Urbanist Wanderer functions both as a travel blog, and as a personal online space providing independent commentary on various urban issues. The site’s core conviction is that urban mobility is best served by non-automobile means as a long term sustainable solution. We believe in creating walkable cities, accessible public transit, and the importance of prioritising local area transit alongside regional mass transit.
Our approach to our travel blog also reflects our conviction where, as much as possible, we try to feature journeys that do not necessarily require driving. We are also passionate about lesser known destinations, and places of natural beauty beyond the grid.
If you’ve stumbled upon this site, feel free to have a look around. We try to post content regularly, so do subscribe to the newsletter.
Travel information for Ireland
The site also aims to provide independent and volunteer curated travel information for the island of Ireland and places beyond with a focus on traveling via train or bus.
While Ireland as a whole is well covered in tourist guidebooks, its public transport system has seen less attention than is ideal. This has led to tourists being keen to rely on privately operated tour buses and car rentals, as opposed to using local public transport options by default.
There is, of course, a very good reason for that, as public transport links to many outlying tourist attractions are of lacklustre standard. This is best exemplified by the public transport connections to the Newgrange site, itself one of Ireland’s most prominent ancient archaelogical sites. Bizarrely, instead of direct public bus links to the site from Dublin, tourists are expected to either drive, hop on a tour bus, or rely on the disjointed rail and bus connections via Drogheda.
We hope that by bringing attention to these lacklustre tourist links, there would eventually be growing public pressure for better public transport links to outlying areas in Ireland.
Why is there a focus on Northern Ireland?
There are a variety of information pages on the web covering public transport in Belfast and the rest of Northern Ireland. However, the city and the region lacks a single website summarising the various public transport options into detailed and usable guides. The region’s public transport operator, Translink Northern Ireland, does make an effort to host various information pages of its own services, but these are unfortunately laid out in a very confusing and fragmented manner.
The information pages for public transport in Northern Ireland are an attempt to unify and summarise the available information on public transport in Northern Ireland. Much of the content and information are drawn from the personal experience of the site’s creator, and it is hoped that readers gain a better overview of the public transport options in this underrated corner of the world.
The site is presently being put together and constantly updated with new content. Do check back often to see what we’ve added.
Disclaimer
The information seen here are curated independently of the respective service operators using publicly available information. Every effort is made to keep the posted information updated and current. However, as this site is maintained on a volunteer basis, we recommend that you cross-check the information with the service operators to verify their usability. For the avoidance of doubt, we will not be held liable for delays, missed connections, and/or losses arising out of any reliance on the information posted on this site.
All references on this site to Quirky Transit & Travels in any shape or form shall be construed as reference to Urbanist Wanderer.