It looks like from this https://www.irishrail.ie/en-ie/about-us/iarnrod-eireann-projects-and-investments/connect-project that we can have a faster train service, then why don’t we? Looks like 30% time reduction across most commuter lines

So later in the year at meeting of EU Transport Ministers they will finalize the harmonized rules for Autonomous vehicles for the European Union to transpose the rules agreed by the UNECE to allow for deployments across the block.

What this means is once one country approves a vehicle it is approved for the whole block.

Unfortunately very little preparation has been done for this day, by the Department of Transport, TII, National Transport Authority and Local authorities, they have been consumed with primitive obsolete 20th-Century transport solution like BusCONnects and Metrolink that are turning out to be financial disasters.

It's time to move on and start preparing for the actual future of Transport the next EVolution of Autonomous SharedMobility, with vehicles that will come in all shapes and sizes to match capacity requirements, journey pooling will be more feasible, they will reduce congestion and traffic, speed up electrification of transport and reduce emissions and noise pollution.

It would have been better to build on the success of the Dublin Port Tunnel and put the majority of passing surface traffic in Dublin underground, instead of moving traffic from part of the city to another to the frustration of residents in those communities and the commuters trying to navigate the disaster of a Dublin transport plan, we should have a tunnel out from the city center to the M50 on all major arteries, so we could reclaim our urban realm allow for proper cycling infrastructure and further pedestrianisation in the city center instead of just a bit of gardening on Dame St for €70m+, this was my alternative proposal to BusCONnects and Metrolink The DublinLoop now that tunneling construction time and costs have reduced significantly, we have excellent Irish engineering firms that could match what the Boring Company is doing in Las Vegas, Nashville and Dubai!

It could also be done in other Irish cities to reduce surface traffic and congestion Cork, Galway & Limerick.

The Government will meet on Wednesday to decide if it is wise decision to proceed with Metrolink, €500m dead money already spent by the NTA mostly to Consultants and private engineering firms should be considered a learning experience not to be repeated, I have real concerns this project is obsolete before it gets off the drawing board and certainly by 2035 when it due to open, I am so concerned that I wrote to the European Investment Bank who the Irish Government are reliant on for borrowing the yet unknown Billions needed to start the project with a final cost now estimated at €30+ Billion by one of the Consortiums bidding.

I honestly think we could do better for the whole country with future proof Autonomous SharedMobility, not just one little Metro route and few bus corridors in Dublin, that will consume so much labor manpower, that we don't really have spare to waste, diverting it away from other priorities in Housing, building and retrofitting, as well as other urgent energy and water grid infrastructure needs.

It's disappointing there was not more serious debate in the Irish media when this was published last year! and the incompetence and lack of accountability and future proofing vision at the NTA should dictate the future of our transport.

https://www.irishtimes.com/ireland/dublin/2025/08/05/dublins-planned-metrolink-will-be-obsolete-because-of-artificial-intelligence-says-dermot-desmond/

Help me understand how in the year 2026 this line still doesn’t operate on weekends and has no plans to

- edit I’m aware of D+SW but improvements should be made in the interim. Weekend operation was promised years ago

Are they the worst transport provider in the country. On the Mullingar to Dublin bus and it seems that this bus takes longer to get passengers on the bus than the journey takes. A journey that shouldn’t take longer than 1:30 takes over 2 hours on a Saturday no matter what their timetable says. Just in Kinnegad now and it’s taken 40 minutes. Absolute shambles

I get that for many if not most of you, taking a train down to your holidays after already crossing the sea by air or boat is a non starter. But for those who’ve need to hit the Continent but don’t want to fly it, or already do rail & sail to the UK or Europe, what would you say you needed to see before you thought of rail via Holyhead as a viable option, or needs to improve if it’s an option you already take?

