Bus Éireann has announced an expansion of bus services in a number of areas, with 120 additional drivers to be hired by the company.
The company is calling it the most significant enhancement it has gone through in 15 years.
More services will be added in Cork, Limerick and Clare while an upgraded route will be introduced in Navan, county Meath.
As the Irish Times reports, the development has been described by the semi-State transport company as the “most significant single enhancement of services in more than 15 years”.
Recruitment for some new 120 bus drivers is still ongoing, and women make up 15 per cent of the new drivers hired to date. This follows efforts in recent years by the company to encourage more women to apply for driver roles.
The funding for the increased services is provided by the National Transport Authority (NTA), and was announced in the Government’s July stimulus plan.
Expressway services
The announcement comes three months after Bus Éireann announced it was suspending several intercity Expressway services due to financial pressure caused by the Covid-19 pandemic.
The Dublin-Belfast route was closed in November, while the company said it was also suspending Expressway services from Dublin to Cork, Galway and Limerick.
The new services announced on Monday, and increased frequency on existing routes, will amount to an extra three million kilometres of bus journeys nationwide per year.
The extra routes will include a full town service in Navan from the end of this week, up from one bus a day to two routes running every half hour, served by five buses.
A new cross city service will be rolled out in Cork linking Glanmire with Cork University Hospital, with the frequency of services from Glanmire to the city centre increased to three buses an hour.
Portroe, Co Tipperary, will have a daily bus route to Limerick and Nenagh for the first time
