New National Rail website

[Watershed]

Google Maps or Citymapper will give you live running information and far better alternative route suggestions, including the Tube, DLR and buses, than NRE.

 

[RailWonderer]

Compare this poxy 15 years outdated website with the SBB and DB websites, and ours is an embarassment. It needs to be mininal, high end, intuitive and use space and colour much better. It will also be the face of UK railways for tourists who visit the UK and book and explore rail journeys and much more. A huge missed opportunity if they don't nail this overhaul.

 

[ThameslinkUser]

There are plenty of alternatives available (for example GTR's seems similar or even slightly more compact than old NRE!) but of course the official site should be better. It's still a beta and I'd hope they'll take feedback on board.

Another benefit of GTR's one is that the 3-digit CRS codes just work. You do not need to type them in and then wait a surprisingly-long time for a drop down box and then select it before finally submitting and loading. Seems clunky to me.

 

[josh-j]

It really ought to allow booking directly through the site as well. If it can be done by a third party (Trainline) then why not NRE?

It's such a messy, poor experience to use NRE to book trains. At least it was the last time I tried years ago, which put me off it for good. And it still looks like it works the same, directing to operator sites.

I suppose the argument would be it would put Trainline out of business. Tbh Trainline do provide a very good service, although I wish they wouldn't stick ads in their app when they already charge booking fees. Contract them to do the bookings through NRE, what's the downside?

 

[Adam Williams]

Contract them to do the bookings through NRE, what's the downside?

Currently NRE does not preference any one retailer over another. Selecting one and giving them a national monopoly is a colossal downside of what you're suggesting and would stifle innovation if not done properly.

 

[josh-j]

Currently NRE does not preference any one retailer over another. Selecting one and giving them a national monopoly is a colossal downside of what you're suggesting and would stifle innovation if not done properly.

I understand the argument but unfortunately it means the primary entry point for people wanting to buy a ticket is a hopeless mess in which people have to then pick arbitrarily between retailers who are all selling the same thing for the same price (except Trainline). And whoever you buy it from you end up with the same national rail ticket, which physically looks like it came from NRE anyway.

The Railway effectively is a natural monopoly already (same as electricity etc.), there is just a hell of a lot of effort put into hiding that behind pretty brand names. We talk a lot on here about joined up thinking being lacking in the rail industry, and I think this is a good example of that.

Most of the resellers are TOCs. The TOCs are controlled by the DfT. Some resellers like Trainline have genuinely innovated IMO, so I don't entirely disagree with you, but I still think the primary website of "the railway" should let you buy tickets, given the tickets are National Rail and ticketing is already a collaborative setup across the industry.

 

[MikeWM]

Was just looking up the Heart of England rover page to see whether this is valid between Wrexham General and Wrexham Central, or not. (Apparently the answer is 'yes', despite the fact it isn't shown on any map, and eg. the Stourbridge shuttle is. But anyway, I digress).

And it seems the rover pages have also been switched over to the new format. Which is ok I guess, except

- the list of rovers and rangers appears to be in a rather random order, rather than say alphabetical (or geographical). So you have to search through 94 things to find the one you want.
- the maps appear to have been lost (admittedly previously only some had maps, but that was better than none)
- the lists of station validity only respects alphabetical order for the first letter - ie. you get all the 'A' stations in some random order or other, then all the 'B' stations, etc. etc. Which is very very odd. Eg. see here for the Heart of England Rover

Acocks Green, Adderley Park, Albrighton, Alvechurch, Ambergate, Ashchurch for Tewkesbury, Alsager, Aston, Attenborough, Atherstone, Ascott-under-Wychwood, Banbury, Bilbrook, Bordesley, Beeston, Bedworth, Bearley, Birmingham International, Birmingham New Street, Blakedown, Blake Street, Berkswell, Belper, Bloxwich, Birmingham Moor Street, Bromsgrove, Barlaston, Bournville, Bescot Stadium, Birmingham Snow Hill, Barnt Green, Butlers Lane, Burton-on-Trent, Bloxwich North, Barrow-upon-Soar, Blythe Bridge, Cannock, Charlbury, Claverdon, Combe (Oxon), Cromford, Canley, Cheltenham Spa, Cosford, Coventry, Cradley Heath, Chester Road, Crewe, Chirk, Craven Arms, Codsall, Coseley, Chester, Church Stretton, Colwall, Derby, Dorridge, Dudley Port, Duffield, Droitwich Spa, Duddeston, Danzey, ......

