Technical Documents

In 2017, through the Bus Services Act, the government introduced powers to require the provision of audible and visible information on local bus services throughout Great Britain.

When enacted, this will require bus operators to equip their vehicles with display screens to provide next stop information and audio systems to announce the information - using both speakers and induction loops.

This paper brings together the findings of an RTIG research project carried out in 2021 into Low Bridge strikes.

This has been a problem for high-sided vehicles such as HGVs and buses for a long time and can be very costly - both in economic and human terms.

The measurement of vehicle occupancy for buses in real time is not something that was carried out regularly or, was in widespread use in the UK until the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. Over the course of 2020, significant work was carried out and progress made, by suppliers and bus operators to introduce passenger counting solutions and present the information to passengers. 
Advice was provided in RTIGT039 Providing Vehicle Occupancy Data:- Data Interfaces in May 2020.

This document has been produced by RTIG as a specification for a set of messages that can be communicated between a bus management centre and a traffic control centre, in order to request and grant priority for buses at traffic signals.

This document has been produced by RTIG as a specification for a set of messages that can be communicated between bus-mounted devices and office-based systems, using a digital open protocol.

This document details the specification and methodology for the transmission of data from public service vehicles, such as buses and trams, to traffic signals and electronic public transport real time information displays.

Guidance on how to measure the quality and accuracy of real time information in the form of predictions that are provided to the customer. It also provides recommendations for the presentation of predicted information to the customer.

On behalf of the UK, RTIG has contributed to the definition of a CEN standard to define a “Service Interface for Real-time Information” (SIRI). It is intended to be used to exchange information between servers containing real-time public transport vehicle or journey time data.

These include the control centres of transport operators and information systems that utilise real-time vehicle information, for example, to deliver services such as travel information.

In 2016 RTIG established a Working Group to consider these issues.

It was quickly realised that the challenge has several dimensions, and separate advice was required on issues such as:

Bus Open Data Draft Statutory Instrument Summary of Key Dates and Data Formats