Enterprise service

[joey]

Originally Posted by Inniskeen

You say passenger numbers cross-border are down - hardly a surprise given the three month closure of the line at Malahide. Before that the largely gratuitous disruptions associated with the Tolka bridge renewal and the so called DART upgrade project severely depressed weekend business due to the tsunami of weekend line closures. Add to that the laughable management and scheduling of services between Drogheda and Dublin and I think Irish Rail might well be in the picture when it comes to accessing the performance of the Enterprise service.

As regards cross-border numbers my understanding is that there has been a modest recovery in usage unlike many other routes that are either gently or preciptively declining.

As regards being a glorified commuter service what do you imagine the Galway, Waterford, Rosslare, Limerick and Sligo services are ? Whar about the 0505 from Cork or the 1900 or 2100 services from Heuston. More glorified commuter services perhaps ?

Yes the Irish Rail mantra is that all the problems with the Enterprise are the fault of NIR - as a regular user this is not my experience. While there are issues with the coaching stock from time to time, the Enterprise sets are probably the most intensively used rolling stock in the country, one set making three return Belfast/Dublin trips each day. While the ride quality is often poor (especially south of the border) it is not generally inferior to the Mk4s on the Cork line. Ambience wise (somewhat subject on my part) the De-Dietrich coaches are way better than the Mk4s.

Irish Rail are, I understand, responsible for locomotive maintenace. Not sure of the ratio of coaching stock issues to locomotive/head end power failures, but suffice it to say that locomotive failures are orders of magnitude more common than when the service was powerd by 071/111 class locomotives.

To be a bit more positive there has been a noticeable improvement in punctuality in recent months due to a number of factors including a large reduction in the number of slacks south of the border and some shift in the Irish Rail's slowest train first policy.

here here!!