?! How confusing.

 

[Lewisham2221]

Was just looking up the Heart of England rover page to see whether this is valid between Wrexham General and Wrexham Central, or not. (Apparently the answer is 'yes', despite the fact it isn't shown on any map, and eg. the Stourbridge shuttle is. But anyway, I digress).

And it seems the rover pages have also been switched over to the new format. Which is ok I guess, except

- the list of rovers and rangers appears to be in a rather random order, rather than say alphabetical (or geographical). So you have to search through 94 things to find the one you want.
- the maps appear to have been lost (admittedly previously only some had maps, but that was better than none)
- the lists of station validity only respects alphabetical order for the first letter - ie. you get all the 'A' stations in some random order or other, then all the 'B' stations, etc. etc. Which is very very odd. Eg. see here for the Heart of England Rover

Acocks Green, Adderley Park, Albrighton, Alvechurch, Ambergate, Ashchurch for Tewkesbury, Alsager, Aston, Attenborough, Atherstone, Ascott-under-Wychwood, Banbury, Bilbrook, Bordesley, Beeston, Bedworth, Bearley, Birmingham International, Birmingham New Street, Blakedown, Blake Street, Berkswell, Belper, Bloxwich, Birmingham Moor Street, Bromsgrove, Barlaston, Bournville, Bescot Stadium, Birmingham Snow Hill, Barnt Green, Butlers Lane, Burton-on-Trent, Bloxwich North, Barrow-upon-Soar, Blythe Bridge, Cannock, Charlbury, Claverdon, Combe (Oxon), Cromford, Canley, Cheltenham Spa, Cosford, Coventry, Cradley Heath, Chester Road, Crewe, Chirk, Craven Arms, Codsall, Coseley, Chester, Church Stretton, Colwall, Derby, Dorridge, Dudley Port, Duffield, Droitwich Spa, Duddeston, Danzey, ......

?! How confusing.

There are still a handful of maps available, mainly with "northern" branding, but not as comprehensive as the previous versions (they don't show all stations in the map).

Are the stations possibly listed by alphabetical order of their 3 letter station code?

All-in-all, I agree, the new ranger/rover section is even less useful than the previous version. There are some rovers/rangers where the ticket is valid from two particular stations, but not valid via the direct route between the two. Without a readily available map to show this, you would need to know which stations were on that line and check for those on the list as well. Local-ish examples that I seem to recall (but can't really check now) are things like being valid from Wolverhampton to Crewe, and Shrewsbury to Crewe, but not Wolverhampton to Shrewsbury via Telford. Or valid at all of Chester, Crewe and Shrewsbury, but not for direct travel Shrewsbury-Chester.

The old maps were also useful to have for ad-hoc planning when you were out and about with said ranger/rover, or for showing to guards or gateline staff when validity was being questioned - the use of an East Midlands Rover to travel down the WCML to Milton Keynes raised a few eyebrows...

 

[Bread & cheese]

Maps of the validity areas of the rovers and rangers are available on the Project Mapping website.

Rovers and Rangers

Some of the ones I looked at are dated 2022. I guess they are up to date?

 

[Envoy]

I just looked up Cardiff Central and the new site tells me that I should take the Trans Cymru T9 bus in order to reach Cardiff Airport. The T9 bus has not run since Covid began. What the site should have told me is to take the train to Rhoose Cardiff International Airport station and then the Shuttle Bus by Adventure Travel (905) for the short link into the Airport terminal.

This is what the new National Rail website incorrectly told me:>

 

[Lewisham2221]

Maps of the validity areas of the rovers and rangers are available on the Project Mapping website.

Rovers and Rangers

Some of the ones I looked at are dated 2022. I guess they are up to date?

Thanks. That's useful. I would assume that they probably are up to date, but as the handful of maps on the new NRE site are a different format, the question is how long for?

However, the point still remains that one shouldn't need to come to a third party forum, to find a link to a third party website, to get access to a map showing the validity of a railway ticket. Especially when the relevant page on the NRE website says "see map for area of validity" but then fails to provide said map!

