On the morning of 17th June, I turned up in Heuston station at 7:26, 2 minutes ahead of the 7:28 deadline for my 7:30 train! I showed my ticket to the Irish Rail employee who was leaning on the electronic ticket gate and he let me in. Half a train was sitting at platform 3, with a few hundred passengers milling about on the platform. They all seemed to be getting off the train.
This was a slow process with mothers and babies, elderly nuns in wheelchairs and tourists. There also didn't seem to be anyone in charge, but later on a lady without an id badge seemed to be in control. The ticket checker was chatting to some people.
There was a virtually inaudible announcement with the standard "we apologise for the late departure of this.. mumble mumble mumble" but the platform display was still showing a nice big "on time."
From taking the train every day, and noticing the fact that we only had half a train (a 3 carriage set) I assumed that they were waiting for a second 3 carriages, and this was in fact what happened. I confirmed this when I managed to. but in on the ticket checkers conversation, and then finally at 7:35 or so, they backed up a second 3 carriage train and stuck it on.
Then, there was mayhem as they tried to get the elderly people going to Knock, the tourists and the foreign nationals with children back on the train.
Now for those that take this train every day, we know that the 3 carriages nearest the gate go to Westport and the 3 furthest away go to Galway. The announcement said, "board the top 3 carriages for Galway and the rear 3 for Westport" which makes sense if you are a train driver, but perhaps not for anyone else. (this happens every day)
What generally happens every day is thats passengers ask each other, and get on a carriage, sometimes the right one and sometimes the wrong. On a good day there are announcements from the automatic voice on board, repeating the "top 3 carriages" lark. This has been going on for months and every day the stress levels of infrequent travellers are piqued, as they worry whether they are in the correct carriage. Most days, the scrolling electronic display on the train is just set for Galway, causing the Westport patients to have hernias.
Then there is the booked seating. Sometimes it is turned on. Sometimes it isn't. Lately someone has started putting "this seat is booked" cards on seats, but there is no name on the electronic display, no date or time on the piece of paper and no information about which portion of the journey the seat is reserved. Lately, they have started putting big stickers on the windows, but again, no indication of for when they are valid.
I went on twitter to give out to @irishrail. When I was there, I decided to see what people were saying in general to @irishrail. A common theme seemed to be lack of information. www.railusers.ie also have a few sections of their forums set aside for information breakdowns by Irish rail, particularly destination displays that go wrong.
It is all very simple. Irish people know that everything is not going to go to plan every day, but why not give us information, so that we don't have to guess!
Today's fiasco could be easily remedied.
Firstly, the platform should not have even been announced to passengers until the train was completely ready for all passengers to board.
A message should have been displayed on the main board in Heuston, announcing that the train would be delayed, and giving an estimated boarding time and departure time.
Next, Irish rail should at this point have fixed their train information displays to deal with joint running trains. Coaches A, B and C should always go to Galway, and should say "Galway - Gailimh" on the side. Inside the scrolling display and automated announcement should list all stations to Galway. The display and announcement should then tell people that the Westport service was in Coaches D, E and F and that passengers would need to get out and go to the left or right (as appropriate) Similar information should be displayed in the westport bound coaches.
The display the station should also make it clear which coaches passengers needed to be in for each station.
Next, the booking system just has to be used. When there is a group, the name of the group could appear instead of the name of the passenger, but it should still be there. Where large groups of school children, or tours going to knock are expected, extra coaches should be used, even if they are only starting from Athlone, but all of this should be announced, on platform displays and by announcements on the train. No more making it up as they go along. No more bits of paper. The train staff should also enforce the reservation system, and have a way of turning off individual seat bookings, perhaps using their mobile phones, if the named passenger is not in their seat as the train is due to depart.
All in all, they just need to get their communication with the customer right. If that happened, travelling by train would be less stressful, and more people might travel! As it is, the system seems to be geared towards keeping people in the dark. The timetables are given padding so that trains are scheduled to take 10-20 minutes longer to get to Dublin from Portarlington, than Portarlington from Dublin. This is, in the style of Ryanair, so that they can claim to be on time, even when the train is late.
So if you are listening Irish Rail, just get the information right, and that will be a start!
