Additional NI services

[TUC]

Given the regular discussions on the lack of flexibility of many TOCs to operate additional services for special events, I was intrigued to see this advert from Translink in Northern Ireland, offering not only an additional service for a key sporting event, but also advising that it will carry 'both seated and standing passengers' (!)

 

[mikeg]

Point 1 is the advantage of an integrated railway
Point 2 is that Ireland and Northern ireland are moving in the right direction, whereas Great Britain is not.

 

[Dr Hoo]

Point 1 is the advantage of an integrated railway
Point 2 is that Ireland and Northern ireland are moving in the right direction, whereas Great Britain is not.

Always good to see this sort of thing but an odd train from, err, 'not Armagh' to 'not Croke Park' in Dublin isn't very different from what GB often manages for a major sports event.

 

[pdeaves]

isn't very different from what GB often manages for a major sports event.

Providing additional services for events at Cardiff, Glastonbury (even when there is major industrial action going on), Wembley, etc. is pretty much 'bread and butter' stuff. Not knocking the Irish train, though; it's good that they can do this, too.

 

[thenorthern]

Point 1 is the advantage of an integrated railway
Point 2 is that Ireland and Northern ireland are moving in the right direction, whereas Great Britain is not.

Railways between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland aren't very well integrated. They don't particularly work very well together.

 

[philthetube]

Sounds like England and Wales

 

[Elwyn]

Railways between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland aren't very well integrated. They don't particularly work very well together.

What’s your evidence for that?

There’s only 1 railway between Northern Ireland and the Republic - from Belfast to Dublin. The service (known as the Enterprise) is a joint operation with stock and revenue shared between NIR & CIE. That seems quite “well integrated” to me.

 

[185143]

What’s your evidence for that?

There’s only 1 railway between Northern Ireland and the Republic - from Belfast to Dublin. The service (known as the Enterprise) is a joint operation with stock and revenue shared between NIR & CIE. That seems quite “well integrated” to me.

Yeah, I don't agree with that statement either.

I'd say a service where the trains are maintained jointly by both countries, the crew are from both sides of the border and both operator's "domestic" stock can be used in the event of failures (presumably only NI staff sign NI stock and vice versa though), and with payment onboard available in both currencies, I'd say it's as well integrated as it really gets. Only complaint would be not being able to book tickets from ROI to local NI stations. Eg: Dublin to Derriaghy required two tickets. Oh and the current nonsense of catering only being available with a Belfast crew onboard! Which made an IE guard look quite silly last time I was on when he told someone enquiring about the buffet that they hadn't been open in 2 years, for her to quickly ask how she bought a coffee that morning then...

 

[thenorthern]

What’s your evidence for that?

There’s only 1 railway between Northern Ireland and the Republic - from Belfast to Dublin. The service (known as the Enterprise) is a joint operation with stock and revenue shared between NIR & CIE. That seems quite “well integrated” to me.

It's not ideal, as far as I know through booking beyond Belfast or Dublin isn't available meaning to go from Colraine to Limerick would need multiple tickets. Also while Belfast to Dublin is the most useful it would be nice to have extensions to places like Cork in the south or Coleraine in the North.

Also in an ideal world the irregular Belfast to Newry NI railways service and the irregular Dublin to Dundalk Irish Rail services would be joined to form a Belfast to Dublin stopping service. Irish Rail in recent years have provided a daily service extension to Newry although it would be nice to have more.

 

[Trainbike46]

It's not ideal, as far as I know through booking beyond Belfast or Dublin isn't available meaning to go from Colraine to Limerick would need multiple tickets. Also while Belfast to Dublin is the most useful it would be nice to have extensions to places like Cork in the south or Coleraine in the North.

Also in an ideal world the irregular Belfast to Newry NI railways service and the irregular Dublin to Dundalk Irish Rail services would be joined to form a Belfast to Dublin stopping service. Irish Rail in recent years have provided a daily service extension to Newry although it would be nice to have more.

you may be happy to hear that there are various improvements in the works, most notably improvements in journey times for Belfast-Dublin and possibly an increase in frequency

Here's a page with some details: https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct..._booklet.pdf&usg=AOvVaw0FuALH_Mx1_TU6-zFaN_1j

 

[thenorthern]

you may be happy to hear that there are various improvements in the works, most notably improvements in journey times for Belfast-Dublin and possibly an increase in frequency

Belfast to Cork services have also been mentioned which would be nice, in an ideal world we would have a regular Cork to Londonderry service but I know that is a long way off.

 

[FormerBritInMe]

the current nonsense of catering only being available with a Belfast crew onboard! Which made an IE guard look quite silly last time I was on when he told someone enquiring about the buffet that they hadn't been open in 2 years, for her to quickly ask how she bought a coffee that morning then...

My understanding is that Ianrod Eireann lost the train caterer they had pre-pandemic and have not signed on a new one as yet. The Enterprise services are under a different contract. Not sure why this means only Belfast based crews can provide it though.

 

[Watershed]

My understanding is that Ianrod Eireann lost the train caterer they had pre-pandemic and have not signed on a new one as yet. The Enterprise services are under a different contract. Not sure why this means only Belfast based crews can provide it though.

