Youth Travel Card 19 to 23

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I'll give them an A on the grounds of clever politicking, think of all the votes Charlie got from his free bus passes for the elderly...

But I'd rather have seen the budget for this go on new bus routes, new train carriages etc
 
I'll give them an A on the grounds of clever politicking, think of all the votes Charlie got from his free bus passes for the elderly...

But I'd rather have seen the budget for this go on new bus routes, new train carriages etc
I thought the EU were paying for this, as it's a pan European initiative? I'll stand corrected btw.
 
I thought the EU were paying for this, as it's a pan European initiative? I'll stand corrected btw.
I think the card is an EU wide scheme, but the level of discount is funded here.

A total of €25 million was announced for youth travel cards as part of the Budget today along with a €1.4 billion package to upgrade the public transport system. Currently, student fares are up to 30% cheaper than adult fares. Today’s announcement means the discount will be bumped up to 50% from next year

 
This is just going to be a new Leap card for 19-23's with new fares. The €25m being spent on this would not buy a lot of buses or trains. I expect some of this money will be used to compensate the Transport Operators for any lost of revenue

the $1.4b will cover the capital expenditure overall including upgrading the ticketing equipment and allowing for phones/credit/debit cards to be used as well as the additional buses and trains
 
My daughters loved cycling when they were small but stopped when they got to about 12.
The ridiculous insistence in so many schools that girls wear skirts as part of their school uniform must be a factor.

Yeah it's one of the factors alright, there's a massive drop off in girls cycling from primary to secondary. The whole pressure on them to look a certain way - not have "helmet hair" etc, there's been stories of girls wearing trousers on their bikes (with their skirts in bags) and then planning to change inside but teachers reporting them for being on school property in the wrong uniform!
This gender imbalance then continues after school, which is why most bikes sold in this country are "racers" rather than the Dutch style which would be much more useful in Dublin and other urban centres.
Skirts, helmet hair, being shouted at by male drivers and boys, lack of safe locking facilities and lack of lockers or changing facilities


We're training the next generation to be dependent and probably obese.
 
The €25m being spent on this would not buy a lot of buses or trains.
€25m a year could quite radically improve services even in somewhere as big as Limerick. It would fully fund purchase and running costs of maybe 50 buses.

I spent a lot of time aged 19 to 23 on the CIÉ group's slow and unreliable services. My main complaint at the time was not the price, but that buses that wouldn't show up and trains that were frequently cancelled.
 
€25m a year could quite radically improve services even in somewhere as big as Limerick. It would fully fund purchase and running costs of maybe 50 buses.

I spent a lot of time aged 19 to 23 on the CIÉ group's slow and unreliable services. My main complaint at the time was not the price, but that buses that wouldn't show up and trains that were frequently cancelled.
I used to get the Train between Dublin and Sligo when I was a student. After about a month I found out that there was a private bus from town every Sunday night that was almost half the price and 45 minutes faster.
 
I used to get the Train between Dublin and Sligo when I was a student. After about a month I found out that there was a private bus from town every Sunday night that was almost half the price and 45 minutes faster.
Yes thats what normal people do
 
€25m a year could quite radically improve services even in somewhere as big as Limerick. It would fully fund purchase and running costs of maybe 50 buses.

I spent a lot of time aged 19 to 23 on the CIÉ group's slow and unreliable services. My main complaint at the time was not the price, but that buses that wouldn't show up and trains that were frequently cancelled.

It's about 2.5% of the current annual running cost of the public system. You'd need to concentrate is somewhere smaller then Limerick to make a radical difference.
 
I would have thought 25m spent on security and disability services in public transport would have made a much bigger difference to public transport users including young adults than this measure. Every day, I see young wheelchair users having to be helped by staff because lifts are broken or some other reason. Again, I have no objection to reducing the fares for young adults but I don't see what difference it will make. I know people who qualify for 48% savings on public transport through taxsaver and still don't use it for numerous reasons. Having lived in a few different countries including the UK, public transport is not expensive in this Country. There have been huge improvements in the quality of public transport as well but we are still miles away from where we need to be. Measures like this don't do anything to address that. And that's even forgetting what 25m could do for making cycling and walking safer.
 
Every day, I see young wheelchair users having to be helped by staff because lifts are broken or some other reason.
The offices of a big property management company is close to where I work. They park their cars with all 4 wheels on the footpath, making it impossible for wheelchair users to pass. Maybe a bit of enforcement of current laws would help too.
 
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