Public TRUST system

[A-driver]

Most tocs to actually list short formed services on the websites. Those that don't should start but that's not justification on spending loads making other systems public. Just needs the company to updates its website more.

 

[jon0844]

Being able to see online how long a train is would help, but I doubt most people need to know much more.

This information is usually only available once you get to the station and look at the platform screen, and even then is quite often just for the next service and not others further down - based on how the information is conveyed.

Sometimes its in the timetable, which is useful, and sometimes (as A-driver says) short formations are mentioned elsewhere, but I see no reason for that not to all be in one central location for end-users, using whatever app/website they wish to use.

No way should anything that has private or confidential information be made available, and I see no reason for anyone to ask it to be. Most people given such privileged information would respect it, but you only need one that doesn't and suddenly a TOC is having to change loads of phone numbers at huge cost and inconvenience.

 

[A-driver]

Being able to see online how long a train is would help, but I doubt most people need to know much more.

This information is usually only available once you get to the station and look at the platform screen, and even then is quite often just for the next service and not others further down - based on how the information is conveyed.

Sometimes its in the timetable, which is useful, and sometimes (as A-driver says) short formations are mentioned elsewhere, but I see no reason for that not to all be in one central location for end-users, using whatever app/website they wish to use.

No way should anything that has private or confidential information be made available, and I see no reason for anyone to ask it to be. Most people given such privileged information would respect it, but you only need one that doesn't and suddenly a TOC is having to change loads of phone numbers at huge cost and inconvenience.

FCC are actually pretty good at listing short formations on its website as well as on twitter. Plus the majority of commuters plan their mornings to get to the station just in time for their train, I would Imagine that for most, if they saw a train was to be short formed in the morning it would then be too late to catch an earlier train anyway.

In the mornings short formations are often only known about minutes before the train leaves the depot to start the service as most faults requiring a short formation are only discovered by the driver or Shunter on prep. Therefore the info would be provided too late for most people. It's fairly rare that a short formed service will be known about in advance and usually only after major disruption the night before or in case of a serious fault taking a unit out of service long term.

 

[Tom]

Wide dissemination is key.

It's all very well stating that 'information is available' but who wants to look in lots of different places to piece together a puzzle - when all that information ultimately applies to 1 thing - the train that you plan to get on.

There's also the point that 'information is available' does not equal 'information is open'.

There's also the point that you can use the detail to provide additional information about the train, such as coach lettering (FGW designate coach letters to the rolling stock, for example), where toilets are (or if none at all), where first class will be...
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

In the mornings short formations are often only known about minutes before the train leaves the depot to start the service as most faults requiring a short formation are only discovered by the driver or Shunter on prep. Therefore the info would be provided too late for most people. It's fairly rare that a short formed service will be known about in advance and usually only after major disruption the night before or in case of a serious fault taking a unit out of service long term.

Logically that would only affect the first service that the stock operates. What about all the later services? Sure, the right length may be restored but until that time...

 

[Tomnick]

Presumably when things are going swimmingly, the unit allocations in GEMINI keep themselves ticking over automatically? When something's then amended (whether a set's stepped up, a unit's pinched off a double set to work something else, or the job's gone horribly wrong in all directions), am I right to think that it relies on someone in the TOC's Control to keep it updated? How quickly is this done, typically? I just wonder how much use the information is, in real-time at least, when the service is rapidly descending into the pan.

 

[A-driver]

Wide dissemination is key.

It's all very well stating that 'information is available' but who wants to look in lots of different places to piece together a puzzle - when all that information ultimately applies to 1 thing - the train that you plan to get on.

There's also the point that 'information is available' does not equal 'information is open'.

There's also the point that you can use the detail to provide additional information about the train, such as coach lettering (FGW designate coach letters to the rolling stock, for example), where toilets are (or if none at all), where first class will be...
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---


Logically that would only affect the first service that the stock operates. What about all the later services? Sure, the right length may be restored but until that time...

Why would a punter need to know all that type of stuff though? The TOCs website will tell you if a train is short formed and if its on time, many phone apps, websites and phone lines will tell you if they are on time. I can't see why anyone needs to know in advance about coach lettering, the position of toilets, type of unit etc-its not relevant and you will be told about it when you get to the station. No one is really going to say 'oh ill let that one go as its formed of an hst today and instead ill catch the one before which is a MKIV'.

