• Our booking engine at tickets.railforums.co.uk (powered by TrainSplit) helps support the running of the forum with every ticket purchase! Find out more and ask any questions/give us feedback in this thread!

Bus announcements!

Status
Not open for further replies.

yorkie

Forum Staff
Staff Member
Administrator
Joined
6 Jun 2005
Messages
67,429
Location
Yorkshire
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/4991326.stm
Emma Hignett will start recording about 30,000 announcements such as "next stop Victoria" for 700 bus routes. Her voice will be accompanied by visual displays.

It is part of a scheme to make buses easier to use for those with hearing and vision difficulties, as well as visitors to the city.

But Liberal Democrat MP Norman Baker said the scheme was evidence of "incessant verbal garbage" in society.

The project will roll out in 2007 as part of the iBus project, which aims to track every bus in London.
I wonder if there will be constant safety warnings, and will it apologise for being stuck in traffic?
 
Sponsor Post - registered members do not see these adverts; click here to register, or click here to log in
R

RailUK Forums

Tom B

Established Member
Joined
27 Jul 2005
Messages
4,602
"This is a 57, operated by an Optare Solo vice a B10M, so squidge up... please remember that smoking is not permitted, unless you're the driver or one of his mates. Customers should not distract the driver, he's got enough distractions from texting his girlfriend and listening to the radio. Please have your mortgage documents ready when purchasing tickets.
 

tramboy

Member
Joined
8 Jun 2005
Messages
367
Wonder if it will be as bad as the StarTrak system fitted to Trentbarton's Rainbow5? "This is Long Eaton Green" (at Beeston), then "Next stop Train Station." (we're not sure which mind!) Also they can announce the stops to Derby when going to Broadmarsh, and vice versa!

Great fun!

Cheers

Dave
 

Nick W

Established Member
Joined
5 Nov 2005
Messages
1,436
Location
Cambridge
Welcome abroard the 0843 bus to Victoria. This bus will call at ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
and Victoria.

Customers for ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ should make sure they press the button well in advance of the stop.

Safety notices are displayed throughout the bus. Please familiarise youreself with this information each time you travel (please don't really do this as the bus is late enough already).

First class accomodation is for those lucky to have seats. Smoking is not permitted on any part the bus other than the roof.

There is no buffer on the bus but with the heat you should soon cook.

Thankyou very much, I wish you a pleasant *sniggers* journey.
 

Galvanize

Member
Joined
8 Jun 2005
Messages
1,100
Location
South East london
Julian G said:
OR a Desiro Style one
"This Bus is for London Bridge calling at Lewisham Pier,St.John's Road,London Bridge road and London Bridge Station"
Where the hell is Lewisham pier?

"Welcome to London Buses. This is London Central's Route 436 to Paddington station via the following principle stops: Lewisham Station, Lewisham College, Goldsmiths College, New Cross road, Peckham High Street, Camberwell Green, Oval station, Vauxhall station, Pimlico, Victoria Station, Hyde Park Corner, Park lane, Marble Arch, Edgeware Road and Paddington Station where the bus terminates.

Customers with Oyster pre-pay should touch in at the readers provided by the doorways. Customers with savers please present to the driver. Please not that cash fares cannot be purchased on this bus, if you have not payed, you may be liable to a £20 penalty fare.

Our staff and passengers have the right to work and travel without fear of attack. Allegations of assualt will be taken seriously.
For the comfort of all passengers, Smoking is not permitted anywhere on this bus. CCTV cameras are in operation on this bus, for the purpose of security and safety managment.

customers wishing to alight from this bus, please ring the bell once, well before the stop.

This is Route 436 to Paddington station.

Please stand clear of all doors."
 

Ascot

Established Member
Joined
26 Nov 2005
Messages
3,382
Location
Birmingham, UK
Oh yes!! have them on the Travel West Midlands 94. Have em down in seconds just like the cameras. <D
 
H

HR2

Guest
Where the hell is Lewisham pier?

Same place as Wigan's I suppose! :confused:
 

asopu10

Member
Joined
16 Feb 2006
Messages
59
tramboy said:
Wonder if it will be as bad as the StarTrak system fitted to Trentbarton's Rainbow5? "This is Long Eaton Green" (at Beeston), then "Next stop Train Station." (we're not sure which mind!) Also they can announce the stops to Derby when going to Broadmarsh, and vice versa!

Great fun!

Cheers

Dave
I get those buses! I like the system it nearlyalways works now, there were a few problmes at first but now it seems fine and I travle by bus a lot so I'm used to it. Though there are sometimes a few mistakes on the first few stops, but thats occasional for me too. In fact the infromation on central trains is far far worse then rainbow 5! Still prefer the train though, so much faster, if only they had a decent morning service to Nottingham. Oh wells.
 

asopu10

Member
Joined
16 Feb 2006
Messages
59
The Rainbow 5's in Nottingham don't have any anoucments or real time information at bus stops for the time being, theres been problems for a few months and its finally died completely.
 

bunnahabhain

Established Member
Joined
8 Jun 2005
Messages
2,070
tramboy said:
Wonder if it will be as bad as the StarTrak system fitted to Trentbarton's Rainbow5? "This is Long Eaton Green" (at Beeston), then "Next stop Train Station." (we're not sure which mind!) Also they can announce the stops to Derby when going to Broadmarsh, and vice versa!

