I'm giving up on public transport and using the car for my commute to Belfast, and here's why

My mind is made up. Translink’s summer of rail closures and price hikes are forcing me back into the car. After years of happily using the train (while complaining about the delays), I never thought I would return to using the car for commuting, but Translink are compelling me to do exactly that.

Why am I making this drastic decision? Where do I even begin to start...

Firstly, Translink had the sheer audacity to introduce another price rise for passengers at the beginning of June, just over a month before much of its rail services in and out of Belfast effectively grind to a halt for the summer.

Yes, for those of us who travel on the Portadown line into Belfast, train services will stop entirely from Wednesday, July 3 until, we are told, ‘early autumn’.

READ MORE: Details of train timetable changes and bus substitutions during station works

READ MORE: Major works on pavements at Belfast Grand Central Station to take 12 weeks

The price of my daily return train journey from Lisburn to Belfast has recently increased from £7.10 to £8, even though I would be forced to use a bus for at least the next two months. It feels like the equivalent of a restaurant hiking its prices while cutting down half of its menu.

Translink have managed many aspects of this process abysmally, starting with the poor communication and lack of transparency with the media and its customers.

Belfast Live, doing its due diligence back in May, first revealed what Translink seemed to want to avoid making clear, that 10 train stations are closing between Lisburn and Belfast through the summer. Judging by the response to our story on social media, many train passengers were unaware of the scale of disruption ahead.

The new £340m Grand Central Station looks very impressive as it takes shape, but did we really need a building of this magnitude at such a gargantuan cost? I think I speak for the vast majority of commuters when I say we just want punctual rail and bus services, we’re not particularly interested in the building that we pass through on the way to and from our places of work.

Look at Dublin. Its main stations, Connolly and Heuston, aren’t grand buildings, particularly Connolly, but as far as I can see, they do the job. Let’s remember that train stations generally aren’t like airports where passengers have to arrive at least an hour before their flight. Ok, it’s important that the number of rail platforms and bus stands are doubling in the new station, but it still feels like an awful lot of disruption to facilitate this work, especially during the summer when weekend socialising in the city’s beer gardens should reach its peak and when music events like CHSQ draw concert goers from across Northern Ireland.

That's all before we even talk about the cross-border Enterprise. If I was travelling to Belfast from Dublin and had to disembark with my luggage at Newry Station, before being bussed to Belfast, I wouldn't be impressed.

Again, we just want punctual train services and this is where Northern Ireland Railways keep getting found wanting. Delays happen too often, and judging by Translink's social media feed, the problem is usually broken down trains. There is questionable value in spending £340 million on a shiny new, fancy station if the trains still break down regularly...

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