Plus when there is disruption it's yet another thing which someone will need to update and keep an eye on or else people will start complaining about false info being given out.

In not saying I don't think it should be made public, I'm just trying to find out how people feel that spending the time and money on this is really justified when there are numerous far better used for the money.

All that I seem to see on here is that enthusiasts would like the info.

 

[Tom]

am I right to think that it relies on someone in the TOC's Control to keep it updated? How quickly is this done, typically? I just wonder how much use the information is, in real-time at least, when the service is rapidly descending into the pan.

Yes. It does require updating manually. All information goes tits up when services rapidly descend into the pan though - it's a case of handling it gracefully and determining what can be still considered to be reliable and show that.

However, during normal operations, it's nice to be able to show the length of the train, whether a train has toilets or not (anyone remember the 313 issue with Southern? They still advertise whether a train has no toilets), etc.

I have come up with ideas that I hadn't even considered since using the realtime data from Network Rail - this will be no different...

 

[Mojo]

Terrorism, organised crime, drug trafficking.... It would be very easy to track the movements of a specific unit so as to find out where it would be at a particular time, hide something on board (in a seat cover, or behind a loose panel etc) and organise nefarious activities around it.

So why do London Underground, TfL and the Airline industry publish the location, or allow the publication, of vehicle numbers through their API then?

 

[Tom]

The TOCs website will tell you if a train is short formed and if its on time, many phone apps, websites and phone lines will tell you if they are on time.

They will. They won't tell you in the same place though. Why can't we have that? I'd rather see something which says "short formed" and current performance on the same page, rather than having to flip between Journeycheck and departure boards, etc.

I can't see why anyone needs to know in advance about coach lettering, the position of toilets, type of unit etc-its not relevant and you will be told about it when you get to the station.

I frequently see people who like to know these sort of things in advance. It's fair to say that most of the people on here will be regular travellers and/or rail staff - so not as aware of the problems that irregular travellers face. It's totally reasonable to want to help them - even if not directly but by providing information to others who can help them.

No one is really going to say 'oh ill let that one go as its formed of an hst today and instead ill catch the one before which is a MKIV'.

I never said someone would. Sure, you'd be able to tell what it is from the data - but it's about building additional value on top of what is there.

Plus when there is disruption it's yet another thing which someone will need to update and keep an eye on or else people will start complaining about false info being given out.

Que sera. In major disruption, it's not worth the hassle of showing it - so you hide it.

In not saying I don't think it should be made public, I'm just trying to find out how people feel that spending the time and money on this is really justified when there are numerous far better used for the money.

All that I seem to see on here is that enthusiasts would like the info.

I see it as being able to provide a great deal of additional information to the passenger. There are always things that will come to fruition once people have had a play with the data - at the moment we can only speculate about the most useful things to do with it...

 

[FGW_DID]

If people are really that concerned about knowing if a certain service has toilets or is formed of three cars instead of four before you leave the house why doesn't someone commission a software developer to approach NR / ATOC and establish if this is all feasible.

 

[A-driver]

If people are really that concerned about knowing if a certain service has toilets or is formed of three cars instead of four before you leave the house why doesn't someone commission a software developer to approach NR / ATOC and establish if this is all feasible.

Indeed-and they can pay for it themselves, not expect the industry to!

 

[BrownE]

If people are really that concerned about knowing if a certain service has toilets or is formed of three cars instead of four before you leave the house why doesn't someone commission a software developer to approach NR / ATOC and establish if this is all feasible.

I know someone who will frequently need to use the toilets for medical reasons. As such they try and avoid services with no toilets, but if they can't what do you propose they do? Stay indoors?

 

[jon0844]

Information about a train having toilets seems like a worthy request.

 

[A-driver]

I know someone who will frequently need to use the toilets for medical reasons. As such they try and avoid services with no toilets, but if they can't what do you propose they do? Stay indoors?

If they need toilets that badly then they could always ask the toc in advance. What do they do if they need to travel on a route with non toilet trains out of interest?