Ah good old StarTrak, never worked right TBH! Back when KinchBus were trialling it on their University Shuttle breadvan route, it hardly ever worked, apparently the Drivers would switch it off cause it p**sed them off. I've only ever been on one bus where it was on and working, and I think it was first installed on the No.7 route in 1999 or something.

It's pretty good at the bus stops though, they generally do work 90% of the time and are fairly accurate.

I still think it's a waste of space though!
 

Tom B

Established Member
Joined
27 Jul 2005
Messages
4,602
One of the airport routes here is fitted with it - GPRS system etc (it's only one bus). They have one of the women at the office reading out the stop names, at the start of the route they sound chirpy but the further along you get, obviously longer down the list they gave her to read, gets noticably drowsier!
 

Guinness

Established Member
Joined
13 Jun 2005
Messages
3,736
Announcements?! To think where I come from Dot Matrix Blinds are a luxury!! ;)
 

ChrisCooper

Established Member
Joined
7 Sep 2005
Messages
1,787
Location
Loughborough
Jamie said:
Ah good old StarTrak, never worked right TBH! Back when KinchBus were trialling it on their University Shuttle breadvan route, it hardly ever worked, apparently the Drivers would switch it off cause it p**sed them off. I've only ever been on one bus where it was on and working, and I think it was first installed on the No.7 route in 1999 or something.

It's pretty good at the bus stops though, they generally do work 90% of the time and are fairly accurate.

I still think it's a waste of space though!

The ones on the stops are great, and do seem to work most of the time. Sadly when they put StarTrak on the 11s and 12s they only did the timing points (although this still doesn't help the drivers to know where they are), although the other stops have that StarText system. The displays on the buses are useful aswell, especially when travelling at night or on an unfamiliar route, although it would work even better combined with route diagrams like NCT have. The announcments though are just annoying, especially on a normal Kinch service where the driver is going over the speed limit, and running early so going past every stop (since people havn't got to the stops yet), so the annoucements are going near constantly as the bus flies past the stops. Of cource, the system should be very good for making sure drivers are running to time, and to verify complaints about passengers, but that would require effort from the managers, and these days they can't be bothered.
 

compsci

Member
Joined
2 Jul 2006
Messages
169
Location
Cambridge
Buses in NYC come with a PA handset for the driver. Most drivers announce every stop, and unlike the subway you stand a reasonable chance of understanding what they are saying.
 

Tom B

Established Member
Joined
27 Jul 2005
Messages
4,602
That's *one* bus with *one* operator - actually that operator is good for setting blinds, though some staff don't know how to work them. The other independant doesn't bother with anything more than corrugated plastic, whereas First varies (some have decent blinds, some have tiny sized numbers and letters, others are broken dot matrix so they resort to the back-of-fare-increase-notice method).
 

Lewisham2221

Established Member
Joined
23 Jun 2005
Messages
1,472
Location
Staffordshire
Chaz said:
Occasionally we get Numbers with our Blind. )
If it's good old actualy blinds, either manual or electric operated we tend to get either a number or a destination. If it's dot matrix or LED, it either works or we get a piece of paper with a biro number.
 

LondonBVE

Member
Joined
22 Dec 2005
Messages
441
Location
Lost!
In our off-coast island here, buses annouced the bus stop name for every stop. Eg. "Palawan Beach x2 (Change for xxxxxx shutttle)" () only applies when there is one. All mainland buses do not have this, only off-coast island buses. Mainland buses company said that after all buses have installed the Dot Matrix Station, they are going to have annoucements. I wonder how the people will feel when taking the bus service from the North to the South of Singapore via the city. Imagine it is late night and you wanted to go home and sleep you took the bus, you are already squeezing then it make annoucements again and again. If me I will bring a spear and kill the driver, irritating person.
 

bunnahabhain

Established Member
Joined
8 Jun 2005
Messages
2,070
Chaz said:
Occasionally we get Numbers with our Blind. )

Do you ever get vandalism of blinds?

Like the "K. Tilbury >" one that's floating around somewhere. ;)
 

Ascot

Established Member
Joined
26 Nov 2005
Messages
3,382
Location
Birmingham, UK
you get blinds???? we gotta ask as the number on the front is different to the number on the side and back and need to ding the bell early as they bomb it.
 

Nick

Member
Joined
8 Jun 2005
Messages
975
Lewisham2221 said:
If it's good old actualy blinds, either manual or electric operated we tend to get either a number or a destination. If it's dot matrix or LED, it either works or we get a piece of paper with a biro number.

They don't bother with paper and biros here! They just let it display what it wants. Thank goodness TrentBarton have stuck with blinds and change them at each terminus :)
 

Tom B

Established Member
Joined
27 Jul 2005
Messages
4,602
Some fool bought some motorised blinds the other year, which adopted a mind of their own. Hence driver pushing in the code for "57 CANTLEY" was stopped at every stop to ask why the new route 168 to Hatfield was running along there!

(NB: it was following the Cantley route 57, showing the number for the Clay Lane route 168, and the destination for the Hatfield route 84!)
 

class 313

Established Member
Joined
10 Dec 2005
Messages
6,477
Location
St Albans
Julian G said:
OR a Desiro Style one
"This Bus is for London Bridge calling at Lewisham Pier,St.John's Road,London Bridge road and London Bridge Station"

How is that a desiro one?

All trains that announce say stuff like that
 
Status
Not open for further replies.

Top