RealTimeTrains website

[Benjwri]

I understand one of the timetable sources that sites such as RTT use have what are called “association records” - which link timetables together for next workings, divides/joins enroute and so on.

Do the TOCs define that or is it some kind of automated process? Just seems odd that random services at Paddington have it, with seemingly no reason to them.

 

[12LDA28C]

Thanks mate

Still doesn't work by clicking on the 'mileage engine' tab on the www.railmiles.me homepage. Strange.

 

[louis97]

Do the TOCs define that or is it some kind of automated process? Just seems odd that random services at Paddington have it, with seemingly no reason to them.

Generally it is in place where the signalling system requires it for ARS (Automatic Route Setting) to input the headcode of the next working(s), but it is a bit hit and miss in some locations (Paddington being one of them). Paddington seems to commonly have it where a unit is booked to split on arrival. The association information received by RTT is actually more or less identical to the information ARS gets, so signallers do need to be on their toes to spot situations where the association in the data is incorrect and gets input automatically (I have seen this multiple times).

 

[Tom]

Do the TOCs define that or is it some kind of automated process? Just seems odd that random services at Paddington have it, with seemingly no reason to them.

It's manually entered into the system that distributes it.

Still doesn't work by clicking on the 'mileage engine' tab on the www.railmiles.me homepage. Strange.

A (very) legacy server off-site was terminated a couple of days ago to save some money as I was informed of yet another price increase of around 10% in electricity costs. The only thing it used to do was host the Mileage Engine, and apparently did the redirect since then which wasn't in the documentation that we've got - the docs said another system did it.

The correct URL for the Mileage Engine is https://my.railmiles.me/mileage-engine/ now.

(Although I'm going to make my normal comment here about reporting issues through the right channels and not just on a forum that I only intermittently check...)

Right now rolling stock allocations are only available for certain TOCs. Does anyone know if and when there are plans to extend this to other TOCs?

Yep.

Wonder if we could see Freightliner give allocations next?

Nope. Although a similar entity is being investigated.

 

[Watershed]

Does anyone know why a seemingly random amount of trains show the 'Service forms from ####', 'Service forms ####' messages? There seems to be no reason as to what has it attached as far as I can see, at least for GWR. Pretty much all Cardiff services do at the Cardiff end, but also a random spattering of services, mostly in the evening at Paddington, seem to also have them, for no noticeable reason.

It's purely down to whether or not there is an association record. ARs have to exist in order for splits and joins to show up correctly, but anything else is hit and miss and their existence will depend on whether the NR planner who processed that particular schedule, or who did that station's platforming, entered it into the system.

 

[Western 52]

RTT showing cancelled Heart of Wales trains today with the reason given as due to the planned train being replaced by a slower train! As the booked train is just a 153, what does this excuse really mean?

Realtime Trains | 2V10 1517 Shrewsbury to Swansea | 13/03/2023

Real-time train running information for 2V10 1517 departure from Shrewsbury to Swansea on 13/03/2023. From Realtime Trains, an independent source of train running info for Great Britain.

www.realtimetrains.co.uk

 

[markymark2000]

RTT showing cancelled Heart of Wales trains today with the reason given as due to the planned train being replaced by a slower train! As the booked train is just a 153, what does this excuse really mean?

Realtime Trains | 2V10 1517 Shrewsbury to Swansea | 13/03/2023

Real-time train running information for 2V10 1517 departure from Shrewsbury to Swansea on 13/03/2023. From Realtime Trains, an independent source of train running info for Great Britain.

www.realtimetrains.co.uk

Weather is the real reason.

 

[Dai Corner]

Weather is the real reason.

Unless you believe what TfW Journeycheck says

15:17 Shrewsbury to Swansea due 19:37 will be cancelled.
This is due to more trains than usual needing repairs at the same time.
Additional Information
Replacement road transport is currently being sourced.

 

[markymark2000]

Unless you believe what TfW Journeycheck says

It is a mix of the two. It was shut mostly due to weather though. Same reason why the pre planned buses on Saturday and Sunday didn't run due to the weather. Road conditions seem better now so they are able to do buses at least. They were doing line inspections and stuff because of it. The stock shortage won't help as if the 175s are mostly not in use so 153s and 150s need to be on the mainline rather than HoW.