But you are finding minority's who want this info. You can't justify spending time and money on a system so your friend can see if a train has a toilet on can you. And it still won't help if its booked with a toilet but its been locked out of use or becomes faulty mid journey etc.

If you really need to know weather a train is short formed then check the website. If you want to know if its on time then check the rail Enquires apps etc. It's very dangerous to look for info on late running too far in advance anyway if it means you will leave home later etc-trains have been known to make up time en route and then you end up missing them!

If you have a genuine reason (like a medical condition) which means you need to know anything else then contact the company directly. I'm still waiting for someone to actually justify spending reasource a and money on this kind of system.

 

[Tom C]

Yes. It does require updating manually. All information goes tits up when services rapidly descend into the pan though - it's a case of handling it gracefully and determining what can be still considered to be reliable and show that

The CIS on FCC is fed off Genius. If an 6, 8 or 12 car working starts missing a unit then that entry on Genius is blank and the system recognises that the train is short formed. Likewise it is possible to enter more than one unit into a carriage working on Genius should a unit go out with more (which happens more than you would think).

If during the course of the day, a replacement unit is found (which on the GN route is usually within one or two trips) then the unit is simply entered into Genius and it automatically updates CIS.

A public version of TRUST will still rely on an operator updating Genius anyway.

What do they do if they need to travel on a route with non toilet trains out of interest?

This is quite a common occurrence. Peak trains from Welwyn to Kings Cross are nearly all 100 mph stock which all have toilets however there is nothing to stop 313's working those services and they frequently do because it is commonly assumed that it is more convenient to run a train rather than cancel it.

 

[Temple Meads]

I'm still waiting for someone to actually justify spending reasource a and money on this kind of system.

Well I don't think the industry spending money on it can be justified, would you have a problem with the non personal information being made public if a third party pays for it being made public?

 

[A-driver]

Well I don't think the industry spending money on it can be justified, would you have a problem with the non personal information being made public if a third party pays for it being made public?

I see no issue with that, no.

 

[A-driver]

Peak trains from Welwyn to Kings Cross are nearly all 100 mph stock which all have toilets however there is nothing to stop 313's working those services and they frequently do because it is commonly assumed that it is more convenient to run a train rather than cancel it.

At the moment most of the services which start or terminate at welwyn are 313s. In the peak most of the 100mph stock is used on the 12 cars. As far as I can tell as a driver since December almost all those services are now 313s, many which were 321s before are now 313 aswell.

But without bringing back the thread from a while ago about toilets on trains, a semi fast kings x-welwyn service really dosnt need toilets at all. Both kings x and welwyn have toilets and even ones which stop at southgate, oakleigh park and barnet only take about half an hour so hardly require a toilet.

 

[Tom]

There's an interesting article somewhere about the economic benefits to a company making data open. Can't find it from a quick search in Google using the details off the top of my head though.

It goes something along the lines of releasing the data effectively outsources work to people who would happily crunch data for free, which would otherwise need to be done by a load of contractors (for £££). By increasing the number of people who can work on it, you can also increase a supplier base thereby driving down costs when you need to buy things in...

On the whole, releasing more data would likely make the industries overall costs to drop - which can only be a good thing.

The CIS on FCC is fed off Genius. If an 6, 8 or 12 car working starts missing a unit then that entry on Genius is blank and the system recognises that the train is short formed. Likewise it is possible to enter more than one unit into a carriage working on Genius should a unit go out with more (which happens more than you would think).

If during the course of the day, a replacement unit is found (which on the GN route is usually within one or two trips) then the unit is simply entered into Genius and it automatically updates CIS.

A public version of TRUST will still rely on an operator updating Genius anyway.

That's interesting. My understanding was that for most TOCs it was a fully manual operation! My view is that any process that can aid wider dissemination without adding any extra work for control rooms, etc, is helpful for the railway on the whole.

 

[dave55uk]

Whilst I fully agree that staff names and phone numbers should not be made public, I think it would be a great idea if passengers on long distant trains could contact the guard of their train by mobile, say for example, if a drunk was making a nuisance of him/herself. Would save someone walking along the train (possibly in the wrong direction) to seek help.

