Public transport in Dublin. Chaos - close to breakdown?

Howth Head

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Is it my imagination or am I reading about major delays on trains/Luas etc on an almost daily basis? I'm hearing from friends and colleagues stuck on DARTs between stations for the last few hours this evening (Thursday 28/11) Seemed to be something similar yesterday and earlier this week.

Added to that, the M50 seems to be on a knife-edge, with almost daily incidents causing serious delays and tailbacks.

Traffic on the main routes into Dublin and even within leafy suburbia is increasingly at a standstill at junctions and crossroads (with cycle lanes and the shutting down of left turning filter lanes appearing to be the main cause.)

I'm also seeing large crowds regularly left standing at bus stops on the N11 (e.g Cornelscourt) in the mornings as packed buses go past without stopping. It seems to be just as bad at major stops towards town - Brewery Road for example always seems to have crowds waiting as busses sail past full. (Can't wait to see the confusion and chaos that'll inevitably arise when the postponed new routes kick in during January!)

Apols for the Dublin-centric focus here - I believe traffic in Galway and Cork is no picnic either.



 
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The new Bus Connects 'network' seems more brittle than the old. Many of the busiest commuter routes have lost departures at peak hours to serve orbitals etc. The orbitals and night buses are welcome but should not have come at the expense of the core routes.

As for the DART, when I used to commute to city centre, I switched to buses in the morning. They took a few minutes longer but I avoided the once a week network crippled for reason X and being well late for work because of it. LUAS seems similar to DART in that respect.
 
Is it my imagination or am I reading about major delays on trains/Luas etc on an almost daily basis?
If you are reading this online then the algorithm is just feeding you what you are more likely to click on and what gets them advertising revenue. Most of the transport services publish metrics, if services were anywhere close to breakdown then it would be very easy to point to such metrics, but of course those in the business of producing click-bait aren't interested in producing articles showing performance of late is quite similar to that of recent years. There's not many clicks to be had in headlines like 'Transport system performing much as it did last year'
 
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