(24 Jul 2015, 4:34 pm)S813 FVK wrote Updating all of the destinations ready for the changes to kick in? Good look
(24 Jul 2015, 4:36 pm)Dan wrote Next Stop Announcements certainly don't update themselves either: 5377 - 5390 and 8310-8318/8328-8338 all have to be re-programmed! Bit of a pain to say the least - the older vehicles aren't fitted with easy access fly leads - so panels have to come down, the lot!
As we regularly say - you would not believe how much goes on behind the scenes to get a bus on the road with everything working hunky-dory...
(24 Jul 2015, 4:36 pm)Dan wrote Next Stop Announcements certainly don't update themselves either: 5377 - 5390 and 8310-8318/8328-8338 all have to be re-programmed! Bit of a pain to say the least - the older vehicles aren't fitted with easy access fly leads - so panels have to come down, the lot!
As we regularly say - you would not believe how much goes on behind the scenes to get a bus on the road with everything working hunky-dory...
(24 Jul 2015, 5:02 pm)citaro5284 wrote For Quaylink, we have decided to try the line plan for the Next Stop slides.....what is your views?
(24 Jul 2015, 4:42 pm)Tom wrote Why do the Citylink ones have to be re-programmed?
(24 Jul 2015, 5:02 pm)citaro5284 wrote For Quaylink, we have decided to try the line plan for the Next Stop slides.....what is your views?
(24 Jul 2015, 5:18 pm)Dan wrote This is the reason why.
Currently, vehicles fitted with Next Stop Announcements are only programmed with the relevant announcements for the service for which the vehicle is branded. As such, if 5389/90 were allocated to the "Quaylink" services (which they regularly will be), they would have shown the generic "Citylink" slide. If the vehicles are re-programmed, we can get them to show the announcement regardless of the brand of the bus. If any of these vehicles are allocated to a service which does not feature Next Stop Announcements, I believe they will show a generic Go North East slide instead of a branded slide. There have also been some minor changes to the "Citylink" slides in general so that they look similar to those on the Quaylink, minus the line plan.
I really like the line plan; not only does it look very professional, but it provides another element of assistance to passengers on-board. Lothian Buses have used the line plan on their Next Stop Announcements for a while now, and what I particularly like about their announcements is that they give approximate journey times (based on the timetable) below the upcoming stops. As citaro5284 said; we are just trying this out for the first time, but if it works as well as we anticipate, there's no reason why we can't look into implementing this on other services with Next Stop Announcements, and using the technology to its full extent by adding things such as approximate journey times, promotional slides in between stops which are of a long distance, and suchlike.
You wouldn't have dreamt of this sort of technology ten years ago... Imagine what it'll be like in 2025!
(26 Jul 2015, 12:08 pm)Dan wrote After a little while of waiting at the bus stop, 5274 turned up on service 9, running about five minutes late. Whilst I'm not particularly fond of the Scania OmniCitys, aside from Arriva North East's 4653 and 4660-64, I do quite like to ride them on service 9. The dual-door Volvo B10BLEs are frequently allocated Monday - Saturday as these four red OmniCitys cover for branded vehicles on "Coaster" service 1 to keep the allocation consistent. Despite the Scania OmniCitys being more comfortable than the dual-door Volvo B10s, the latter is far superior in terms of performance. It wasn't long before we reached Boldon; in fact, I barely had time to finish typing this section of the review up on this journey!
(29 Jul 2015, 6:27 pm)R852 PRG wrote When we got to Stanley, more-or-less on time, I headed onto the Front Street to see what was going on. I met a woman outside of the bus station, I asked her if she was working - she said it was 30 for oral; 50 for full sex. I heard a group of young teenage charvers rambling on with their cigarettes, at the entrance to the bus station. As I headed down towards Greggs, I saw a few civilians running for their lives, as a squadron of pigeons opened fire from above. Two of them were hit, while the other two made it indoors. Unfortunately, the pigeons saw this, and bombed the building they hid in. Outside of ''£ stretcher''; I saw a young teenage girl giving birth, unaided. A yobbo charver then threw a bottle of alcohol through a shop window, causing a series of fires and a massive mushroom cloud. In the midst of the chaos, shots were fired; and I retreated back to the bus station. Stanley really is a god-forsaken place.
Forum Moderator | Let us know if you have any issues
Service Manager, Coatham Connect
(07 Aug 2015, 8:24 pm)Jimmi wrote Ah right, was just intrigued as to how that worked. Was a pretty quiet journey to North Shields.
(07 Aug 2015, 8:43 pm)BusLoverMum wrote I think that 9 must have dashed off towards Jarrow, empty to make up time.
We're trying again, tomorrow. I'll just have the big one, so waiting around bus stations will be less torturous. No having to leg it after a boy who has just remembered where he saw a lift (lifts have bell buttons in and bell buttons make a great stim, it seems)
I think the X21 portion of that Peterlee-Darlo route suffers from buses to destinations along the route leaving fairly close together. The 61 (which does busiest art of the route before heading off to Murton) the 22 and the X7 all leave in the 10-15 minutes before the X21. The 22 often runs fairly empty along that stretch late afternoon, even on a Saturday (I was going to say quiet, but that's often not the case, even with just a handful of passengers! And those ones always stay on all the way to Wheatley Hill!)
(07 Aug 2015, 8:46 pm)Tom wrote They do that quite often! It's not on really, it'd be okay if it was a Jarrow one, but if your waiting for a North Shields one and it was only five minutes late you shouldn't have to wait 25 minutes for the next one.
(07 Aug 2015, 8:43 pm)BusLoverMum wrote I think that 9 must have dashed off towards Jarrow, empty to make up time.
We're trying again, tomorrow. I'll just have the big one, so waiting around bus stations will be less torturous. No having to leg it after a boy who has just remembered where he saw a lift (lifts have bell buttons in and bell buttons make a great stim, it seems)
I think the X21 portion of that Peterlee-Darlo route suffers from buses to destinations along the route leaving fairly close together. The 61 (which does busiest art of the route before heading off to Murton) the 22 and the X7 all leave in the 10-15 minutes before the X21. The 22 often runs fairly empty along that stretch late afternoon, even on a Saturday (I was going to say quiet, but that's often not the case, even with just a handful of passengers! And those ones always stay on all the way to Wheatley Hill!)
(07 Aug 2015, 8:46 pm)Tom wrote They do that quite often! It's not on really, it'd be okay if it was a Jarrow one, but if your waiting for a North Shields one and it was only five minutes late you shouldn't have to wait 25 minutes for the next one.
(07 Aug 2015, 8:58 pm)Jimmi wrote I think it is totally unacceptable that this is happening on North Shields trips with the service only operating this far every half an hour and is the only service to North Shields in these areas so I think to leave passengers in Sunderland because it was running about 5 minutes late is **** poor really!