RealTimeTrains website

[Chris217]

As an enthusiast, I am just so grateful that Real-time Trains provides such a vast amount of information, thank you

Spot on!

 

[185143]

How come c2c allocations still aren't shown given we're out of lockdown and none of the route is in Tier 3?

 

[Tom]

Because we haven't decided to do so yet.

The exact wording we used was "we will not be releasing train allocations at present due to the current coronavirus restrictions" - while I can see why you would read that the moment we come out it'd result in allocations being available, it doesn't.

I am led to believe that c2c is in general quite busy at the moment and it doesn't really seem right to incentivise the idea of making their trains any busier than necessary at the moment. They'll come, don't worry, but not yet.

 

[cactustwirly]

Because we haven't decided to do so yet.

The exact wording we used was "we will not be releasing train allocations at present due to the current coronavirus restrictions" - while I can see why you would read that the moment we come out it'd result in allocations being available, it doesn't.

I am led to believe that c2c is in general quite busy at the moment and it doesn't really seem right to incentivise the idea of making their trains any busier than necessary at the moment. They'll come, don't worry, but not yet.

But the trains are empty at the moment, only carrying 30-40% of passengers. So I don't see the logic in your reasoning?

 

[py_megapixel]

I get the impression that the fact of the matter is c2c doesn't want them released yet.

I suspect there's very little that anyone outside of c2c is likely to do about that... us enthusiasts will - entirely understandably - just have to wait.

 

[Tom]

Social distancing means that the available capacity of rolling stock is reduced. They have a number of services which could be considered a problem about in terms of how busy they are after applying that capacity factor reduction - 30-40% passengers on a train could mean anything from 60-120% load of 'covid capacity' these days depending on the rolling stock.

Ultimately, it is a joint decision between RTT and c2c when numbers become available - do bear in mind it took a good two months from memory for LNER to go live. Essentially, both c2c and I have to be comfortable with it.

We have already delivered the primary functionality in our eyes which is the primary benefit for the travelling public. Sticky digits will come at some point, patience is a virtue - bear in mind this time last year the entire concept of any numbers being public was laughed upon.

I don't wish to get drawn any further into this discussion as it'll just end up being rather circular.

 

[FrodshamJnct]

Social distancing means that the available capacity of rolling stock is reduced. They have a number of services which could be considered a problem about in terms of how busy they are after applying that capacity factor reduction - 30-40% passengers on a train could mean anything from 60-120% load of 'covid capacity' these days depending on the rolling stock.

Ultimately, it is a joint decision between RTT and c2c when numbers become available - do bear in mind it took a good two months from memory for LNER to go live. Essentially, both c2c and I have to be comfortable with it.

We have already delivered the primary functionality in our eyes which is the primary benefit for the travelling public. Sticky digits will come at some point, patience is a virtue - bear in mind this time last year the entire concept of any numbers being public was laughed upon.

I don't wish to get drawn any further into this discussion as it'll just end up being rather circular.

Indeed. Grateful for how much info has been made available through RTT in the last 12 months all things considered.

 

[Muzer]

But the trains are empty at the moment, only carrying 30-40% of passengers. So I don't see the logic in your reasoning?

40% of capacity for a morning peak service that is normally full and standing will still violate social distancing... I can certainly understand why c2c would not wish to encourage unnecessary journeys.

 

[kemal]

The Realtime Trains website is a brilliant website. I really do appreciate all of the vast information that is shown.

Thank you

Kemal Ali

 

[Statto1965]

The Realtime Trains website is a brilliant website. I really do appreciate all of the vast information that is shown.

Thank you

Kemal Ali

I have to concur that Realtime Trains is a great site.

 

[ScottDarg]

South Western Railway is now participating in Know Your Train (including allocations)

South Western Railway join Know Your Train

South Western Railway, and their Island Line operation on the Isle of Wight, are the seventh train operator to partner with us for Know Your Train.

blog.realtimetrains.com

We’re pleased to welcome South Western Railway as our latest partner for Know Your Train, who become the seventh train operator to support the service.

