MidlandRed.net

At the moment , according to the screen , the 144 terminates northbound at "Birmingham City" - much to the consternation of Aston Villa fans ?? A few weeks ago , the service was terminating at Smallbrook Queensway . . . . .

The terminus of the southbound 145 has now altered to "Ombersley Street". But ,to be fair , according to streeetmap.co.uk , there is only one Ombersley Street in the whole of the U.K. !!

Yesterday the northern terminus of the 145 was shown as "SUPERMARKET".

The SUPERMARKET destination has re-appeared to go with another odd one - "GROUNDS" . . . . .

And today , the 144a runs from Crowngate Bus to that well known international interchange hub - "Aintree Close".

The "big screen" is mostly obscured by temporary fencing screening construction work which includes installing a new footbridge over The Spadesbourne.

Yesterday , Diamonds increase in services are displayed on the big screen as departures to "Rail St." Longbridge at 16.51,16.53,17.31 and 17.33

On quite a few occasions over the last few weeks the screen has been showing the same departure two or three times . . . .

Maybe a little insight into how these screens work...

In all the areas I work they are installed by the local County Council, and I see no reason why Worcestershire would be any different. The data displayed is taken from the BODS (Bus Open Data) file supplied by the operator when the service is registered. This is a legal requirement that must be submitted for each alteration, and mostly contains timetable information. The data is publicly available to anyone via the internet and is used by the likes of bustimes.org for their websites, therefore if the data is wrong it means the operator has made a mistake or the local authority has not uploaded the latest file.

The issues with odd or confusing names will arise when the person programming the data doesn't really take into consideration that this data is now public facing. When the requirements were first introduced the data was only ever seen internally by staff at the company and by the local authority when approving (or rejecting) the licence to operate. All these people were familiar with the area so vague or colloquial names were understood by all involved and not that important.

Where I work, I can often get a good idea which commercial officer has registered a given service just by looking at BusTimes. One of them is very old-school and doesn't see the need, so route descriptions are vague such as "Town Centre - Town Centre" for a circular route, while another is the complete opposite and often gives so much information that it goes off the end off the screen. And then there's the one that can't spell!

Thank you Adam . Interesting to read. The X20 Birmingham terminus is often displayed as The Square Peg . . . . . .