Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire (Cork South Central, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I thank the witnesses for attending today. With the NTA present I am tempted to start talking about Bus Connects but I will stick to the brief. Having listened to other members raising issues I agree with Senator Garvey that the issue of bus shelters seems to be a very tortuous process. It can be extremely slow. It is not unlike a number of other issues in this regard, where multiple agencies are involved. Progress can be remarkably slow on things that would appear to be easily achievable to the public. I have lived all my life in places that have been served by bus routes that run at 20 or 25-minute intervals. However, the reality in many rural communities is starkly different. I have three main questions. It is clear that significant progress has been made. We have gone from a starting position of effectively no transport or very localised transport not supported by the State some years ago, to a position now where many communities are served. However, there is still room for improvement. The bit that jumps out at me first is in respect of the NTA statement and the idea of an app-based demand-responsive service, which is an interesting idea. I would like to hear a bit more about it. It sounds a bit like a rural version of the Free Now app or something like that, but perhaps I am wrong and maybe the witnesses can tell me a bit more about it.

This question is for both the NTA and Irish Rural LInk. With any of these routes, whether it is the fixed routes or the demand-responsive routes, public money is involved with an element of subvention. A balance has to be struck in approving it as to the community benefit and then the cost to the NTA and the Exchequer. What is the threshold? At what level does the NTA decide it is not going to approve a certain fixed or demand-responsive route? What criteria are applied? From Irish Rural Link's point of view, are any of the criteria too onerous? Rural communities are diverse. Some rural areas are quite densely populated such as Gweedore, for example. Others are very sparsely populated, such as large parts of south Kerry or the Sheep's Head Peninsula, County Cork, and other places. Rural is not all the one, as I am sure the witnesses well know. In what areas does Irish Rural Link find that the thresholds that the NTA applies are perhaps too onerous or that the test is not quite fair and perhaps need to be revised?

In both in urban and rural contexts, the distribution of people travelling throughout the day or week is not even. Travel is concentrated at certain times. Schools are an obvious example of this and the school transport programme is in place for that work. Very often the timetables can reflect the uneven distribution and there is a glut of morning services and evening services whether it is on the Bus Éireann routes or some of the fixed rural transport links. However, within a given week, there are frequent and regular events that a large amount of people go to within a community. There is a balance here, because there is space for purely private contractors and they have a right to operate and they have their role to play. Take for example a community that has Thursday night bingo in the local GAA hall, is there scope for providing a service in this case or is this more suited to the private sector? To give another example, take a large rural community where 40% of children go to soccer or GAA training. Is there a possibility in cases like this where many people are travelling at the one time to an event? Perhaps the witnesses' response will be that this is better suited to the private sector, properly so called, with no public involvement. However, there are times in the week, outside of school and work when people travel, sometimes in large groups. Is there scope to do more to address this issue?