South Western Railway operate train services from London Waterloo to suburban and regional destinations. They also operate the Island Line which operates train services on the Isle of Wight from Ryde to Shanklin.

444019 in SWR Pride livery

You can now find the latest information on the rolling stock running on your train service on the day on all South Western Railway and Island Line services, including what facilities what will be available.

We’ve added a new onboard entertainment facility which is identified with a new film icon: much of South Western Railway’s longer distance fleet is fitted with free-to-use on-board entertainment.

Know Your Train is now available on over a third of all train services covering over 2 million miles every week across all seven train operators.

 

[XCTurbostar]

Great to see SWR join the Know Your Train service. One thing I do wish is that there was some kind of 'export to excel' button at stations which puts headcodes/destinations against allocated trains. That way I dont have to go through and copy paste every train.

 

[spark001uk]

Good job Tom, this idea is gathering pace nicely!
I'm hoping sites like railcam can find an interface to populate their allox automatically on their live diagrams.

Also with SWR KYT I've noticed the allox is showing the old 450/5 numbers, which don't exist anymore.

 

[Chris217]

This site just gets better and better.
Well done Tom.

 

[Trackman]

This site just gets better and better.
Well done Tom.

Yes, well done Tom and thank you for all your work.
I wonder if one day we'll have a 'full house'?

 

[kemal]

Yes, excellent work Tom. This site goes from strength to strength.

 

[andyc20050]

The modified class 450/5 unit numbers are showing although they have since reverted back to their original number.

 

[43096]

The modified class 450/5 unit numbers are showing although they have since reverted back to their original number.

On the units they have, but SWR have not renumbered them on the system.

 

[TT-ONR-NRN]

Yes, well done Tom and thank you for all your work.
I wonder if one day we'll have a 'full house'?

Indeed thank you, the ability to see allocations has been longed for by many for years, it’s amazing now we have them

 

[theironroad]

Great to see the SWR data available and being displayed.

Couple of queries,

Is it possible to display the coach type? I.e. on a 444, which has first class and on both 444/440 which is the coach that takes wheelchairs?

In train info, is it possible to either remove 'reservations available' or add a rider that actual seats cannot be reserved . (I assume the dataset thinks that the counted places used for advance quotas are seat reservations)

Also, and unfortunately for many reasons , can the reference to trolley service be removed as they wont be returning as contract terminated. Imagine again it is in the dataset and not sure how feasible it is to correct.

RTT still a great site and project. Well done.

 

[43055]

Great to see the SWR data available and being displayed.

Couple of queries,

Is it possible to display the coach type? I.e. on a 444, which has first class and on both 444/440 which is the coach that takes wheelchairs?

Seeing that the 159's have the first class line on the image time sure it will be possible. Although I think it is normally at the London end of the train on the 444's. For the wheelchair space on the 450's they are in the center of the train under the pantograph well.

I have to agree with many others that RTT is a great website

 

[Tom]

The SWR network is complex and the data around orientations is not reliable, so we essentially put in assumed orientations where possible until such a time where we can mitigate this issue. We are working on it in the background, but decided to release in the current state to assist those making journeys they need to. As such, facilities are only displayed on coaches where they are unambiguous on either way around.

It's up to SWR to fix things around reservations available and trolley service references. I don't change anything that comes from upstream datasets like that as a rule as it can result in inconsistent datasets and just creates hassle if and when something gets reversed.

On the 450/5s, they are still 450/5s in the rolling stock library even if they have been renumbered on the cabs themselves.

 

[Jamesrob637]

Will any more TOCs join RTT before the New Year? Good on SWR for doing so especially after the new year when people slowly return to office. RTT is very well known nowadays.

 

[TT-ONR-NRN]

Will any more TOCs join RTT before the New Year? Good on SWR for doing so especially after the new year when people slowly return to office. RTT is very well known nowadays.