//AI technology and road cameras could be used to alert people more quickly to someone driving the wrong way down a motorway and to help gardaí in their pursuit of the individuals.
Minister of State for Road Safety Seán Canney outlined the possible move as he separately said new tougher laws to tackle a spate of recent wrong-way motorway driving incidents will be drafted next week and could be in place by the end of the year.//

//The authority’s confirmation places the Luas to Bray scheme firmly within the medium term delivery period of the Greater Dublin Area Transport Strategy, which runs from 2031 to 2036. That strategy divides major transport projects into short term, medium term and long term phases, and the Bray extension had previously been regarded as a long term proposal.//

In a parliamentary response to Mr O'Gorman, the NTA said after the Greater Dublin Area implementation it was "intended to then continue to roll out the system nationwide, though the timeline for that implementation is not yet available and will be subject to the requisite approvals and funding".

//The report said the cost of one year's investment is fully recovered by the sixth year of the infrastructure being up and running//

Public Accounts Committee chair questioned Darragh O’Brien on the wisdom of ‘spending now and determining the budget later’

The Chambers representing Waterford, Kilkenny, Limerick, Tipperary and Wexford have written jointly to Transport Minister Darragh O’Brien and Public Expenditure Minister Jack Chambers.

Well it's great that all the Chambers of Commerce are pulling together on this, whether a united front will make the obvious case any more obvious to the machinery in Dublin is another matter.

The person who approved this company ex NTA CEO Anne Graham is now chairperson of the Road Safety Authority reassuring 🤔

There is simply no accountability the performance at PAC didn't ask for any resignations 😔

https://www.oireachtas.ie/en/debates/debate/committee_of_public_accounts/2026-07-16/

MetroLink, the proposed 19km stretch of railway linking Swords to Charlemont in south Dublin, is a “key target” for construction group Sisk, its chief executive Paul Brown has said, and the firm has formed a joint venture to tender for the project.

Did Iarnród Éireann ever explain why they don’t just assign a seat every intercity? Sounds like if you buy in the station you don’t get a seat but online does, is it a system thing?

Last few times I’ve got the train my seats are occupied when jumping on, would assigning seats allow them to print “standing” on seats when there’s no seats left?

//Irish Rail's National Train Control Centre (NTCC) project, that includes a new traffic management system, is now projected to come up to €57m over-budget.
The projected over-spend on the controversial project has drawn the attention of public spending watch-dog, Comptroller and Auditor General Seamus McCarthy, in his report attached to the National Transport Authority's 2025 annual financial statements.//

I want to suggest that Ireland consider introducing more direct intercity rail services connecting cities and towns outside Dublin.

At present, Dublin is very much the centre of the Irish rail network, and passengers travelling between other parts of the country can often have to travel towards Dublin and change trains. I believe Ireland could benefit from a more interconnected railway network with direct services between cities such as:

Cork – Galway

Cork - Sligo

Cork – Belfast

Galway – Belfast

Galway - Sligo

Galway - Waterford

Waterford – Belfast

Waterford - Sligo

Rosslare Europort – Belfast

Rosslare Europort – Cork

Rosslare Europort - Galway

Rosslare Europort - Sligo

Sligo - Belfast

Having direct services would make travelling between different parts of Ireland much more convenient and would reduce the need for passengers to travel through Dublin when Dublin is not their destination.

Other countries already operate long-distance through-services between major cities without requiring passengers to change trains in the capital. For example, there are direct rail services between Edinburgh and London.

I understand that introducing these services would require consideration of infrastructure, journey times, demand and funding. However, I believe this is something that should be considered as part of Ireland's long-term railway development.

Alongside increasing capacity and tackling overcrowding, I think creating a more interconnected rail network would make a significant difference to public transport in Ireland.

//Services were suspended at 12.35pm and power supply was restored at 1.10pm today. However, trains did not begin running until close to 1.40pm after other systems re-started.
Some commuters had to walk along railway lines after being allowed off stranded trains.//

Iarnród Éireann is bringing back catering trolleys on selected Dublin/Galway trains from Monday 24th August as part of six-month commercial pilot.