All public transport should be free. Discuss

I believe that all public transport should be free to the user, and instead should be funded fully from tax revenues.

Not because the (minor) individual savings would encourage people to switch to public transport, but rather for the sake of efficiency. How often has a road full of cars been held up because someone can't find the last 20c at the bottom of their pocket for the bus fare? How bad are the queues at train stations every Monday morning as people buy their weekly tickets? This puts people off travelling and results in them crowding our roads.

How many bus / train inspectors could be freed to actually drive buses/trains etc., rather than fighting a useless battle trying to catch the odd fare dodger?

There seems to be an obsession in Irish civil service / political thinking that the public transport sector should be cost neutral and/or recoup as much of its costs as possible. This is not what a public transport sector should be about.

Public transport should be solely dedicated to transporting people from A to B.

The collection of monies to pay for it should be farmed out to a different sector of the State apparatus better equipped to collect and allocate monies. Let's face it, we subsidise the public transport sector massively through direct taxation anyway - straight-up subsidies, wages, pensions, buildings etc. Why not go the whole hog and free up all that wasted administrative, security, accounting and collection overhead and allow the public transport sector to focus 100% on what management consultants would call it's 'core competence' - namely, moving the public around?

This would significantly decrease the amount of time buses spend parked at bus stops holding up traffic behind, and would probably realise significant cost savings in terms of admin and security costs.

Yes, it would be 'expensive' on the face of it. But I believe the efficiency improvements, both in terms of overhead savings in Iarnrod Eireann and in terms of the general economy having roads moving more freely, would help offset the expense to a degree that would make such a move worthwhile.

yes, lots of cars would disappear, but you need to remember that governments are not charities, they're businesses. So what would they put up in price in order to make all that money back?

More buses would need to be bought, an maintained, the government would not like the way there's less traffic because that means less revenue from fines summonses etcc.. not to mention more "yobos" hanging around the back of buses smoking hash on the dole, (maybe)

If ive learned nothing else about politics, i've learned that it's not to satisfy ppl like you, but to satisfy their pockets.

Basically i think the cars in the traffic jams would be replaced by buses. People would see it as a chance to go on a tour of "Eire" taking free transport for granted.

Well that's my shallow view anyway.

Sherman said:

I believe that all public transport should be free to the user, and instead should be funded fully from tax revenues.

Not because the (minor) individual savings would encourage people to switch to public transport, but rather for the sake of efficiency.

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Surely, an incentivized ticket system is the solution here? If there was a greater advantage for people to pre-buy tickets, then the problems you mention would disappear.

In Barcelona, you can buy a 10 journey ticket for about half the price that it would cost to buy them all individually. These 10 journey tickets also have the advantage that they can be used in conjuction with different types of integrated transport (train, metro, tram, buses, etc) as part of the same journey (there's a time limit of 1hour 15mins). Hence, nobody except tourists and out-of-towners buy single tickets. It's very rare to see someone fumbling around for change to pay their way as they enter a bus.

I think that a free public transport system would be just abused by people and would become a kind of delivery system for certain businesses.

Afuera said:

Surely, an incentivized ticket system is the solution here? If there was a greater advantage for people to pre-buy tickets, then the problems you mention would disappear.

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Any use? www.dublinbus.ie/fares_and_tickets/annual.asp Notice on the left the selections of frequency i.e. Daily, Monthly etc..

Afuera said:

I think that a free public transport system would be just abused by people and would become a kind of delivery system for certain businesses.

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That's what i was trying to say But couldn't find the words.

Sn@kebite said:

Any use? [broken link removed] Notice on the left the selections of frequency i.e. Daily, Monthly etc..

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I can imagine many people having problems commiting to an annual ticket. What if they change job, buy a car, etc?

The other tickets they have on offer, like the 7 day Dublin rambler for 21 EUR, seem interesting. But when you look into it, if someone only used the bus to get in and out of work (i.e. 10 trips per week), it works out at 2.10 EUR per journey. Buying it individually would probably cost less than this.

I think if they had a 10 journey ticket for 10 EUR with a long dated expiry (i.e. a year) then it would greatly reduce the amount of people paying for individual journeys and the whole problem with coins etc.

Afuera said:

The other tickets they have on offer, like the 7 day Dublin rambler for 21 EUR, seem interesting. But when you look into it, if someone only used the bus to get in and out of work (i.e. 10 trips per week), it works out at 2.10 EUR per journey. Buying it individually would probably cost less than this.

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Have you been on the bus in Dublin recently? My city centre bus costs €1.90 each way so a 7 day rambler would be a saving.

