Bus stop showing closed

[neelamk]

Hello,

It’s been reported by a user that Bus Stop L Park Royal Station is open, not closed.

Are you able to look into this?

Thanks

[briantist]

@neelamk

How can I tell if a bus stop is closed?

I have found this happening too. When I rang up Transport for London, it seems that local councils can close bus stops for their own reasons for weeks at a time without telling TfL. If they do it the official way, then the system is supposed to instigate a temporary bus stop. My guess is that this probably what happens when a fare freeze coincides with sudden leap in inflation.

[jamesevans]

hi @neelamk - I’ve asked the Network Management Control Centre to check this as they currently have a stop block deployed.

Thanks,
James

[mjcarchive]

@briantist
In my recent experience it is the exception rather than the rule for a temporary stop to be provided when a stop is closed. In some cases it is simply not practicable because there is no safe space to stop but sometimes it feels as if this necessary exemption is being, er, interpreted overgenerously to save the bother. If you are lucky, all you get is a “The next stop is closed” announcement. If you are really lucky you get that before the bus has left the previous stop.

To play devil’s advocate, there must be occasions when works finish early and it must be better just to let buses serve the stop again rather than wait for someone to remove the closed marker on an information system. A right side failure, so as to speak.

[briantist]

@mjcarchive

It’s hard to know really. I’ve given up using buses in London. It’s easier to take the tube/DLR/train/Liz to the nearest point nearby and walk. If I’m not up to walking (and I do have a posh “step counter” Google Watch to nudge me into this) the it’s just a better use of my time to take an Uber.

Every time I look at using a bus, even if it’s just to come back from my local Asda, all the at-stop screens are bust so it just seems more likely that the timings at the Central Line station are going to be more accurate than the random timings of bus minutes.

This doesn’t bode well for the Superloop project: without accurate information on arrivals and journey times, I can’t see them working for their advertised purpose of “getting people out of their cars”.

But, this is just my impression and I’m sure people who work at TfL are working hard to make the bus experience tolerable.

Yes, getting back to your point, people who want (or have) to use buses are sometimes getting a decent deal (to carry their shopping home say) by finding closed stops have been reopened. But I would again advocate that this penalizes people who check first!

[mjcarchive]

That’s not my experience, @briantist. Most screens work for me and if they don’t (or if, like my local stop, there is no screen) I have a smartphone. Perhaps it is worse in some areas. Of course there are problems sometimes and buses missing from the screens but for me the experience is generally good. I know it is the lowest of low bars but when I think back to the '70s and 45 minute waits (with no information) on a 15 minute headway route, it is one hell of a lot better. It must also be rather disheartening if people are in effect told that the whole thing they are working on is rubbish!

On your last paragraph, how are the advance checkers penalised? If the stop did not open until the TfL website had been updated with the stop status, they would still have to walk to the alternative stop. Should a diversion not be discontinued after an accident the instant the road is clear again? I think that is putting the information system ahead of what it is supposed to support.

[harry]

@mjcarchive

If you are lucky, all you get is a “The next stop is closed” announcement.

Most annoyingly, the announcement is typically:

• not played until the bus is leaving the previous bus stop, therefore preventing passengers who needed to alight at the closed stop from choosing to alight at the previous stop, which would typically have got the passengers to their intended destination faster than staying on the bus and having to walk back (especially as closed bus stops generally are the result of road works that prevent buses travelling at their normal speeds

• does not state the name of the closed bus stop, which is of no help to somebody who isn’t familiar with the area

Trains generally handle this much more helpfully, saying specifically “Xxxxxx is closed” and doing it at least 3 stations earlier, giving passengers the chance to rething their journey. iBus urgently needs updating to allow it to do the same.

@mjcarchive

there must be occasions when works finish early

There are also occasions when work hasn’t even started, but buses insist on skipping stops because some jobsworth has told them that the stop is closed, even though it very clearly isn’t.