Bosco, the 1980s television puppet, the great and the good of public transport planners and providers, and even the sun, came out for the Dart’s 40th birthday celebrations at Grand Canal Dock on Tuesday.
As dignitaries mingled around a slowly melting Black Forest gateau in the shape of a Dart carriage, a specially “wrapped” train arrived emblazoned with images from the last four decades – including a Rubik’s cube, a millennium milk bottle and marriage equality badges.
Somewhat unnervingly, as the train stopped, Bosco appeared at the window of the driver’s cab, welcoming people aboard to see a short film written by Dublin author Roddy Doyle.
The film featured Doyle’s “Two Pints” characters braving the southside, as one recalls he met his wife when he held the door for her to get her horse on the Dart. There was no point in going to Greystones, they agreed, as it had no pubs. It was too like Iraq, they said: “All sand and dry.”
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Recalling the electrification of “the world’s first commuter rail line”, Minister for Transport Eamon Ryan was in excellent form. He said “the naysayers” had claimed the Dart would have no passengers as there were “only seagulls on one side” of the route.
Smiling broadly he warned: “Whoever is in government next time has to continue the two to one spending ratio in favour of public [over private] transport.
“Otherwise,” he said, “we won’t be able to afford Darts for Cork – Carts for Cork.”
Smiling even wider, Mr Ryan went on to articulate aspirations for Darts in Limerick, Waterford and Galway.
Jim Meade, chief executive of Irish Rail, detailed the arrival of a new Dart fleet from French train maker Alstom and said planning approval for the Dart to Maynooth was “about to” be granted by Bord Pleanála.
“I would argue that the Dart is the country’s greatest public transport success story: in the hugely challenging economic era that was early 1980s Ireland, it won the argument that investment in high-quality, high-frequency public transport will be supported by the communities it serves,” he said.
As the assembled crowd sweltered in unaccustomed afternoon sunshine, Dr Mark Gleeson of Rail Users Ireland said the lack of air conditioning in the original Dart fleet was “a design flaw”.
“But it is a good day. They deserve their day,” he said.
Emerging from the train Mr Ryan, Mr Meade and Anne Graham, chief executive of the National Transport Authority, posed for photographs as Mr Ryan used a sharp knife to cut the now disassembling birthday cake. He did not appear to see a specially presented silver cake slicer brandished by Irish Rail spokesman Barry Kenny.
The Minister was later presented with a Leap card and a bum bag made out of yellow and green Dart seat material.
Irish Rail said since the Dart opened to the public in July 1984, almost 670 million passenger journeys had been made on the service.
Over the years the service has become something of an icon for the city. It has featured in the film version of The Commitments; has inspired poetry by the late Nobel laureate Seamus Heaney; has appeared in Conversations with Friends and Fair City; and is the only public transport used by The Irish Times columnist Ross O’Carroll Kelly.
The Dart+ Programme, which is already under way, aims to treble the size of the Dart network with extensions to Drogheda, Maynooth, Hazelhatch and Wicklow.
A Dart 40th anniversary stakeholder conference is planned for October, to coincide with the unveiling of the first of the new Dart+ fleet, being delivered by French train manufacturers Alstom.
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