Suggested Solutions to Limerick's Bus Problems

Limerick Post

In my opinion the Limerick City Bus Service has problems.  In the following

 paragraphs I will outline what I believe some of these problems are, and I will give

 my suggestions on how to overcome them and improve the service.  I see no reason

 (apart from the obvious one, lack of funds) why Limerick can't improve it's bus

 service to the extent that it is a model of good public transport for other towns and

 cities in this country to copy.

From my experience the only people that take the bus in Limerick are those that have

 to, i.e. the elderly, students, people that can't drive and people that can't afford cars.

 Given the choice between taking the bus and driving, most people in this city opt for

 the former it seems. If taking the bus means half-hour waits only for a dangerously

 overcrowded bus to pull up and reasonably refuse to take on any more passengers,

 coupled with really long walks from the bus stop to wherever it is you wanted to go

 (There is some statistic that everywhere in Paris is within 500m of a metro station. 

I doubt the same could be said for Limerick regarding bus stops - if people

have really long walks after their bus journey, often in the wind, the wet, the rain, they

 will be discouraged from using the bus)....Bus Eireann have to get their act together

 so that people will choose the bus rather than the car. If they can convince more

 people that they are offering a good service, they will increase their revenue and then

 be able to invest in improving their service even further. I've a couple of suggestions

 of how they could improve their service:

1. Schedule the busses for every 10 minutes on the busiest routes, every 20 minutes

 on all other routes. People willl only choose the bus over the car if they know their

 bus will be at their stop when they want it, or at least if they know they won't have to

 wait all that long. This would involve buying more buses and hiring more drivers –

 good for employment then.

2. Establish a night service. Sure the taxi-drivers will be up in arms, but isn't

 competition good for the consumer? This could be run to some of the areas most in

 demand at night time but maybe only every 40 minutes.

3. If they feel that double-decker buses are too awkward what with bridges and that,

 why not invest in those single-storey buses twice as long as normal buses with the

 accordion type thing in the middle?

4. Give the public more incentives to use the bus. For example, in the town in France I

 lived in for a while, Besançon, nearly everyone that used the buses had weekly,

 monthly or yearly bus passes. This was made by making the bus passes much cheaper

 than buying single tickets - for instance my student monthly bus pass there was €21

 whereas if I bought single tickets (each one costing a euro) I would have spent well

 over €50 on the bus per month. The bus passes were available in every newsagent,

 and also in the universities and schools. The bus company also had a shop in the

 centre of town to buy

them. Encouraging the majority of people to have travelpasses is also good because it

 speeds up the time it takes to get onto the bus - there is no waiting for change, all you

 have to do is flash your ID.

5. The town also had a great idea to show car-users what life on public transport is

 like. If you brought your car into a mechanic in Besançon, the bus company allows

 you to travel for free on the bus for the duration of your car being out of action.

6. Perhaps put park and ride facilities on the outskirts of the city, i.e. at Coonagh,

 Patrickswell, Annacotty etc. Make the use of these facilities much cheaper than city

 centre parking. Hopefully this would free up traffic so buses would run on time and

 make restore the public's faith that the bus would be on schedule.

7. The design of the current buses needs to be changed. There's too much seating on

 them for a start - it's fine when there are hardly any passengers on them but positively

 dangerous at 5 o'clock in the evening when passengers are squashed up against the

 front windshield. Remove some of the seating and replace it with areas to lean, bars

 to hold onto, and fold up seats.

8. Put 2 doors in the buses - one for going in at the front, one for going out towards

 the back/middle. Much time is wasted when everyone that wants to get off the bus

 has to be let off the door before the people waiting can get on.

9. At every bus stop put maps of Limerick showing all the routes highlighted in

 different colours. Don't have every route necessarily going through town - have more

 routes using orbital roads along the lines of the UL-Raheen via Childers Road route.

10. Widen the Childers Road.

11. Publicity campaigns informing the people of great changes made and the ease of

 taking the bus.

12. More bus shelters.

13. Get property developers of ever expanding suburbs in places like

Annacotty and Raheen contribute towards the extension of bus routes into their

 estates. We can't have everyone relying on the car, the roads just can't accommodate

 them all for a start.

14. Many of the less-used bus routes stop at 6 o'clock. I believe they should stop at 7

 or 8 at the earliest, as this will give people who work until then to catch a bus home.

 Perhaps one of the reasons why some bus routes are so underused is because they are

 so infrequent.

15. It would be good if city buses left from outside the bus and train station too.
Perhaps they could leave from where the taxi rank is, and the existing taxi rank could

 be moved to within the train station car park. At the moment there aren't even signs

 in the train station directing visitors about where the city bus stops are located.

16. Run loads of extra buses on big match days in Thomond Park and the Gaelic

 Grounds, especially from park and ride facilities. Perhaps include free use of public

 transport for the day of the match in the price of the match ticket.

To conclude, I believe that the solution of Limerick's bus problems (and, indeed,

 traffic problems) is to convince people that have the choice about whether to drive or

 not that the bus is a better option. I believe this could be achieved through

 implementing the measures I have outlined above.

Photo: Wendy