Irish Terminus.con : Bus: Photo of the Week Page

This page updated Weekly will compliment our T/Port Pic of the Week, with Bus Photos.

Lookback to 2003 this time, and Broadstone's RV603, still in Malahide Road 27 Flyer , standing on Hawkins Street on a EURO Working on route 39 in Summer 2003.

New to Clontarf in late 1999 and moved to Broadstone in September 2000, the veichle was repainted into Standard Cityswift colors in late 2003, moving to Harristown in November 2004 and it's current home of Ringsend in early 2008.

In 2009 the Isle of Man Bus System underwent a rebranding exercise, becoming "Bus Vannin".

Co-inciding with this rebranding was the arrival of 11 Volvo B9TL/Wright Gemini, to help replace most of the Island's remaining Olympians, including ex Dublin RH36. 168 is seen here at Douglas having just arrived from Port Erin on December 27th 2009.

The Bus Eireann 8.8m DPC Fleet (DPC101-111) has undergone mixed fortunes in recent times, with many of the class ousted by the new AM Class Enviro 200's.

However by June 2009 batch leader DPC101 was still active and is seen here on the Drogheda Town Service on June 22nd 2009.

 

Bus Photo of the Week, now back on stream, takes another look back to 2002 and one of the main events of the year, the Dublin Bay Rally on April 1st 2002. The TMSI's Preserved R1 sits in the company of Ringsend's then RH175 & WV1 at Custom House Quay before the Rally's Commencement.

The Rally later contunied to Bray and back from there to Clontarf Garage.

In July 2008 Stena Line's Stena Adventurer began carrying foot passengers on the Dublin Port - Holyhead service, complimenting the HSS Stena Explorer on the Central corridor. Buses are used to convey foot passengers from the terminal to the vessel in both Holyhead and Dublin.

The operator used Optare Excels, one of which is seen here on the Stena Adventurer's Car Deck on July 17th 2009 shortly before disembarkation at Holyhead.

The Alexander Dennis Enviro 500 has devolped somewhat of a following since it came onto the Market, with the type now in Operation with KMB in Hong Kong and Dublin Bus's VT Class to name a few, with First Glasgow to follow suit.

However the type has also broken into North America.  Grey Line uses them on their New York City Tour, in an open top form, where 71601 is seen here outside the Empire State Building in downtown New York on September 22nd 2008.

                        

Since Stena Line opened up the Stena Adventurer to foot passengers in July 2008, Mortons have operated a special shuttle from Westmoreland Street at 07.15 to connect with her 08.20 Holyhead sailing.

05-D-8594, delivered to their Circle Line operation in 2005, is seen here outside the Stena Dublin Port Terminal on March 20th 2009.

Apoligies, after a brief interlude Photo of the Week is now back online.

To kick things off, Phibsboro's RV637 is seen here outside Brady's in Maynooth on March 17th 2009, operating a relief on Route 66. The veichle was one of two RV's to visit Maynooth on this day, with RV449 noted in Maynooth 2 hours after this photo was taken.

Castle Avenue's Route 130 Terminus is this week's photo, with Clontarf's RA269 pictured at the pull in on April 21st 2007.

In 2007 the route was an RA mainstay until EV9-22 arrived on Clontarf in Late 2007. RA269 was sold to Southdown PSV in the UK but was quickly resold on, to University Bus (UNO) of Hatfield, UK, In December 2007, where it remains today, with former RA276 & 277. Pics of RA277 can be found here.

By March 2009 Conyingham Road recieved RV590-599 from Harristown and had withdrawn many of their own RV390-399 Batch.

However ex Wedding RV392 survives in service, pending the depot's reciept of EV61 from Broadstone. She is seen here on Dublin's Aston Quay on March 3rd 2009, Operating Route 78A to Liffey Valley Shopping Centre.

Keeping with this week's AOA Theme, Go North East's 3890 , a 2001 built Plaxton President, is seen here at Royal Quays, North Shields, having just shuttled passengers from Newcastle Upon Tyne for the Bergen (Norway) boat on August 21st 2008.

This service operates daily these days, connecting with the DFDS Seaways boat to Amsterdam (Ijmunden) in the evenings, whilst promoting the company as well.

Another 2002 pic for this week, this time from Tralee, Co. Kerry, where KR210 stands on August 2nd 2002.

By this point the KR/KS were still dominant on schools,  but the mass arrival of newer machines saw the fleet's numbers dwindle until the 2005-2007 period, when the last such examples were withdrawn, the last members of the "K" family in revenue earning service. Indeed Tralee was a user of the type in scheduled service up to 2005/2006 on their Route 282 (Kenmare - Castletownbere) during the Summer Months.

This week's pic skips a few years back to 2002, when the first major cull of the Olympians in Dublin took place.