However, the real issue for me is integration. We have some level of ticketing integration but it doesn't work well. EG: I need to get the bus and dart on my daily commute. You can buy a single on the bus that's valid for the train too but not a return. There is no combined weekly bus and rail ticket. The weekly rail ticket I get includes a feeder bus but by Tuesday it has stopped working on both the bus and the dart. I'm held up every time and the ticket checker person tells me the magnetic strip degrades!

I've been to many other countries were integrated ticketing between all forms of public transport is par for the course. Why the hell can CIE not organise this? They keep making excuses about different companies but all 4 (Iarnrod Eireann, Dublin Bus, Bus Eireann the Luas) are governed by CIE. Just do it.

The 5 x One Day Rambler tickets for €18.30 instead of 5 x €6 = €30 when bought individually seems like [broken link removed].

For a while a couple of years ago I used to get the 39 bus in Abbey St. in the evening. I used to buy a 10 journey ticket.

At the time it always amazed me to see the number of people who, every single evening, used to queue up to pay the driver for a single journey. It was always the same people every evening. The bus pulled in empty. They all went to queue up to pay for their single journey ticket. People with prepaid tickets went in through the other side of the door, validated their tickets and sat down. Most of the mugs who hadn't prepaid had to stand for the whole journey home.

Maybe things have changed now and they have eventually copped on, but I doubt it.



Murt

Theres also the 'chancers discount' which happens when you stick the ticket in your back pocket roughing it up a bit and if the machine can't read it then half the time the driver usually waves you through and your ticket lives to be used for another day.

Yet another reason to buy prepaid tickets

I find at the stops I use, its quicker to pay the driver because everyone queues up to use the ticket validator.

I find that it's quicker to drive.

I detest driving, but it always seems to work out quicker and easier, for me. For example, a journey form Kerry to dublin;

Train - Very expensive and typically can take up to five hours. Left stranded at train station with no means to get to final destination.

Plane - Initially sounds cheaper and quicker than driving, but it isn't. Once the journey from airport at either side is taken into consideration, it's much longer and more expensive. I have also missed internal flights because of traffic delays etc.

car - leave when you like and have the use of a car at your destination.

When I lived in Dublin, I often experimented with public transport, always to return to the relative comfort of my car. On more than one occasion, I remember waiting for a bus to take me into Dublin city centre for over an hour. I then would have to resort to car/taxi, losing an hour VDT.


People won't use public transport until it's much, much better. I'd love to use public transport, but at the moment in Ireland, it's **** and overpriced (train is anyway)

I took the bus to and from work for 5 years, I have now been driving for 3 years. I still take the bus from time to time, but the main problem is TIME not the cost. I don't mind the fact that the bus takes longer to get somewhere, but it's the waiting 20 mins (I'm lucky and live on a fairly good bus route), which can happen twice as I have to take two buses, is too much. I switched to the car when I had children, I quite enjoy the bus journey, but no way was I missing out on time with the kids courtesy of Dublin Bus.

shanegl said:

I find at the stops I use, its quicker to pay the driver because everyone queues up to use the ticket validator.

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Yes, however the validator is more likely to be out of order!

Once i put a gold coin in to the cash machine, (accident!), thought it was 1 euro, don't know why. And he didn't care or didn't notice it! that was good

dont cie charge more on the train on fridays to actually discourage people from using it as its there busiest day, a ticket inspector told me this a few years ago, has anyone heard of this? what would they do on fridays if it was free?

When I lived in Sligo (a long time ago) a return train ticket bought in Dublin was nearly twice the price as a return ticket bought on Sligo. Is this still the case?

No, it's 36 return both directions.

What we should have is increased cash fares, and heavily discounted prepaid fares.

But not free.

umop3p!sdn said:

I find that it's quicker to drive.

I detest driving, but it always seems to work out quicker and easier, for me. For example, a journey form Kerry to dublin;

Train - Very expensive and typically can take up to five hours. Left stranded at train station with no means to get to final destination.

Plane - Initially sounds cheaper and quicker than driving, but it isn't. Once the journey from airport at either side is taken into consideration, it's much longer and more expensive. I have also missed internal flights because of traffic delays etc.

car - leave when you like and have the use of a car at your destination.

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This is very different from my experience. Even though I'd make a pile of cash from driving, thanks to generous public service mileage rates, I would always fly when heading to Kerry or Cork. I'd prever to fly when heading to Mayo/Sligo/Donegal, but the flight times weren't aimed at facilitating a business day trip from Dublin.

Dublin Airport is a bit of a pain, but Aer Arann's check-in is up to 30 minutes before departure, so you don't spend too long in the airport at all.