Belfast Glider bus rapid transit

[telstarbox]

Has anyone been on this BRT system? Does it work well?

 

[peterblue]

I've been on the northern stretch (City Centre to Titanic Quarter) and the eastern stretch (City Centre to Dundonald P&R) and it seems okay. All ticketing is done off-bus similar to some tram systems and you must scan your pass/card or purchase a ticket before boarding. Most shelters are quite modern and have a seating area, a full shelter, and a ticket machine.

When visiting I had a "Freedom of Northern Ireland" card. It's a bit on the pricy side (£17.50?) but it enabled access onto all buses, coaches, and trains within the country.

Note this info is based off a trip in August 2020 - so some may have more upto date info

 

[danm14]

Has anyone been on this BRT system? Does it work well?

Anti-social behaviour and fare evasion are absolutely rife on the West Belfast portion of the route, which mostly serves deprived working-class nationalist communities. It is not uncommon to see youths smoking, drinking, running up and down the bus hassling other passengers and generally making a nuisance of themselves. Coughing in other passengers' faces was a trend for a while last year.

Fare evasion is very obvious - it is very common to see an entire bus stop worth of people allow a Glider with a ticket inspector on board or a Metro bus serving exactly the same route (which they would need to buy a ticket to board) pass by and wait 15 minutes for the next service. When a ticket inspector boards the bus, large numbers of passengers hastily alight and wait for the next bus.

Staff are very reluctant to intervene in a meaningful way in either fare evasion or antisocial behaviour as attacks are common, and some are very brutal - including one a few years ago where a ticket inspector was dragged off the bus by half a dozen teenagers for challenging their behaviour, and the driver was bludgeoned with a building brick when he tried to intervene.

The East Belfast portion of the route is much better, serving more affluent areas - including Ballyhackamore, one of the most desirable areas of Belfast to live in.

It is, however, painfully slow to get between Belfast and Dundonald - leading to the introduction of express services operated by traditional buses at peak commuting times, and Ulsterbus services to Newtownards and beyond being permitted to carry passengers between Belfast and Dundonald at all times.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 15 Mar 2022 ==

When visiting I had a "Freedom of Northern Ireland" card. It's a bit on the pricy side (£17.50?) but it enabled access onto all buses, coaches, and trains within the country.

The "Freedom of Northern Ireland" card is a brand name used to promote the iLink Zone 4 card to tourists. It covers the entire Translink network within Northern Ireland. It is not valid on services of any other operator - not even Bus Eireann services that accept Ulsterbus tickets (e.g. Route 32 between Aughnacloy and Strabane). It costs £16.50/day, £60/week or £205/month.

There is also a "Freedom of Belfast" (iLink Zone 1) card which covers all buses and trains within the bounds of the Metro/Glider network (and a little bit beyond in some areas, e.g. Cultra and Jordanstown) at £5/day, £19/week or £67/month.

iLink Zones 2 and 3 cover larger circles around Belfast, and iLink Zone NW covers a large portion of the North West centred around Londonderry.

There are also Metro/Glider-only options, which are strictly limited to Metro/Glider services (and Ulsterbus services which convey passengers within the Metro area, e.g. Dundonald-Belfast or Dunmurry-Belfast) with no rail validity. These are the dayLink card (£3.50/day before 9:30am, £3/day after 9:30am, £15 for a bundle of five non-consecutive days) and Smartlink Travelcard (£15/week, £55/month)

 

[Roilshead]

Anti-social behaviour and fare evasion are absolutely rife on the West Belfast portion of the route, which mostly serves deprived working-class nationalist communities. It is not uncommon to see youths smoking, drinking, running up and down the bus hassling other passengers and generally making a nuisance of themselves. Coughing in other passengers' faces was a trend for a while last year.

The April-May issue of The Omnibus Society's Omnibus magazine reports that, last year, "32 physical assaults and 58 verbal assaults were recorded on Gliders as compared with 13 physical assaults and 32 verbal ones on all Metro services.".

 

[TUC]

It has worked fine when we have used it, although it adds little in terms of speed to traditional bus services. The main issue we found was how many seats were raised high and could only be accessed via a step, which is unusually inaccessible compared to modern day buses.