06 Jan 2018, 10:00 am
#70
(05 Jan 2018, 7:05 pm)ne14ne1 I was on an Gateshead bound service that was diverted via the Tyne Bridge. (It was a 21). Coming down the Bigg Market the NSAs had obviously announced the next stop was High Level Bridge North, however being on diversion and turning left onto Mosley St we never reached High Level Bridge North.
If it had been London, the clever iBus system would have been utilised to announce something on the lines of 'This bus is on diversion, please listen for further announcements'. Not being as intelligent though there was no such information given here, (and I didn't hear my driver announce the diversion either) - not great for blind/visually impaired or people unfamiliar with the route/area. Anyway I take it theres no option for our drivers to play pre-recorded announcements in such circumstances?
Is this because our announcements are linked to the destination selected and will only play recordings for that route?
(So if a bus diverts away from the route it'll just not play anything until the bus rejoins the usual route and the NSAs will suddenly catch up?)
I also wondered what happens when services to Newcastle are terminated early at Gateshead due to congestion in Newcastle etc. Is anything altered then or does the bus continue to announce it's going to Newcastle, or if the driver is aware of the short service before reaching Gateshead, is there Gateshead destination screens available & the relevant NSAs linked for those eventualities?
Just curious. Sorry for the hundred questions. 
(05 Jan 2018, 11:59 pm)G-CPTN As I understand it, a pre-programmed route of NSAs is triggered by GPS signals, so, if the vehicle doesn't reach that location, the NSA will not be triggered.
It is theoretically possible for ALL bus stops throughout the region (and, indeed, the whole of Britain) to be included (much like a standard SatNav) but the current system contains only a linear description of the route and has no facility for diversions (though regular diversions could conceivably be included).
Next generation NSAs maybe? - and work for Dan and his mates.
Having said that,the current system isn't foolproof and gliches can occur with stops being 'missed' - at least initially - with the system catching up later on the journey.
The iBus system is great, and the customer experience in a bus in London is completely different to any bus elsewhere fitted with Next Stop Announcements. It's a really clever system, and the equivalent systems used by operators in the North East and beyond will never be quite as sophisticated.
You're right in suggesting that, unlike the iBus system, the announcements on buses in the North East will only play recordings relevant to the route which has been selected by the driver on the destination controller. So yes, the bus will just show the stop which it should have next reached, until it reaches another stop on the route which is recognised in the programme for that service. Go North East's buses are also set to show a generic message/slide after a period of time without seeing a bus stop the system recognises.
Most services which usually terminate in Newcastle have the option of setting the destination as Gateshead as an alternative. Of course there are regular announcements which say "This is the xxx service to yyy", which would hopefully reiterate to customers that the service is not terminating in Newcastle as it usually does. As well as this, there is also a pre-recorded "transferring passengers" announcement. This plays a recording advising passengers that the bus will terminate early in order to allow the service to make up time and to change at the next bus stop and transfer to another bus, also apologising for the inconvenience. The destination shows Not in Service publicly, so should be selected immediately before reaching the point at which the bus is going to be regulated at.
How Go North East utilise the system is more or less the system at its limit, as the technology currently stands. The only other thing Go North East could do is show connections to rail stations and Airports (showing scheduled or real-time departures). It works based on having a connection to the Wi-Fi on the bus - Lothian Buses do it on their new Skylink and Airlink buses - but the computer sitting behind the scenes only has so much memory. The more you add, the slower the system will load, and the more problems the system is likely to incur. Go North East's 'bank' of programmed journeys sits at around 500 now - the first time the media is loaded, it takes around 30 minutes to load to the bus.
