How does data get to small railway stations for departure boards?

[Trains1]

Hello

Does anyone on here know how the data for a small train stations run by Northern departure boards get there like over the Internet or is there a separate network for these it looks like thay connect back to the box that the ticket machine connects to

Thanks

 

[Bletchleyite]

Over the Internet, likely via a SIM card.

The display on Northern's TVMs and information screens (rather than the LED ones) is just a web page eg:

Web CIS

Change the 3 letter code to the Northern operated station of your choice.

 

[Adam Williams]

likely via a SIM card

I had heard that particularly rural stations are sometimes well-placed to make use of RFC 1149 where connectivity is otherwise a challenge, though I understand the latency isn't great.

 

[Mcq]

Over the Internet, likely via a SIM card.

The display on Northern's TVMs and information screens (rather than the LED ones) is just a web page eg:

Web CIS

Change the 3 letter code to the Northern operated station of your choice.

Is there a similar Webcis for north london stations - e.g. Winchmore Hill (WIH) please?

 

[MrJeeves]

I had heard that particularly rural stations are sometimes well-placed to make use of RFC 1149 where connectivity is otherwise a challenge, though I understand the latency isn't great.

Explains all the Darwin "no reports".

 

[Halish Railway]

Explains all the Darwin "no reports".

I’d have thought that’d be more to do with the signalling design, rather than mobile/internet reception, particularly for stations that are in the middle of long block sections where there aren’t any track sensors.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Is there a similar Webcis for north london stations - e.g. Winchmore Hill (WIH) please?

Worldline Tiger appears to work for there:

https://tiger.worldline.global/home

 

[Nottingham59]

There's a national data feed from Network Rail that anyone can subscribe to over the interweb. My teenage son has live departures from Nottingham Station continuously scrolling on a mini-LCD display hooked up to a Raspberry Pi.

EDIT: This is the link he used. Don't ask me for the details as I have no idea how it works

https://www.raspberrypi.com/news/real-time-train-station-arrival-board/

Also:

https://www.raspberrypi.com/tutorials/train-timetable-raspberry-pi-tutorial/

 

[Geoff_K]

Worldline Tiger appears to work for there:

https://tiger.worldline.global/home

I wonder why Crayford (CRY) is missing from the list of stations you can click on?

 

[Mcq]

Thanks Bletchleyite

 

[pokemonsuper9]

Over the Internet, likely via a SIM card.

The display on Northern's TVMs and information screens (rather than the LED ones) is just a web page eg:

Web CIS
Change the 3 letter code to the Northern operated station of your choice.

That explains where the UI for the TVMs comes from, it's literally just that page!
I thought it was just something the TVM maker had designed.

 

[Bletchleyite]

I wonder why Crayford (CRY) is missing from the list of stations you can click on?

Tiger only includes stations that have a Worldline CIS setup.

 

[stadler]

Tiger only includes stations that have a Worldline CIS setup.

Crayford does have a Worldline CIS and has done for twelve years. For some odd reason most Southeastern stations are missing from the Tiger website. It is supposed to include all stations with a Worldline CIS but yet the majority of the Southeastern stations are missing. It must be an error and perhaps Worldline forgot to add them.

 

[buz33]

I had heard that particularly rural stations are sometimes well-placed to make use of RFC 1149 where connectivity is otherwise a challenge, though I understand the latency isn't great.

Explains all the Darwin "no reports".

I’d have thought that’d be more to do with the signalling design, rather than mobile/internet reception, particularly for stations that are in the middle of long block sections where there aren’t any track sensors.

I don't think that was a serious suggestion that RFC 1149 is used for internet connectivity.

IP over Avian Carriers - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[Geoff_K]

Thanks for the info.

 

[rf_ioliver]

I had heard that particularly rural stations are sometimes well-placed to make use of RFC 1149 where connectivity is otherwise a challenge, though I understand the latency isn't great.

Bandwidth is pretty good....do you know how many SD cards you store in a coconut?

 

[Trains1]

There's a national data feed from Network Rail that anyone can subscribe to over the interweb. My teenage son has live departures from Nottingham Station continuously scrolling on a mini-LCD display hooked up to a Raspberry Pi.

EDIT: This is the link he used. Don't ask me for the details as I have no idea how it works

https://www.raspberrypi.com/news/real-time-train-station-arrival-board/

Also:

https://www.raspberrypi.com/tutorials/train-timetable-raspberry-pi-tutorial/

I'm building one of those at the moment

 

[Frontera2]

Crayford does have a Worldline CIS and has done for twelve years. For some odd reason most Southeastern stations are missing from the Tiger website. It is supposed to include all stations with a Worldline CIS but yet the majority of the Southeastern stations are missing. It must be an error and perhaps Worldline forgot to add them.

Not an error… there’s a cost element to providing TIGER feeds for more stations.

 

[stadler]

Not an error… there’s a cost element to providing TIGER feeds for more stations.

I am surprised that a state owned railway company as large as Southeastern can not afford that. At neighbouring GTR they have 100% of stations on Tiger despite having double the amount of stations. It is probably just someone at Southeastern management trying to cut costs by limiting Tiger to only a few stations.

I will say that Southeastern seems to spend a lot less money on their CIS compared to other TOCs. For example Southeastern still have 45 smaller stations (eg, Crowhurst, Folkestone West, Martin Mill, Stonegate, etc) that use basic Text To Speech (Acapela Rachel) announcements from the Infotec boards rather than proper Anne and Rob announcements. Meanwhile at neighbouring GTR they have proper Anne and Matt announcements at 100% of stations. Even tiny little Doleham has Anne announcements now.

It would be good if the ongoing nationalisation of all our TOCs brings some standardisation and brings all TOCs up to the same level. Hopefully all stations will be on Tiger then. Or maybe even a new replacement for Tiger will be developed by then.

 

[rf_ioliver]

I had heard that particularly rural stations are sometimes well-placed to make use of RFC 1149 where connectivity is otherwise a challenge, though I understand the latency isn't great.

And in many places they put lines up above the tracks so that the Layer 1s can take a rest.

RFC 1149 works best with UDP

 

[JBuchananGB]

I have a Raspberry Pi displaying the CIS from National Rail

https://realtime.nationalrail.co.uk/ldbcis/departures.aspx?u=039B1CD1-14D4-4CB9-83B1-A84CC3AEDF83&crs=sra