 

[AM9]

Maps of the validity areas of the rovers and rangers are available on the Project Mapping website.

Rovers and Rangers

Some of the ones I looked at are dated 2022. I guess they are up to date?

Strange, using your link, I can get the PM webpage showing all of the map thumbnails, but clicking on any of them and using the 'drive' app to view the pdf gives a blank screen. So no maps at all for me!

 

[Horizon22]

The site is still very much in a beta phase by the look of things - people testing things and finding errors and the website looking incomplete is perfectly normal. In fact, I’m sure the feedback to the developers would be welcome.

 

[py_megapixel]

The site is still very much in a beta phase by the look of things - people testing things and finding errors and the website looking incomplete is perfectly normal. In fact, I’m sure the feedback to the developers would be welcome.

There doesn't seem to be any clear way of giving feedback to the developers!

There's a page about the new site on the old site, but that just goes on about how amazing it is - there's no feedback form or contact details.

 

[bearhugger]

There doesn't seem to be any clear way of giving feedback to the developers!

There's a page about the new site on the old site, but that just goes on about how amazing it is - there's no feedback form or contact details.

I've just tried - it's a bit of a faff. Using the page linked to by @MikeWM for the ranger / rovers page scroll all the way to the bottom of the page & click on 'Contact Us' -> click on the yellow 'Find out more' button under the National Rail Enquiries section and there is a web form, two different phone numbers ( one for enquiries about train times, fares, and Season Tickets, and the other is a dedicated feedback freephone number) and a snail mail address.

Edit: Going to include the link to the rovers page .

 

[Envoy]

They certainly need to include maps of the routes the Rover tickets are valid on & hopefully a way of buying these tickets.

 

[MikeWM]

Are the stations possibly listed by alphabetical order of their 3 letter station code?

Having tried a few, that would appear to be it, yes. Good catch! Though how useful that is supposed to be is anyone's guess.

The old maps were also useful to have for ad-hoc planning when you were out and about with said ranger/rover, or for showing to guards or gateline staff when validity was being questioned - the use of an East Midlands Rover to travel down the WCML to Milton Keynes raised a few eyebrows...

Agreed, though I've been fortunate enough not to be questioned so far, I always have a map available in case the issue arises.

--

Maps of the validity areas of the rovers and rangers are available on the Project Mapping website.

Rovers and Rangers

Some of the ones I looked at are dated 2022. I guess they are up to date?

Yes, they're the ones I like to use, many (though by no means all!) of the maps there were linked from the old NR site. That has the map for the Heart of England Rover that doesn't show Wrexham General <-> Wrexham Central, to return to my original query that led me down this rabbit hole though I think that's the only inconsistency that I've noticed on those maps.

 

[Sad Sprinter]

Yes I agree — I was just trying to think what the web designers working on with this would’ve thought. Martin Loader’s web-site is a good example of a quality site but a simple design: http://www.hondawanderer.com/

That's such a good site, I've always loved the pictures.

 

[Horizon22]

I'd rather have a site designed 20 years ago that presents the information I need at-a-glance, than a 'cool' modern site that doesn't. Far too much of the internet nowadays is style-over-substance.

Anyway, if so, give us separate mobile and desktop sites, as the NR site does currently, to cater for the very different environments.

Only NRE was a decade old at least, and its interface was terrible for the simplest of tasks. You couldn’t reverse your origin or destination and sometimes one location would get stuck, the layout wasn’t easy to read. That’s just one example of many problems.

You compare it to Trainline or other TOC websites and it was very poor. Other pages has lots of broken links and bland walls of texts.

Most people are not railway enthusiasts and want things in a clear and visually attractive order.

 

[MikeWM]

Only NRE was a decade old at least, and its interface was terrible for the simplest of tasks. You couldn’t reverse your origin or destination and sometimes one location would get stuck, the layout wasn’t easy to read. That’s just one example of many problems.

You compare it to Trainline or other TOC websites and it was very poor. Other pages has lots of broken links and bland walls of texts.

Most people are not railway enthusiasts and want things in a clear and visually attractive order.

I'm not arguing against improving the website - I'd agree there is much that could have been improved - or indeed giving it a new look.

