Longford 5.15 debacle.

[andyl222]

Anyone else witness the shocking buffoonery that befell platform 3 & 4 this evening. Hundreds (literally) of commuters being herded from one platform to the other with an announcement telling us one thing and a young employee adamantly reassuring us of another, and then to top it all of being packed onto a train like livestock.... Ah IE once again I'm amazed by your ever present concern for customer satisfaction. Oh and I forgot to mention the late departure, but still at this stage it goes without saying.

[ThomasJ]

Something went wrong in the main station tonight the signal failure coming into connolly southbound may have had something to do with it. It wasn't the only problem IE had tonight.

18.00 arrival of sligo-dublin connolly - 15 minutes late arrived at platform 5

18.42 pearse-rosslare europort - departed pearse 20 minutes late, due to signal fault at coolmine.

19.05 connolly- sligo - departed platform 5 - 15 minutes late

19.00 pearse-maynooth - technical fault on train- passengers directed to connolly- 4 car train at platform 7 awaiting passengers- train left crammed 15 minutes late at 19.25

[Mark Gleeson]

There is a serious weakness in the track arrangement in Connolly, it is technically possible to block the entire station if you send a 8 coach train from P1 to Maynooth and it sits down half way

It appeared to be some class of track circuit failure in the P2/3 and carriage sidings

Couldn't find any details on the IE site at the time it happened

The clever will have noted that the Sligo train should have come in via the Midland line and parked out of the way beyond P7, its also 3 minutes faster than the Drumcondra approach

[ThomasJ]

Originally Posted by Mark Gleeson

There is a serious weakness in the track arrangement in Connolly, it is technically possible to block the entire station if you send a 8 coach train from P1 to Maynooth and it sits down half way

It appeared to be some class of track circuit failure in the P2/3 and carriage sidings

Couldn't find any details on the IE site at the time it happened

The clever will have noted that the Sligo train should have come in via the Midland line and parked out of the way beyond P7, its also 3 minutes faster than the Drumcondra approach

This is IE we are talking about. Sligo terminated at platform 5, Drogheda was platform 6 and a southbound DART platform 7 with people being redirected all over the place

[ThomasJ]

Originally Posted by andyl222

Anyone else witness the shocking buffoonery that befell platform 3 & 4 this evening. Hundreds (literally) of commuters being herded from one platform to the other with an announcement telling us one thing and a young employee adamantly reassuring us of another, and then to top it all of being packed onto a train like livestock.... Ah IE once again I'm amazed by your ever present concern for customer satisfaction. Oh and I forgot to mention the late departure, but still at this stage it goes without saying.

Just out of interest what platform did the 5.15 end up departing from, and any idea where the 5.05 sligo left from?

[andyl222]

Originally Posted by ThomasJ

Just out of interest what platform did the 5.15 end up departing from, and any idea where the 5.05 sligo left from?

as far as i could see, the Sligo 5.05 left from platform 4, then as soon as it was out of the station all people waitin for platform 3 were redirected to 4 where the 5.15 arrived to.

[Mark Gleeson]

P2 and P3 where out of commission, the 17:15 to Longford was sitting in P3 as normal but was trapped hence a short train in P4

[andyl222]

Originally Posted by Mark Gleeson

P2 and P3 where out of commission, the 17:15 to Longford was sitting in P3 as normal but was trapped hence a short train in P4

Ahhh see, i can understand that and not be altogether too annoyed. In Connolly yesterday however, the passengers were told nothing and then the lack of communication between the IE staff just exacerbated the situation, we were told to go to platform 4 then on platform 4 we heard an announcement sending us back to 3. Then those that did in fact go back to platform 3 were stunned when the train eventually pulled into platform 4. It was a joke.

[Redsoxfan]

I was waiting on the 6pm to Longford. It rolled in just before 6-loads of people were waiting. It could have departed just after 6, but no, it was probably nearly 18.10 before it chugged out.

Of course in the meantime, the 18.05 to Maynooth (calling at all stops) has departed, meaning that our train took around 45-50 minutes to get to Maynooth as we had to keep slowing down/stopping to wait for the train in front.

[ThomasJ]

Yeah that happened a few weeks ago with the 19.05 train to sligo running ten minutes late but the 19.10 to maynooth ran ontime. you had the 1910 to maynooth closely followed by the 1905 to sligo closely followed by the 1920 to clonsilla one after the other!! Probably the signal system has no mercy for latecomers!

One thing i've learned monday: Never assume that all is well with your train until you reach your destination!!! The 19.00 pearse to maynooth arrived at pearse couldn't see any problems. The announcement "the next train at platform 1 is the 19.00 hours service" was followed by silence for two minutes, then delay on the platform information display, followed by the announcement please go to connolly, get the next northbound dart!!!