I’d love to see SouthEastern join, or perhaps Greater Anglia

 

[spark001uk]

RTT is very well known nowadays.

Depends who you talk to really. Rail enthusiasts and the industry, yes definitely, but the general travelling public not so much. This is why I'm surprised some TOCs are handing this info over but not adopting it on their own journey planners, so that "non-RTT" users can still benefit.

 

[bramling]

Depends who you talk to really. Rail enthusiasts and the industry, yes definitely, but the general travelling public not so much. This is why I'm surprised some TOCs are handing this info over but not adopting it on their own journey planners, so that "non-RTT" users can still benefit.

There’s still the issue that the industry remains a little cagey about things like platform allocations being completely open season. Firstly at some places they may suppress them off departure boards to allow things like preparation or cleaning to occur, but also because the information still needs to be interpreted with some degree of inside knowledge, as things like unit swaps can happen.

If you had joe public using a specialist site for everyday purposes then there’s going to be problems.

 

[Tom]

One single website or service is never going to achieve critical mass amongst the general travelling public. You have the large sites such as Trainline which are in the public conscience, and you have the TOCs which have a captive advertising market, too. RTT doesn't, and realistically will never, have the advertising budget in order to achieve that level of interest.

However, the higher echelons of the industry as a whole have begun to accept that the reality is that RTT and sites like it aren't going anywhere and, therefore, there's little to no point trying to hold back and not try and improve the customer proposition with us. Most of us are here either because we find the openness interesting and a technical challenge or we want to try and do some good.

RTT sees around two thirds to three quarters of usage (pre pandemic) coming from the general public. In the grand scheme of things for RTT, that's a lot of people. I do have the exact numbers and they are quite surprising compared to what some people may think - at the very peak of usage in 2019 I was seeing over 600,000 people use the RTT website every day... let alone all the apps which also use it.

There’s still the issue that the industry remains a little cagey about things like platform allocations being completely open season. Firstly as at some places they may suppress them of departure boards to allow things like preparation or cleaning to occur, but also because the information still needs to be interpreted with some degree of inside knowledge, as things like unit swaps can happen.

The industry need to get over themselves a little bit on this one. The data is there and it is being done. If RTT stopped advertising platforms, and I have been asked many times to stop doing it by various parties, then someone else would do it - it's literally the definition of Hydra. They've also asked me to suppress platforms until they're released onto Darwin which is a no because (1) I can't as I'm not permitted to use Darwin under its licensing clauses, (2) see previous Hydra reason and (3) they frequently fully suppress platforms on apps anyway which is not helpful to the customer.

If you had joe public using a specialist site for everyday purposes then there’s going to be problems.

I have walked around various station concourses at termini in the evening peaks and the number of people using RTT has genuinely shocked me. In May 2019, I was at Euston at about 1720 and had a brief walk around. I'd say 60% of people had RTT up. Have problems occurred? Yes, a few minor ones and the more experienced are learning. Because it's spread by word of mouth, this is less of an issue as people can explain how to use it. Know Your Train, or more specifically the allocations underneath it, allow the system to be a bit more intelligent about when it indicates platforms as it can track units around and that will come some point next year.

This is why I'm surprised some TOCs are handing this info over but not adopting it on their own journey planners, so that "non-RTT" users can still benefit.

Simply put, industry moves slowly. I move very quickly. Some TOCs are working on it, and I'm assisting with it, but it's better to have it out there to some degree rather than not at all until it can be in multiple channels.

 

[spark001uk]

And sometimes places as official as nr get in a twist. Such as this belter today!!

 

[TT-ONR-NRN]

I did see a SWR service to Poole advertised as having fifteen coaches today

 

[swt_passenger]

I did see a SWR service to Poole advertised as having fifteen coaches today

That’s not too unusual. I’ve also seen theoretically impossible numbers on SWT/SWT station PIS displays, such as 13 coaches, often enough that it’s not much of a surprise. I expect RTT will simply copy it across if thats what’s in the data stream...