Dublin bus routes privatised.

It's hard to know the numbers... it's such a small amount of the network that on its own it won't make much contribution one way or another?

How much cheaper was the Go Ahead bid I wonder?
Will Go Ahead be supplying smaller buses for some of these low volume orbital routes and therefore saving costs in that way?

Will the new service integrate with LEAP card system and RTPI?
Will they be able to share bus stops with Dublin Bus?
If not, it will make linking these orbital routes with the Dublin Bus city centre routes challenging.
Hopefully NTA have thought about these things :)

Why did the tenders have to commit to "operating a depot"? Presumably the other bidders who dropped out because of this would have had lower cost than Go Ahead or Dublin Bus. I understand the NTA laying down service level agreements, but this is possibly over restrictive specification?

I am also not sure full stop about some of these orbital routes as currently routed\timetabled, whether run by Dublin Bus or another operator, 90% of the time when I see a 104 bus it has less than 5 people on it!
 
Nothing to do with fares.

All fare revenues on these routes goes to the NTA.

Same bus stops, new NTA bus stop design being rolled out. Bus stops should not be operator-specific.
 
Go Ahead are supplying no buses. From what the NTA said on the radio earlier, they will take some buses back off Dublin Bus (that are already leased from the NTA) or lease some newly sourced vehicles out to Go Ahead directly.
Dublin bus staff not required to transfer across....they will be giving alternative work elsewhere in the company if they so wish.
 
Leap card will be accepted by the supplier, it was a condition of the tender.

This isn't the big tender to watch out for, that will be in Waterford if Bus Eireann lose the right to run the city buses. Then the unions are going to go ballistic
 
Hello,

Are these routes going to have multiple operators on them, or just the new operator ? If only the new operator, how exactly is it increasing competition ?

Supply and Demand will determine the size of buses, the frequency of buses etc. so I'm not sure how moving this from Dublin Bus to another operator will improve the frequency of service to be honest. Perhaps they are hoping that the introduction of more frequent, smaller buses may help encourage more people to use the service or something ?

I'm generally in favour of privatisation and competition (unless there is a very good reason for the state to be involved in a service and perhaps have a monopoly), but I don't see any real logic to what has taken place here - other than to introduce the principal of removing Dublin Bus from certain routes.
 
MrEarl said:
Are these routes going to have multiple operators on them, or just the new operator ? If only the new operator, how exactly is it increasing competition ?
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These orbital routes will just have the new operartor. The routes are not in competition with Dublin Bus routes.
So there is no direct competition in the consumer marketplace, the competition is in the tendering process.
 
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TheBigShort said:
https://www.rte.ie/news/2017/0810/896450-go-ahead-dublin-bus-routes/

Competition on the bus routes. Reducing the subsidy paid by taxpayers and increasing efficiency of the bus service.

This will no doubt result in reduced burden on public finances and result in cheaper fares for consumers.

Or will it?
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I don’t think this is about the cost to consumers but rather the subsidy by the State on the cost of running the service.

In the longer term it should also reduce the cost to the State of funding very generous defined benefit pensions for CIE group company employees.


I like the idea of the State regulating but not delivering as many public services as possible. The problem is that intimately the people doing the regulating will be unaccountable, unnameable and unsanctionable public servants and recent history tells us that our Public Service doesn’t have the skills, ability or backbone to regulate the Private Sector properly.
 
MrEarl said:
I don't see any real logic to what has taken place here - other than to introduce the principal of removing Dublin Bus from certain routes.
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I agree, it hasn't been explained what it was that Go Ahead would provide in their tender application that Dublin Bus did not already provide.
 
odyssey06 said:
So there is no direct competition in the consumer marketplace, the competition is in the tendering process.
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If company A can provide the same service and standards cheaper than company B and ticket fares remain the same for consumers, who benefits from the reduced costs?
 
TheBigShort said:
If company A can provide the same service and standards cheaper than company B and ticket fares remain the same for consumers, who benefits from the reduced costs?
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In theory, the Minister for Finance now has funds available for other purposes.

But, in practice, and I might be over-thinking this one... I have a suspicion\instinct that Dublin Bus might have been using this tender as a nice little earner to balance the books, as an indirect subsidy.
So my concern is that losing out on this, they will need further shoring up regardless...
 
Purple said:
I don’t think this is about the cost to consumers but rather the subsidy by the State on the cost of running the service.

In the longer term it should also reduce the cost to the State of funding very generous defined benefit pensions for CIE group company employees.
Click to expand...

The cost to consumers v the cost to taxpayers. Invariably, they are the same people. Robbing Peter to pay Paul.
I doubt if the consumer taxpayer will see any benefit by way of reduced taxes, or improved services or reduced prices.
Just my hunch.
 
Delboy said:
Dublin bus staff not required to transfer across....they will be giving alternative work elsewhere in the company if they so wish.
Click to expand...
Priceless; Cost reduction State company style, "We are outsourcing your job but we'll keep paying you."
 
TheBigShort said:
The cost to consumers v the cost to taxpayers. Invariably, they are the same people. Robbing Peter to pay Paul.
I doubt if the consumer taxpayer will see any benefit by way of reduced taxes, or improved services or reduced prices.
Just my hunch.
Click to expand...
You are probably right but I do like the idea of people paying for the services they consume rather than things being funded through general taxation. People should pay the full cost for their bus and train journeys and not expect their neighbour to subsidise them.
 
Purple said:
You are probably right but I do like the idea of people paying for the services they consume rather than things being funded through general taxation. People should pay the full cost for their bus and train journeys and not expect their neighbour to subsidise them.
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I couldn't disagree more. People who use public transport already pay their fares and subsidise those that choose to use private cars to transport to work. Public transport passengers reduce congestion on roads, reduce the likelihood of accidents, reduce carbon emissions and overall make a far greater contribution to the efficient running of the economy than any motorist does.
The State should intervene to subsidise more public transport services in order to reduce reliance on congestive private transport.
A comment was made about a bus carrying only 5 passengers. But it wasn't stated how many passengers were being carried in the five cars (running 5 engines) that followed after the bus - perhaps only 5 passengers too.
 
odyssey06 said:
I am also not sure full stop about some of these orbital routes as currently routed\timetabled, whether run by Dublin Bus or another operator, 90% of the time when I see a 104 bus it has less than 5 people on it!
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Do you think that a private operated service charging the same fares, providing the same service will increase passenger numbers?
 
TheBigShort said:
Do you think that a private operated service charging the same fares, providing the same service will increase passenger numbers?
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If there is no change to timetabling or frequency or fares... I would not expect any increase or decrease in passenger numbers. Why would you?

Possibly the amount of coverage the routes are getting now in the press as a result of this might alert some people to the existence of these routes and lead to an increase in usage ... but that's a but nebulous.

I'm not sure what the threshold is in terms of passenger usage for cancelling a route \ continuing to provide a subsidy on it. But the 104 must be surviving by the skin of its teeth!

Your original question was: "This will no doubt result in reduced burden on public finances and result in cheaper fares for consumers."

In theory it will reduce the burden on public finances.
As to whether it will result in cheaper fares for the consumers, that is a question for the NTA and Department of Finance.
If the NTA can reduce the subsidy by using GoAhead but provide the same service, then there is less pressure for fare increases, for example.
Alternatively, the Department of Finance might use the subsidy to pay for a helicopter in Galway.
 
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