Killarney's tourism industry is suffering as the rail strike continues for a fourth week. During the summer, some 2,000 people a day pass through Killarney railway station on the five and sometimes six daily passenger trains to and from Cork, Dublin and Tralee.
"That road is normally full of people coming down with bags for the weekend and for a few days' break. Now there's nobody. It's deserted," a Killarney jarvey, Mr Danny Ferris, said yesterday, pointing at the unusually quiet East Avenue road.
One or two trains a day have run since the dispute with the breakaway train-drivers' group, the ILDA, began. But while trains are travelling, passengers are not. People are simply afraid to travel, in case there is no train back.
Hackney and tour operators are also seriously hit. Dero's Tours in Killarney's Main Street operates coach tours of the Ring of Kerry. It runs a regular collection service off the trains.
"There were only six people off the train from Dublin the other day. On normal days you might have to wait 15 minutes before the flow of people would stop," Mr Denis Spillane of Dero's Tours said.
Tourists are nervous about travel plans, and B&B business is definitely down, the Killarney Tourist Office says. Cancellations are also coming in because of the strike, according to the B&Bs. The bigger hotels, reliant on bus tours, are not affected. But smaller B&Bs, and hostels, are smarting from the rail disruption.
"Put it this way: we normally service the railway station three times a day. Now we may go once with our bus," Mr John Claffey of the An Oige hostel in Aghadoe outside Killarney said.
Iarnrod Eireann said the bulk of its losses of £150,000 a day are in the Kerry region. A spokesman, Mr Andrew Roche, said he was worried about long-term effects on passenger and freight confidence in the south-west.
Students on Eurail and Inter Rail tickets are opting for routes where trains are travelling normally. There has been a significant increase in business to Limerick, for instance.
Ms Kathleen O'Regan-Sheppard, chairwoman of the Kerry County Tourism Board, said people on business, people meeting medical appointments in Dublin and Cork, Kerry people on shopping trips, "the ordinary people" were upset.
Cllr Michael Gleeson told a meeting of Kerry County Council last week that "a crisis is besetting the county because of the rail strike". And a meeting of Killarney Urban Council also heard that the rail dispute was leaving the county "economically wrecked".