A few weeks ago, I recounted the experiences of a member of my household on a bus in Cork.
On this particular trip, the driver took a wrong turn early on in the journey and had to be corrected by passengers. Later, the bus caught the side of a parked car when pulling out after a scheduled stop.
A couple of people accused me of overstating the case afterwards — of over-egging the pudding, as it were — when it comes to unusual bus journeys. I have to say the opposite applies, if anything.
Another member of my household had to abandon a bus journey a few weeks back when the bus couldn’t make any progress in the Beaumont area of Cork. Cars parked on both sides of the road simply didn’t give the bus room enough to get past, so she and her pal had to disembark and walk the rest of the way.
A few weeks before that, this particular research assistant was left waiting for a different pal, who eventually came into view at the bottom of Maryborough Hill a good deal later than anticipated, and on foot — rather than on the bus she said she was taking.
The delay was caused by smoke belching ominously from the bus engine, which led to the journey coming to an abrupt end when the driver told the passengers to get off. They walked onwards to complete their journeys, as the bus itself awaited rescue and repair.
This random sampling from one household should be seen in context, I hear you say.
Well, here’s some context. A couple of weeks ago, there was a far more serious incident in Cork when a bus crashed into the garden wall of a home in a housing estate in Ashmount in Silversprings, Tivoli. As reported here: “ . . . the 208 bus crashed into a garden wall after going off the road. Four people were on the bus; three passengers and the driver ... a man aged in his 50s, was taken to hospital for medical assessment.”
Over €20m was reported to be lost over fare dodging in public transport services across Ireland last year.
Less than a week after that, there was another incident in which a bus collided with a car on the N20 Cork-Mallow road, but this was overshadowed by a more recent crash in the centre of the city itself — when a woman had to be taken to hospital after two buses collided.
According to a Garda statement: “Gardaí and emergency services attended the scene of a road traffic collision involving two buses on Grand Parade in Cork City at approximately 8.30pm on Sunday, 25th May 2025. A passenger in one of the buses, a female in her 20s, was conveyed to Cork University Hospital for treatment of non-life-threatening injuries. Enquiries are ongoing.”
The eagle-eyed will make the obvious point that these issues are not all of Bus Éireann’s making. If people are too ignorant to park properly then situations like Beaumont arise and there is little the service can do about it.
In a similar vein, the various collisions and accidents above are not cited in an effort to assign blame or responsibility for them.
However, they are cited to point out the challenges facing public transport in Cork. As a city without a light rail system, the reality is public transport in Cork means the bus, and it will remain the bus for the foreseeable future.
Antisocial behaviour
That reality includes the very real prospect of antisocial behaviour on those buses. As The Echo reported late last year, there were 83 incidents of antisocial behaviour incidents on Cork buses in the first six months of 2024 alone, the majority taking place before 9pm. Eight of those incidents occurred in the morning and included verbal abuse, aggressive behaviour, and a person throwing a bike at a bus at 6am.
This has a real impact on bus services. As recently as February, the 203 service in Cork was pulled because of ongoing problems ranging from: Threats of violence and racial abuse; fires being set on buses; and, eventually, a stone being thrown and shattering a window on one bus.
Some people complain that antisocial behaviour is a weak description of the crimes which fall into that category, but here it is deadly accurate. What could be more antisocial than activity which stops vital community services?
The highest fare evasion rates were on two services in Cork — the 220X Ovens-Crosshaven route (35.3%), and 206 Grange-South Mall (34.3%). There is something enraging about someone dodging a fare if you’ve paid for your ticket, but these figures left me with a grudging admiration for the scale and ambition on show.
Are we really saying that one in three people travelling on the 220X and 206 are not paying?
I raise the various travails of our bus system because of a particularly worrying story in these pages recently.
Set to get worse
Sean Murray reported on a Department of Transport study which predicted that congestion and its associated ills — financial, health, and infrastructural — would get worse, not better, in the coming decade and a half.
The report stated: “In the Cork metropolitan area, population and economic growth will be likely to generate more demand for commuting trips.
“This results in the growth of congestion costs in the morning and evening peaks over the period as well as overall growth of congestion in this area.
“Deliveries of public transport and road infrastructure could reduce congestion temporarily; however, population and economic growth will likely generate demand that exceeds infrastructure provision.”
Significantly, the Department of Transport’s estimates assume that key infrastructure elements of the Cork metropolitan area transport strategy, such as BusConnects, are delivered. Other elements of that strategy include the now-infamous Cork light rail scheme, which is proposed for half of the city because northsiders are afraid of train carriages or something.
That means even if Bus Connects, despite its strange routes, tree-phobia, and various destructive impulses, is delivered, and the South City Light Rail — with its blindness to the airport and its indifference to half the city — are delivered... things will actually be worse?
The report added that in 2022 heavy traffic congestion was seen near the city centre, but future congestion is likely to spread east, west, and north of the city centre. That last section of the city will not have light rail, of course.
We’re in a very unusual position, then. Our current public transport system is a shambles but proposed improvements won’t make a difference in the next 15 years. Do we need an entirely new metropolitan area transport strategy if the one we have won’t work?
If so, that would be typical. You wait around for a metropolitan area transport strategy then two come along at the same time.
