Translink: Late night public transport for Christmas period

Extra bus and train services are available on certain routes across Translink's network until 18 December

The provision of extra late night bus and train services in the lead up to Christmas has been welcomed as Northern Ireland struggles with taxi shortages.

The Nightmovers service includes extra buses and trains in Belfast, Londonderry and a number of other urban routes across Translink's network.

Some weekend services are now departing up to midnight and slightly beyond on both Friday and Saturday nights.

The new timetable was introduced last weekend and will run until 18 December.

It's the first time the Nightmovers service is operating in Derry and from Belfast to Newtownards.

The extra services include:

• Seven Belfast Metro routes which are operating special midnight departures on Friday and Saturday nights only

• In Derry, Foyle Metro is running extra buses at 22:00 GMT, 23:00 GMT and midnight along four routes on Fridays and Saturdays

• Translink's Goldline coach service is providing midnight departures from Belfast along seven routes including Derry; Downpatrick; Newcastle; Newry; Larne; Dungannon and Newtownards

• Northern Ireland Railways is providing additional evening services, including a small number of after-midnight departures from Belfast's Great Victoria Street station to Bangor; Larne; Portadown and Coleraine

• Park and ride services will also open longer for late-night shoppers

The Nightmovers service has been provided in previous years in the run up to Christmas, but did not operate last due to pandemic restrictions.

The return of the temporary service has been welcomed by members of the public and people working in the night-time economy, as it has become increasing difficult to book a taxi, especially at the weekend.

The outbreak of Covid-19 has significantly affected the local taxi industry.

• Taxi firms 'slaughtered' amid shortage of drivers

• Northern Ireland taxi firms unable to meet demand

The North-West Taxi Proprietors organisation told BBC Newsline that there are currently about 8,500 drivers with a taxi licence in Northern Ireland - but only 5,000 to 6,000 are currently working.

It is estimated that about 30% of taxi drivers opted out of the industry during the pandemic.

A shortage of taxis has made getting home from a night out difficult in Derry and elsewhere

Eamonn Corrigan from Regency Cabs in Antrim said Northern Ireland had more than 15,000 licenced taxi drivers in 2013 but since then numbers had declined significantly.

• Northern Ireland taxi firms unable to meet demand

• 'Half of taxi drivers' fail to claim Covid-19 money

He told the BBC's Evening Extra programme that although extra late night buses and trains would help some customers, the widespread taxi shortage will still affect travel plans.

"The taxi industry throughout Northern Ireland would welcome the announcement from Translink in relation to getting the consumer to the town of their destination late in the evening," Mr Corrigan said.

"But that will then create a problem in the provincial towns, because when the customer is then to go from the station - bus or train - to their final destination, their home address, there isn't a taxi service to [meet] that demand."

He told the programme that more needs to be done to attract new drivers into the taxi industry.

Passenger numbers down

Speaking on the same programme, Translink's director of service operations Ian Campbell was asked about the possibility of running extra services past midnight into the early hours of the morning to help get people home.

"We did consider that... but at the minute we're operating these services within our existing resources," he said.

"That does depend very much on the good will of our staff to stay on and commit to work these services."

Mr Campbell added that Translink's resources had been targeted "in line with where we believe the demand is".

"It's also fair to say that the pandemic has had an impact on public transport," he added.

"We're currently operating 100% of our services, but carrying only 70% of our pre-Covid level, so we're trying to match the service offering and match our resources to what we believe is the current demand."