I'm moaning about the general trend to present less and less information in the space available, which is an irritating trend across almost all webdesign currently, and if you're using a desktop computer, or even a tablet, is a major step backwards. It is almost as tedious as the trend 6 or 7 years back to present everything on the website in very slightly different shades of gray with no regard for people who need decent contrast - fortunately that fashion has passed, at least for now, and good contrast has mostly returned.

 

[jhy44]

Google Maps or Citymapper will give you live running information and far better alternative route suggestions, including the Tube, DLR and buses, than NRE.

CityMapper and Apple Maps are excellent yes; Google Maps however is often very wrong. It doesn't show bus diversions ever, so shows ghost departures at closed stops, and frequently shows bus / tube / trains which simply do not exist, including some bizarre incorrect info like '120+ minute delays on all services' despite there being no issues whatsoever.

The bugs are seemingly random without pattern. I've had a few friends fall foul to this and miss events and then switch to using CityMapper exclusively. So be warned!

https://tubestatus.net seems to be the best I've found for real time tube departure boards.

 

[Pigeon]

I thoroughly concur with various people's comments about the appalling so-called "design" of nearly all websites these days and can only add that the code behind the bits you can see is even more of a gruesome abortion, and the kind of questions its authors ask on stackoverflow etc (plus the answers they get from others of their breed) make it very clear why this is so. Someone posted a while back that for churning out this clueless rubbish they get paid more than train drivers, which only goes to provide further confirmation of the general inverse relationship between how important/skilled/responsible someone's job is and how much they get paid for doing it.

The only bit of the National Rail website I ever use is the journey planner, and since neither the NR website nor any of the others which use the same API provide a non-vomitous interface to it, I have written my own interface which fits both the user input and the list of results all on the same screen at the same time, and uses native browser controls. Unfortunately I can't find any documentation on the API and the information available from seeing what the NR website and others do with it is very limited, since for anything more than the basic output you can get from ojp.nationalrail.co.uk/service/timesandfares/{org}/{dst}/{dmy}/{hm}/{"dep"|"arr"|"first"|"last"}[/{dmy}/{hm}/{"dep"|"arr"|"first"|"last"}][?{query_param_list}] they all seem to want to go into a different mode that refuses to work at all without storing client-side state and offers no clues as to what other functionality might or might not be available without imposing unnecessary and unacceptable requirements. I can't even find whether it is possible to get that basic API to do something as simple as give more than five results at a time, or exclude fare options that depend on banking facilities.

So I'm hoping that this might be a good place to ask whether anyone does know of some proper documentation for that API, and if so from what URL can I download it?

 

[py_megapixel]

They've seemingly moved a load of pages around and not put the appropriate redirects in place. Cue lots of annoyed users finding that their bookmarks no longer work or that links are broken.

 

[Diedinium]

I thoroughly concur with various people's comments about the appalling so-called "design" of nearly all websites these days and can only add that the code behind the bits you can see is even more of a gruesome abortion, and the kind of questions its authors ask on stackoverflow etc (plus the answers they get from others of their breed) make it very clear why this is so. Someone posted a while back that for churning out this clueless rubbish they get paid more than train drivers, which only goes to provide further confirmation of the general inverse relationship between how important/skilled/responsible someone's job is and how much they get paid for doing it.

The only bit of the National Rail website I ever use is the journey planner, and since neither the NR website nor any of the others which use the same API provide a non-vomitous interface to it, I have written my own interface which fits both the user input and the list of results all on the same screen at the same time, and uses native browser controls. Unfortunately I can't find any documentation on the API and the information available from seeing what the NR website and others do with it is very limited, since for anything more than the basic output you can get from ojp.nationalrail.co.uk/service/timesandfares/{org}/{dst}/{dmy}/{hm}/{"dep"|"arr"|"first"|"last"}[/{dmy}/{hm}/{"dep"|"arr"|"first"|"last"}][?{query_param_list}] they all seem to want to go into a different mode that refuses to work at all without storing client-side state and offers no clues as to what other functionality might or might not be available without imposing unnecessary and unacceptable requirements. I can't even find whether it is possible to get that basic API to do something as simple as give more than five results at a time, or exclude fare options that depend on banking facilities.

So I'm hoping that this might be a good place to ask whether anyone does know of some proper documentation for that API, and if so from what URL can I download it?