 

[gazr]

I've been looking in to Rail Replacement Bus stops, and the curious fact they are in most cases assigned CRS (3Alpha) codes. There are the odd few, such as Banstead (Fir Tree Road) (not Firtree), which are unallocated and use the TIPLOC instead. Like stations with multiple CRS codes, should the rail replacement stop be merged, as searching for Banstead on 19/3/23 shows no trains or mention of RRB? Another nearby location Tadworth has the same problem on 26/3/23.

Also leads me to wonder who is in charge of assigning CRS codes? New stations, such as Pineapple Road already have been assigned a code (PIR), so who to contact about the missing ones?

 

[03_179]

ATOC are the ones.
We used to set them up with the NLC codes in CAPRI

 

[CR165022]

Any ideas as to why Chiltern allocations haven't been on rtt the past few days? As far as I'm aware all other tocs are on there as normal

 

[Western 52]

Any ideas as to why Chiltern allocations haven't been on rtt the past few days? As far as I'm aware all other tocs are on there as normal

Some TfW are missing too.

 

[sd0733]

Some TfW are missing too.

In general the missing TFW ones aren't showing internally either. A lot of that is due to diagrams being chopped and changed on Short term plans

 

[DavidGrain]

Chiltern have n9t been running north of Banbury on many days recently which could mean that there have been many late changes of the stock.

 

[Western 52]

In general the missing TFW ones aren't showing internally either. A lot of that is due to diagrams being chopped and changed on Short term plans

Yes I can imagine the number of changes there must be at the moment with most of the 175s out of service!

 

[CR165022]

Chiltern have n9t been running north of Banbury on many days recently which could mean that there have been many late changes of the stock.

I don't think that's the reason, as they're now not on there for the 5th day in a row

Edit: 168001 & 168004 have now been allocated, currently the only units on there, so they're obviously starting to put them on now

 

[Tom]

Chiltern have had an issue on their side for a couple of days with how they connect to another industry system (where we get the data from).

 

[Roger B]

I spent a while in Cardiff today, and noticed an anomally I've not seen before.

WTT showed 231002, 231006 and 231008 all out working - and they were - but not the services shown in WTT! 002 was working the services allocated to 006, 006 those to 008, and 008 those to 002 - for most of the day. Perhaps it's a case of the units being swapped between being allocated and entering service for the day, but by late afternoon, they were still showing incorrectly - reflecting the source data, no doubt. Surely by then source systems should have been updated / corrected? Or perhaps they were, but WTT doesn't receive intra-day updates from the relevent source systems?

I'm hoping that this is a very rare occurrence - otherwise it makes me a little nervous about accepting allocation data from WTT - may have to fall back to clear sight identification.

 

[Tom]

RTT receives updates every few minutes from TfW so it is likely that it remained incorrect on their end for the entire day.

 

[TT-ONR-NRN]

RTT receives updates every few minutes from TfW so it is likely that it remained incorrect on their end for the entire day.

It’s been very helpful for helping us track which troublesome 175s are actually in service, and where they are.

Are there plans for 197/231 little picture diagrams in the near future?

 

[357]

I spent a while in Cardiff today, and noticed an anomally I've not seen before.

WTT showed 231002, 231006 and 231008 all out working - and they were - but not the services shown in WTT! 002 was working the services allocated to 006, 006 those to 008, and 008 those to 002 - for most of the day. Perhaps it's a case of the units being swapped between being allocated and entering service for the day, but by late afternoon, they were still showing incorrectly - reflecting the source data, no doubt. Surely by then source systems should have been updated / corrected? Or perhaps they were, but WTT doesn't receive intra-day updates from the relevent source systems?

I'm hoping that this is a very rare occurrence - otherwise it makes me a little nervous about accepting allocation data from WTT - may have to fall back to clear sight identification.

RTT receives updates every few minutes from TfW so it is likely that it remained incorrect on their end for the entire day.