 

[The Planner]

Sorry but if it is getting to the stage where we give out phone numbers to save someone walking down a few coaches then we might aswell give up now...

 

[maniacmartin]

I had a need for more data about a train formation a few days ago.

I was a small station whose ticket office was closed with a bicycle and wanted to know where to stand and where board the train so that the bicycle could be loaded efficiently.

As there were no staff around, I used the help point but the person on the other end had such a poor grasp of english they thought I was asking for train times so I had to just guess. Had the data been open, I could have boarded at the right place and not potentially held up the train.

 

[A-driver]

Whilst I fully agree that staff names and phone numbers should not be made public, I think it would be a great idea if passengers on long distant trains could contact the guard of their train by mobile, say for example, if a drunk was making a nuisance of him/herself. Would save someone walking along the train (possibly in the wrong direction) to seek help.

Sorry but I completely disagree. If you give out phone numbers it will just be abused. There are pass coms for emergencies, phone numbers should never be given out. Not only will it lead to people making prank calls etc but also people will see it as an 'at seat service' phoning the guard every time the train stops to ask what's happening, phoning up to ask when the trolly will pass through etc.

Can't see any benefit in it at all!

 

[Marklund]

I had a need for more data about a train formation a few days ago.

I was a small station whose ticket office was closed with a bicycle and wanted to know where to stand and where board the train so that the bicycle could be loaded efficiently.

As there were no staff around, I used the help point but the person on the other end had such a poor grasp of english they thought I was asking for train times so I had to just guess. Had the data been open, I could have boarded at the right place and not potentially held up the train.

Well worth the railway spending thousands of pounds and hours of time on to save a 30 yard walk... :roll:

This thread seems to me to be a never ending demand by train spotters, desperate to be elite, getting access to information that is nothing to do with them, frankly.

If you *really* are desperate for toilet availability knowledge, short formations, tweet the toc and see how you get on.

 

[wbbminerals]

This thread seems to me to be a never ending demand by train spotters, desperate to be elite, getting access to information that is nothing to do with them, frankly.

As I have said before, how will making the data open to all make the people who can access it 'elite'? The present situation makes the people with access to it the 'elite' ones (ie via logins to Genius etc)...

 

[Marklund]

"Elite" was meant as seeing every type of unit, rather than having access to privileged information.

And to put it back to you, how will knowing what unit is on what diagram (and such like) will help the general travelling public, rather than a very small special interest group?

Anyway, isn't it the same as asking for certain types of information on here?

 

[wbbminerals]

Examples have already been given. For example short formed trains, where to put the bike etc. If processed correctly, the type and/or number of unit could be used to assist in such queries, without the need to bother staff or delay the train if no such information is available at the station (for example standing in the wrong place with a bike).

I also don't see why this has to be a mass market product; there's a gap in the market - even if it is a niche one.

 

[A-driver]

Examples have already been given. For example short formed trains, where to put the bike etc.

Short formed trains are shown on websites by the TOC and where to put bikes only affects a very small number of trains, on most trains people just use doorways.

Plus, as has already been said, saving a few secs of you walking to a different part of the train with your bike dosnt really justify spending huge amounts of reasources on does it?!

 

[wbbminerals]

I would agree that it's not worth throwing money at this, especially when everything on the railway costs a multiple of what it actually should. But there do seem to be uses for the information if it could be made public in a cost effective way.

 

[DarloRich]

Whilst I fully agree that staff names and phone numbers should not be made public, I think it would be a great idea if passengers on long distant trains could contact the guard of their train by mobile, say for example, if a drunk was making a nuisance of him/herself. Would save someone walking along the train (possibly in the wrong direction) to seek help.

Do you actually think that is a good idea? :roll:

Also few people seem to have consider the practicality of getting a system that essentially dates from 1422 to speak to modern IT systems. It might be easier to send runners!

The fact it still works at all is nothing short of miraculous. Christ knows how you actually get anything usable out of the insane combinations of letters , numbers, symbols and the ancient data input system! User friendly it is not!

I have a crib sheet with the codes i need on it. And no you aint getting it