Irish Ferries/Stena Line

[cosseric.coss]

Does anyone know why Stena Line have their own bus and lorry and irish ferries don't

[FerryMan]

what do you mean??? which route?

[20knots]

Don't know the answer but maybe it's just down to image. The Stena Line shuttle bus used for foot passengers at Fishguard/Rosslare (on occasions when the gangway is not used e.g. repairs) is turned out very nicely with company livery. There's also at least one - newer - silver coloured single deck at Holyhead/Dublin which also looks very smart.

The shuttle buses for Irish Ferries seem to be provided by  O R Jones, a bus company on Anglesey.

Shuttle buses in a port situation make the experience cumbersome for foot passengers - far more user friendly to walk on and off via a dedicated foot passenger gangway.

[larry]

thats a very good question though, never thought about it before but im thinking about it now

[Matt73]

Don't know the answer but maybe it's just down to image. The Stena Line shuttle bus used for foot passengers at Fishguard/Rosslare (on occasions when the gangway is not used e.g. repairs) is turned out very nicely with company livery. There's also at least one - newer - silver coloured single deck at Holyhead/Dublin which also looks very smart.

The shuttle buses for Irish Ferries seem to be provided by  O R Jones, a bus company on Anglesey.

Shuttle buses in a port situation make the experience cumbersome for foot passengers - far more user friendly to walk on and off via a dedicated foot passenger gangway.

Very interesting question and I agree. There is a gangway at Holyhead and Dublin for the Ulysees. For some reason the Stena berth, next to Irish Ferries' at Holyhead doesn't.  Those with greater knowledge of the situation will be able to advise us why, I'm sure.

I think it's unacceptable in 2013 for none to be available.

Matt

[bfm003]

The problem with Holyhead is that the main passenger terminal is so far from the ships.
Stena use a shuttle bus from the main terminal directly onboard the ship. Irish Ferries use a shuttle bus to get the passengers down to the terminal beside the ship. The passengers then get off the bus pass through the other terminal and then walk over to the ship via the walkway and on to the ship at the gangway.
On arrival the passengers leave the ship via the gangway and walk to the mini terminal and then get the shuttle bus back to the main terminal.
If there is bad weather and Irish Ferries decide not to use the gangway the shuttle bus will go directly onboard as  Stena does.

[FerryMan]

There's also at least one - newer - silver coloured single deck at Holyhead/Dublin which also looks very smart.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/45570958@N05/7211130836/

Stena Line have four of these buses two up north & two in Holyhead that travel on board the Adventurer, they were originally delivered to Concorde Express at Heathrow & Stena got them when the service closed. The two up north are now only used as backup to the new passenger gangways. They are great buses for passenger transfer as the have three doors two on one side & one on the other side.

[aidan664]

They're Optare Excel's at least the one in the picture is.

[Davy Jones]

Might be a bit late for this answer (which probably isn't accurate, but is how I understand it) but never mind, here goes:

Terminal 3 was developed in the 90s for Irish Ferries to berth their new vessel, the Isle of Innisfree, together with their own dedicated building on Salt Island. Accordingly it made sense to fit a passenger walkway directly to the ship. Stena however at that time was operating freight vessels (Stena Challenger, then Stena Forwarder) from Terminal 4. All foot passengers were carried at that time by Stena Explorer on her 3 round trips daily service. When Stena Adventurer arrived on the scene she was really intended to be a glorified freight vessel. Terminal 5 was developed only to allow a better draft and double tier loading, whilst foot passengers remained the mainstay of the fast-craft. Only when the Explorer's trips were cut back was it considered that foot traffic would have to be handled by Stena's conventional facility. The Stena buses which were originally intended to act as a 'park and ride' from the long stay car park near the fish dock were pressed into further service, commuting between the main terminal building directly to Terminal 5.

Think that's it, unless anybody knows different.