Dublin’s local authorities should pay attention to this….. think of all the apartment developments built with inadequate parking spaces for the numbers living in the development in order to discourage car use. Despite this, bus services are too be withdrawn. Misery for the commuter/apartment complex dweller forced to buy a car because their bus disappeared and no where to park it!

completly agree Gerard, cut the prices all around. Its ridiclous what some short distance routes cost. Also if some more of the buses actually went as far as St Stephens green for commuters who work on the southside that may help also- after all Busarus is 5-7 minutes walk to the nearest dublin bus going across the liffey. Which would be fine if we didnt live in a country where it rained 250 days a year. Laura is right- with the withdrawl of services the number of cars on the road will rise. I thoughty the greens were supposed to encourage public transport?

I believe Dublin Bus volume is down in part due to the collapse in the building trade, if 10’s of thousands of E European workers are going home one would assume the majority were Bus users.
I hate using bises because I never know when the next one is coming. Privatise the lot and let some real competition in that will actually innovate.

Prices, that’s a start but the service its self is so poor. After waiting over the hour for a No. 8 bus outside the CUH in Cork (this is a very popular route in Cork there should have been 3 busses pass in that time) I flagged a taxi, the driver took great delight in telling me he always picks up fares at that bus stop after 8 o clock. Looks to me like the buses deserted the people.

Perhaps if bus companies, and particularly Dublin Bus, could cop on to the notion of “the customer” and treat the aforesaid “customer” as a human being, instead of mere inconvenient freight, they might have a more viable future.

I am steaming mad this evening, having taken over 2 hours to complete a journey on Dublin Bus that takes 30 minutes on the Swords Express. I also had the delight of a mile walk in the snow and ice because the roads are apparently too dangerous for the buses. Which was funny, because traffic (other than buses) appeared to be proceeding largely unimpeded on the (treated) roads, while pedestrians, who had paid to travel by bus, were risking life and limb on (untreated) footpaths. I realise that service curtailments have to be made at times like this, but I do think the Dublin Bus inspector at the bus stop could have made this clear to passengers waiting for a Rivervalley bus which would not, in fact, be going VIA RIVERVALLEY.

I checked the Dublin Bus website, and of course there is no email address where complaints are received. I realise they’d probably be instantly diverted to the trash box, but there isn’t even an acknowledgement of the possibility that a customer might want to complain. Just a telephone number you can call during office hours. Fantastic.

Of course the demand isn’t there – what with timetables that only tell you when the bus leaves the terminus, a complete lack of anything resembling shelter at bus stops, why on earth would I want to get the bus when my car is so much nicer? I live, in suburban Dublin, a mile from a bus stop with a shelter, which on rainy days is a significant disincentive to get the bus. I know what time the bus gets to the stop, although only because I live at the last stop. When I lived closer in, I had no idea when the bus would arrive.

Add to all of this the fact that you have to either get a pricy weekly ticket or have exact change combined with the other fact that the bus lanes are all going into town, not out of it, so the trip home is always a great deal longer?

And they wonder why patronage is falling?

Did anyone see the Brown Thomas spokeswoman’s reaction when asked if the lack of Bus Services due to bad weather (!) had affected their sale? Apparently their customers are all drivers…funny that. I think I’ll just give up the old green credentials and get the Jag out of storage.

Alan, the drivers are not public servants, CIE is a semi-state company

for a student the cost of the bus is silly. At 8.45 return to college 5 day’s a week. No point getting a multiple 10, journey ticket, as the tissue paper they’re printed on falls apart. It is now cheaper for me to drive to rathmines park and get the luas. Including petrol and the luas return ticket. Also the buses in both directions are always 20-30 minutes late!