RH8 of Ringsend, RH29 of Summerhill & Donnybrook's RH's 46 & 50 are seen here on the Broadstone bank on June 23rd 2002, having been replaced by the newly arrived AV230 - 282 batch. In the end all were sold to Ensign Bus, with RH8 passing to Fourways, Chelmsford (UK), RH50 to Chambers, Bures (UK), RH46 to Bruen, Coolock & RH29 to Dualway, Rathcoole. By 2009 all remain in service, with RH29 recently repainted by Dualway.

Dublin Bus has strived to keep a relatively young and well presented Wedding Fleet, and this year saw some new arrivals.

EV64 of Conyingham Road & VG9 of Phibsboro were part of a small group of recently arrived examples, with Similar VG10 in Phibsboro & EV88/89 in Clontarf. The livery suits both veichles well, although EV64 requires some finishing work to match it's partner in Conyingham Road, AV353.

Next week's Pic of the Week will be a bit before EV64 & VG9's time....

Dublin Bus have recently begun to push into service thier new VG Class buses with Non-Sequential Number Plates, with VG21 to 50 being numbered accordingly.

VG21 is seen here on Townsend Street on January 8th 2009, it's first day in service, on the 128. This veichle is part of Harristown's VG12-33 batch, with the Northside depot being the largest reciepent of the new Wright Deckers Dublin Bus are recieving. Members of the type in Wedding & Airlink liveries are due soon.

King Long                                    September 26th 2008

Some unusual designs have hit the roads in the Irish Bus Market ,particularly in the past 3 years.

However the above Specimen is one of the more unusual of them. 08 - C - 11 arrived with Kearneys Coaches of Cork earlier this year and at present is one of the only of the type in Ireland, being used as a demonstrator for the type here. Kearneys help to promote it here through King Long Coach Sales Eire. A somewhat large looking veichle, it has one or two style looks of one of it's competitors, the Irizar Century. The Veichle itself spawns from King Long Bus & Coach in Xiamen,China.

With CIE recieving many new buses it is easy, not to mention shortsighted,  not to pay attention to a sector of the bus market which contributes significantly to the Irish Transport System, some of whom have invested heavily in recient years, even now as the country faces Recession. So in time ,who knows, this unique coach type could find other prospective suitors in the turbulent times ahead....

 

As Seirbhis                                          August 10th 2008

No soon had the last RA's been withdrawn after last weekend's outing to Dun Laoighre & Dundrum than the first RV's ,withdrawn for reasons other than accident or fire damage, been taken out of action, with the impending arrival of EV51-100 and AX shuffles.

RV331 was one of the casulties, seen above heading back to Donnybrook. This RV was sent to Ringsend but it entered service in Conyingham Road instead,where it remained until March this year,moving to Donnybrook. Another casulity was RV333, below at Liffey Valley during it's stint in the Adamstown AOA for the 25/A & 78A. It,332 & 334 were withdrawn. All 3 entered service on the 3rd week of May 1997,on the Lucan Corridor to provide much needed relief to the VA fleet,before moving to Clondalkin Routes.

Cest La Vie......

VT's to Celbridge                                 August 4th 2008

The end of the Circle Line operation in June has seen passenger loads,particularly on the Dublin Bus routes running similar routings- the 25 Group & the 67 Group increase, and with the transfer of Phibsboro AX's elsewhere, VT's are now expected to take up "Euro" duties on the Lucan corridor, with the 67 group expected first.

With schools re-opening at the end of the month, demand will only be stimulated further, so the arrival of VT's onto these routes will be a welcome change,as filling them should not pose too much of a challenge, as their appearence on the 38's and 39's has shown, where they will probably still run as well,  that the demand is there, particularly on a corridor where the last major change in the timetable was in 2003.

Lucan's Oxygen            July 17th 2008

The Oxygen Shuttles operated again this year from July 10th to 14th but unlike previous years had a minor route change, this time operating via Lucan (Ballyowen) and on the new ring road via Grange Castle to Kingswood ,where they joined the N7. This avoided the 2007 problems experienced at Newlands Cross with major traffic congestion, when the shuttles ran via the M50.

The 2 photos here show Conyingham Road's RV332, shortly to be withdrawn, and Clontarf's RV428. Summerhill's RV383 operated the last Shuttle via Lucan. Both photos taken at Woodies,Lucan on July 14th 2008.

RV428's scroll is of particular intrest, the unusual font standing out. Clontarf buses were dominant on the final day of the shuttles,with Conyingham Road, Broadstone, Summerhill, Donnybrook & Harristown also chipping in.

Full Circle                          27th June 2008

The Circleline service, which has been in operation for the past few years, bowed out on the 27th June. The service- jointly run by Mortons Coaches of Rathfarnham & Bartons of Maynooth, blamed Dublin Bus for unfair competition but no doubt other factors such as the rising cost of fuel played their part. The above photo, and the 2 photos below, were all taken on D-Day, June 27th.