Railway Procurement Agency

Railway Procurement Agency (RPA)
State Agency of the Department of Transport overview
Formed	28 December 2001 (2001-12-28)
Jurisdiction	Ireland
Headquarters	Parkgate Business Centre, Parkgate Street, Dublin 8
State Agency of the Department of Transport executive	Cormac O’Rourke, Chairman
Key document	Transport (Railway Infrastructure) Act, 2001
Website	www.rpa.ie

Railway Procurement Agency (Irish: An Ghníomhaireacht um Fháil Iarnród) is a State Agency of the Department of Transport in the Republic of Ireland charged with the development of light railway and metro infrastructure. It was established in December 2001 under the Transport (Railway Infrastructure) Act 2001.

Many of the staff of the agency came from the Light Rail Project Office of Córas Iompair Éireann (CIÉ), which dissolved upon the RPA's inception. The agency operates completely independently of CIÉ. This was due to a fear by the government that CIE's implementation of new rail projects would be slow and inefficent, as the company is not well regarded by the country's political leadership. The RPA's main role is overseeing the operation of the Luas system, along with the planning of new Luas and Metro lines for Dublin as laid out under the Irish Governments Transport 21 investment programme. The operation of the Luas is contracted out to Veolia, and the RPA are responsible for monitoring their performance.

The agency has no role in the mainline railway system, which is operated by Iarnród Éireann (a subsidiary of CIÉ).

The RPA were also in charge of developing an integrated ticketing system for all public transport modes in Dublin. This resulted in the introduction of the Leap card in December 2011.

Transport 21 Initiatives

The RPA will have crucial role in implementing key rail elements of the Irish government initiative, Transport 21. It will be responsible for the planning, coordination and procurement through conventional means, and through Public Private Partnership, where necessary, of the following projects:

• Dublin Metro, consisting of Metro North and Metro West
• Connolly Station to Point Depot extension - Red Line
• Belgard to Citywest extension - Red Line
• Stephen's Green to O'Connell Street extension - Green Line
• Sandyford to Cherrywood/Brides Glen extension - Green Line.
• The RPA is also responsible for planning new Luas lines to Lucan and Liffey Junction planned, along with a second green line extension to Bray, and a short section of Luas to join the Red and Green lines.

Controversies

Luas Red Line - Engineering

In 2006, the RPA were criticised for allowing the Red Line to be opened, in the knowledge that parts of the track support of line were faulty in regards to track support.^[1] This became public through an independent report by Austrian consultants. Though not life threatening, the supports must be replaced soon and the building contractors have agreed to do this at their own cost.

Chief Executive Dispute

Early on the CIÉ project director of Luas, Donal Mangan, took legal action as he felt that he had the right to be its chief executive.^[2] For two years the agency paid his salary and gave him an office, even though the chief executive's position had been filled by Frank Allen.

Integrated Ticketing Scheme

At the end of the last century the first discussions and investigations started to introduce a standard payment scheme for all modes of public transport. When the plans for the -then- new platform the Luas became reality the demand for one single ticketing scheme became more and more important and it was the intention and goal to introduce the new scheme together with the opening of the new Luas line. The Leap card scheme, final result of this lengthy process, uses a smartcard which is usable in all Dublin public transport systems. The RPA was respobsible for drawing up an integrated ticketing scheme, and the project was victim of many set-backs: many times exceeding the budgets, not delivering on date etc.^[3] The RPA was also responsible for the development of the Luas smart-card which is not compatible with the new Leap card which was delivered in December 2011.Though integrated ticketing, of a form, existed in Dublin prior to the LEAP card, in the form of dual or triple service paper magnetic strip tickets, these were not the basis for the interconnected ticketing system. In fact many argue that LEAP is a smart card, but not integrated ticketing. For example, there are magnetic strip ticket options that allow one unlimited travel on all three Dublin public transport services, and inter-city tickets that allow a person taking an intercity journey to also ride Dublin Bus or Luas into the city centre from regional rail stations if they wish, as part of their ticket price. LEAP is not fully integrated. While it can be used across all three services, there is no single zonal system for all Dublin public transport and one cannot start a journey on a Bus and finish on a Luas, for example. There are also some oddities with the ticketing system. For example, a magnetic strip ticket in the form of a Daily Rambler for DART and Bus is €13.10, however the daily cap for the LEAP card means that one can have a de-facto unlimited daily rambler on all services including Luas for just €10. Once this cap is reached, the card will not deduct further credit.

References

External links

• Railway Procurement Agency
• Photos of the LUAS Green line
• Rail Users Ireland - Ireland's National Rail User organisation