Minister and Government continue to ignore Kildare Commuters 

Labour Cllr and General Election candidate for Kildare South Mark Wall has once again called on the Minister for Transport , Shane Ross T.D., to once and for all address the cost of transport for rail commuters in South Kildare. 

Cllr Wall was replying to a letter from Ms Anne Graham, CEO of the NTA in response to the Kildare South Rail survey. In her reply the CEO states that annual and monthly tickets are virtually unchanged following the NTA yearly review but the review of all other fares will be announced in March 2020. 

“Minister Ross must listen to the 7,000 people from South Kildare who have signed our petition for fair rail fares and the hundreds that completed our rail survey. These Commuters are finding it difficult to manage train fare costs, commuters are still travelling to Sallins rail station rather than use their local station. For a Minister for Transport to allow this to continue is simply unacceptable on so many fronts. There seems to be still time for the Minister and this current Government to address this issue, they cannot continue to ignore commuters.”

In relation to the second biggest issue raised in the rail survey, that of overcrowding, the NTA have given a detailed response to the roll out of new carriages for the Kildare line.Unfortunately Commuters will have to wait until the end of 2021 to see the introduction of these carriages. The additional capacity of 30% will be welcomed by Commuters but the NTA, Government and Irish rail cannot wait two years to address this overcrowding. They need to look at additional early morning services on the Waterford line and the area of booking seats which continues to cause problems where such seats are not being used to maximum benefit of commuters.

For more contact Mark on 0833341488

Please see attached response from NTA.

Each year the NTA reviews the fares in respect of subsidised public transport services. The NTA recently published the outcome of its review of monthly and annual fares for 2019 / 2020 and the report is available at this link https://www.nationaltransport.ie/public-transport-services/fares-determinations/ As you will see, annual and monthly tickets for Iarnród Éireann commuters are virtually unchanged. The NTA plans to publish the outcome of its review of all other fares in March 2020.

Arrangements are in progress to provide additional capacity on commuter rail services serving the Dublin region. An order has now been placed for 41 additional Inter City Rail carriages from Mitsui of Japan.  These are the same type of train vehicle currently in use on many of the Dublin commuter lines. The  41 carriages to be purchased are passenger units only, and will not include driver (cab) cars. Consequently, they will be used to expand capacity by lengthening existing train sets. As you will appreciate the process of manufacturing rail fleet is a lengthy process and the first carriages will be delivered about 24 months from now, at the end of 2021. Thereafter the remainder of the fleet will be delivered over the subsequent nine month period. However, the implementation of 41 ICR intermediate vehicles will provide sizeable additional capacity on the three major commuter routes of Kildare, Maynooth and the Northern Line. The Kildare Line will see capacity increases in both peak periods from current capacity levels of 13,385 to 19,165 providing a 30.2% in capacity for both AM & PM Peak periods and the focus will be on lengthening the existing train sets and providing additional capacity on the current service pattern.