Software developers for the most part in the UK do not get paid more than train drivers. I'm effectively a junior developer at the moment on £24k, although I have my fingers crossed to go up to £44k with a new job. I can confirm that in software development most have no idea what they're doing and are just winging it the entire way, and are more interested in the pay than anything else.

Anyway, back to the main point: it's only Senior software engineers (or management level roles) which reach salaries of £60k+ and only really in certain private sectors (software roles in the public sector are normally 10-20% lower than private as well). Getting to this level usually takes more than a decade to get to, and isn't guaranteed.

Sounds like you're trying to work with what's effectively a completely undocumented API though, good luck, it's hard enough to work on an API when you've written it yourself - yet alone using someone else's!

 

[MikeWM]

The 'new' journey planner isn't working at all on my iPad. In Safari it goes to the disruptions page (?!) after entering details. On both Firefox and the DuckDuckGo browser you can't enter any journey details at all. Good job, breaking the most important part of the site Never had an issue getting the old one to work.

It's also really unprofessional to replace a site that worked perfectly well with a new one that is prominently marked as 'beta'. Have they switched earlier than intended by accident?

 

[TheLunaPark]

The 'new' journey planner isn't working at all on my iPad. In Safari it goes to the disruptions page (?!) after entering details. On both Firefox and the DuckDuckGo browser you can't enter any journey details at all. Good job, breaking the most important part of the site Never had an issue getting the old one to work.

It's also really unprofessional to replace a site that worked perfectly well with a new one that is prominently marked as 'beta'. Have they switched earlier than intended by accident?

Everything seems fine on my iPad using Safari. Not saying your problem isn’t legitimate of course, but could be something on your end?

It’s also fairly common for beta sites to be opened up to a larger pool of users. It also covers the developers’ backs of course if one or two things don’t work as expected. Personally, I think as long as the basics work then there’s no harm in testing a beta with the public.

One thing I would like to see is a change to Rail Alphabet 2 and the overall colour scheme to match the new Rail Symbol 2. Although it’s a Network Rail project, I think it would be wise to have everything consistent as National Rail is afterall the online gateway to UK trains for many people. Perhaps once/if GBR comes to fruition, the National Rail entity will be retired completely. A simple change of the font stack and refinement of the CSS to make sure everything fits correctly is all that’s needed.

 

[Surreytraveller]

The mobile version of the site is now regularly not working. Why can't they just leave things alone?

 

[Triddle]

The only bit of the National Rail website I ever use is the journey planner, and since neither the NR website nor any of the others which use the same API provide a non-vomitous interface to it, I have written my own interface which fits both the user input and the list of results all on the same screen at the same time, and uses native browser controls.

The 'new' journey planner isn't working at all on my iPad.

The mobile version of the site is now regularly not working. Why can't they just leave things alone?

I haven't used the National Rail Enquiries site for decades(!). Found https://traintimes.org.uk/ around that time, and always use it to find out routes and fares. It takes the data from NRE, so won't help when that database has the wrong info, but the interface is simple and works.

PS If you want to quickly check next departures, you can just type in eg https://traintimes.org.uk/CRE/EUS , which is also nice if you want to bookmark a regular connection. There's a few other nice extras in there, but I haven't explored them.

 

[Dr Strider]

The mobile version of the site is now regularly not working. Why can't they just leave things alone?

I use the NRE site for its departure boards mainly. I couldn't connect at all to m.nationalrail.co.uk yesterday (the legacy mobile site) via both my O2 phones. Tried multiple browsers, purging cache/cookies etc. The problem was some sort of certificate error I think - "your connection is not private / ERR_CERT_COMMON_NAME_INVALID".

Weirdly I had no problems via wifi!

I fear they will run down - or get rid of - m.nationalrail.co.uk altogether. The new site only displays three departures at a time on the screen - ridiculous! I hate wasted space and needless scrolling. I'll continue looking at alternative websites I guess, there are plenty to choose from but I haven't found the perfect alternative yet (compact display, lots of trains at a glance, red ink for delayed trains etc.).

Dr Strider

 

[Triddle]

I use the NRE site for its departure boards mainly.

Traintimes.org.uk does live departure boards too, and more than three at a time. Here's the link for Crewe, just change the station code at the end of the link for other stations: https://traintimes.org.uk/live/cre