When the units returned to the depot at night and get prepped for the next day the error would get picked up. They should then update the system but not sure how this will then update things like rail miles

 

[91130nut]

I spent a while in Cardiff today, and noticed an anomally I've not seen before.

WTT showed 231002, 231006 and 231008 all out working - and they were - but not the services shown in WTT! 002 was working the services allocated to 006, 006 those to 008, and 008 those to 002 - for most of the day. Perhaps it's a case of the units being swapped between being allocated and entering service for the day, but by late afternoon, they were still showing incorrectly - reflecting the source data, no doubt. Surely by then source systems should have been updated / corrected? Or perhaps they were, but WTT doesn't receive intra-day updates from the relevent source systems?

I'm hoping that this is a very rare occurrence - otherwise it makes me a little nervous about accepting allocation data from WTT - may have to fall back to clear sight identification.

WTT ? Has Jonathan Ross taken to spotting units in Cardiff now. I think you mean RTT !

 

[william.martin]

RTT receives updates every few minutes from TfW

Very useful, had TFW change their mind from being a 6 car 158, to a 2 car 158 then to a 158+150 in less than 5 minutes the latter is what turned up.

 

[TT-ONR-NRN]

WTT ? Has Jonathan Ross taken to spotting units in Cardiff now. I think you mean RTT !

This made my day, I always love the irony when someone tries to be funny when correcting someone but is actually wrong themselves. WTT is correct, as opposed to VAR/STP/CAN. They’re timetabling/data layout thingys, I can’t describe them.

Edit: Or maybe I’ve misunderstood myself, how embarrassing

 

[william.martin]

WTT ? Has Jonathan Ross taken to spotting units in Cardiff now. I think you mean RTT !

WTT stands for working  timetable

 

[greatkingrat]

This made my day, I always love the irony when someone tries to be funny when correcting someone but is actually wrong themselves. WTT is correct, as opposed to VAR/STP/CAN. They’re timetabling/data layout thingys, I can’t describe them.

No, you're the one that's wrong - the Working Timetable (WTT) does not show unit allocations so the original post only makes sense if you read it as RTT.

 

[Benjwri]

This made my day, I always love the irony when someone tries to be funny when correcting someone but is actually wrong themselves. WTT is correct, as opposed to VAR/STP/CAN. They’re timetabling/data layout thingys, I can’t describe them.

Pretty sure this is incorrect, the poster was referring to taking allocation data from ‘WTT’, the WTT (I.e. Working Timetable) doesn’t include unit allocations. RTT on the other hand does, and given the context it’s fairly obvious this is what the poster meant.

 

[TT-ONR-NRN]

No, you're the one that's wrong - the Working Timetable (WTT) does not show unit allocations so the original post only makes sense if you read it as RTT.

Pretty sure this is incorrect, the poster was referring to taking allocation data from ‘WTT’, the WTT (I.e. Working Timetable) doesn’t include unit allocations. RTT on the other hand does, and given the context it’s fairly obvious this is what the poster meant.

How hilariously ironic then Thanks for telling me this.

 

[SargeNpton]

I've been looking in to Rail Replacement Bus stops, and the curious fact they are in most cases assigned CRS (3Alpha) codes. There are the odd few, such as Banstead (Fir Tree Road) (not Firtree), which are unallocated and use the TIPLOC instead. Like stations with multiple CRS codes, should the rail replacement stop be merged, as searching for Banstead on 19/3/23 shows no trains or mention of RRB? Another nearby location Tadworth has the same problem on 26/3/23.

Whether a rail-replacement bus stop gets a CRS code or not depends on a number of factors: does it need to be shown as a location in its own right, or is it suitably close to the station to be regarded as part of it; has it been linked to a main National Location Code (NLC), or does it use an NLC that is a subsidiary of the station; has the TOC made a commercial decision to show the bus stop as a location in its own right?

For Banstead, the bus stop is treated as being part of the station in all public-facing systems so doesn't need its own CRS code. At Tadworth it's the opposite, where the TOC has decided that the bus stop there will be shown in its own right - with TTA as the CRS Code.