it possible maybe Brexit uncertainty has caused a decline in passenger numbers?

The Irish Ferries ferry the 890 uses has been cancelled a number of times this year, sometimes at short notice, leading to problems for passengers trying to rebook, relying on a single coach each day or a route several hours longer via Dublin. Probably does not help passenger confidence and loyalty.
Official notification of the end of the service only went out to agents in a service bulletin less than a fortnight before the final journeys, from Cork 6th Feb and from London 7th Feb.
While not wanting to go off-topic, it's perhaps not entirely irrelevant to note that there have been quite a few timetable changes across the NX network, and changes to service patterns across the 212/707/737/777 airport routes, from 10 February, with some other routes such as 337, 460 and 461 scrapped.