Because the Belfast based catering crew are under Translink NI. So not subject to the same catering 'issues' as IE.

 

[Elwyn]

Belfast to Cork services have also been mentioned which would be nice, in an ideal world we would have a regular Cork to Londonderry service but I know that is a long way off.

The numbers of passengers travelling from Belfast or Londonderry to Cork are very small. Running through services appeals to rail enthusiasts but leads to all sorts of difficulties when things run late. There is not a strong business case for either route. (Several airlines like Aer Arann and Flybe tried operating from Belfast to Cork and they couldn’t make that work either).

My understanding is that Ianrod Eireann lost the train caterer they had pre-pandemic and have not signed on a new one as yet. The Enterprise services are under a different contract. Not sure why this means only Belfast based crews can provide it though.

I think it’s to do with where the crews live. Two of the 3 Enterprise units are staffed by Belfast based crew and one by Dublin based crew. So if run by NIR they’d either need to overnight Belfast based catering staff in Dublin to do the first and last departures each day from Dublin, or engage their own Dublin based staff. Something that might perhaps happen if IE are unable to resume their part of the food service.

 

[Starmill]

It's not ideal, as far as I know through booking beyond Belfast or Dublin isn't available meaning to go from Colraine to Limerick would need multiple tickets. Also while Belfast to Dublin is the most useful it would be nice to have extensions to places like Cork in the south or Coleraine in the North.

Also in an ideal world the irregular Belfast to Newry NI railways service and the irregular Dublin to Dundalk Irish Rail services would be joined to form a Belfast to Dublin stopping service. Irish Rail in recent years have provided a daily service extension to Newry although it would be nice to have more.

Through booking is available at ticket offices. Not particularly passenger-friendly but there it is.

 

[185143]

Belfast to Cork services have also been mentioned which would be nice, in an ideal world we would have a regular Cork to Londonderry service but I know that is a long way off.

Funny you should say that.

When I visited the Cork 'Spoons, I decided walking the 20 minutes back to the station was too much effort/time for another pint so I jumped in a taxi on a nearby tank. Got talking to the driver as you do, and he mentioned he'd driven a family member to Belfast and back the day previous. About 5 hours each way by road. Even on the non stop Cork-Dublin service you'd struggle to beat that by rail!

 

[thenorthern]

The numbers of passengers travelling from Belfast or Londonderry to Cork are very small. Running through services appeals to rail enthusiasts but leads to all sorts of difficulties when things run late. There is not a strong business case for either route. (Several airlines like Aer Arann and Flybe tried operating from Belfast to Cork and they couldn’t make that work either).


I think it’s to do with where the crews live. Two of the 3 Enterprise units are staffed by Belfast based crew and one by Dublin based crew. So if run by NIR they’d either need to overnight Belfast based catering staff in Dublin to do the first and last departures each day from Dublin, or engage their own Dublin based staff. Something that might perhaps happen if IE are unable to resume their part of the food service.

It's not so much going from Derry to Cork more people getting a service between two intermediate stops. For example on the CrossCountry services very few people travel from Plymouth to Edinburgh but rather between intermediate stops on the route such as Bristol to Leeds.

Don't get me wrong though cross border services between Belfast and Dublin are much much better than they were 20/30 years ago. I must admit though whenever I normally go from Belfast to Dublin I take the coach as often cheaper, more frequent and quicker. In an ideal world though the train should be more frequent and quicker.

 

[craigybagel]

Always good to see this sort of thing but an odd train from, err, 'not Armagh' to 'not Croke Park' in Dublin isn't very different from what GB often manages for a major sports event.

It's not about Armagh the city, but Armagh the county - since it's to transport supporters of the county's Gaelic Football team. Both Portadown and (parts of) Newry are in County Armagh, plus they act as rail heads for the rest of the County.

Connolly Station is easily walkable from Croke Park.

Providing additional services for events at Cardiff, Glastonbury (even when there is major industrial action going on), Wembley, etc. is pretty much 'bread and butter' stuff. Not knocking the Irish train, though; it's good that they can do this, too.

The difference between Ireland (North and South) and Great Britain is that services like these are a normal and expected part of the service provision of the companies involved (NIR and IÉ). They've been running these services for big matches and other events for decades, and have a fleet large enough to cope. This particular special will almost certainly be worked by a number of NIR 3000 class DMUs - and when that fleet was procured,a requirement was that part of the fleet would be compatible for working South of the border, to work services like this (and of course to cover for unavailable Enterprise sets).

In the UK, most TOCs are not in a position to provide a similar scale of extra services on a regular basis.

It's not so much going from Derry to Cork more people getting a service between two intermediate stops. For example on the CrossCountry services very few people travel from Plymouth to Edinburgh but rather between intermediate stops on the route such as Bristol to Leeds.

The numbers making the intermediate journeys are even fewer. And the complications of running search a service are much more complicated than what XC have to deal with. For a train to cross the border, it needs to be fitted with both countries signalling systems (AWS & TPWS for the North, CAWS and soon the new hybrid ETCS system for the South) and staff need the training for those systems, plus the other minor differences between the two jurisdictions. It's worth the hassle to link the two largest cities on the island, and enough staff and trains are in place to deal with it, but beyond that.....