Blackpool assesses potential for real-time displays with Journeo
Real-time information for Blackpool Transport and Stagecoach buses serving the Fylde resort’s town centre is now being provided by a large display. Along with the accompanying software system, it has been installed by Journeo and forms “an insight into the potential of the technology,” says Blackpool Council, which plans to expand real-time bus information provision in due course.
The display is within the window of Blackpool Transport’s currently-closed customer service centre on Market Street. The package has been funded by Blackpool Council’s Local Transport Plan. Live journey times were previously only available for both operators’ services within their respective apps. The local authority points out that the new screen particularly benefits passengers that have no access to such technology.
Blackpool Council now hopes to roll out further real-time displays. That will include via shelter-mounted units at key stops, and through free-standing ‘totem screens’ around the town’s new tram terminus as part of the Talbot Gateway Phase 2 development, which is scheduled to open later this year.
Those totem screens will be interactive and display live travel information for buses, trams and trains as well as maps, points of interest and other messaging. The work is part of Blackpool Council’s efforts to promote sustainable travel where possible after it declared a climate emergency in 2021.
Each operator involved in the real-time information provision via the new screens has welcomed the development. Blackpool Transport Managing Director Jane Cole says that it “is the next step in making bus travel even more accessible than ever before,” while Stagecoach Merseyside and South Lancashire MD Matt Davies has also acknowledged its value in encouraging patronage.
DVSA 'keen' on long-term horizon for vehicle test availability
Achieving longer-term visibility of heavy vehicle test availability for Authorised Testing Facilities (ATFs) and operators alike is something that DVSA is “keen to look at” as part of ongoing work around the Heavy Vehicle Testing Review.
Writing in a blogpost, Head of Vehicle Policy and Engineering Neil Barlow says that one way to help achieve that could be moving towards “a longer term view of planning and confirming testing resource.” That may involve agreeing the hours for which DSVA Vehicle Standards Assessors (VSAs) are provided to ATFs over a rolling 13-month period, Mr Barlow suggests.
When combined with a mechanism for short-term adjustments, he believes that such an approach would “enable ATFs to give [operators] the service they need.” The Agency was criticised by some operators in 2021 for failing to ensure sufficient availability of heavy vehicle test slots in all regions. It put that down to testing exemptions awarded in 2020, which impacted the spread of expiry dates and caused bunching.
Mr Barlow says that DVSA wants to move to a system for ATFs to book VSA hours that “works for everyone.” He adds that establishing an equilibrium in that regard between DVSA and ATFs “is key to making the service work better.”
The Agency acknowledges that under the current arrangement for how VSAs’ hours with ATFs are scheduled, operators cannot always book tests as far ahead as might be desirable. Certainty of appointment availability “is something that is critical for many operators,” says Mr Barlow. “But we also know that flexibility to change things at shorter notice is important."
Additional work by DVSA on a longer-term approach to the allocation of Assessors is anticipated early in 2022, although he cautions that any change “cannot happen overnight” as some quarterly booking processes for this year have already been confirmed.
Further focus groups exploring how DVSA can improve its heavy vehicle testing regime are planned. Sessions that have taken place so far have informed the Agency of “things that we were already thinking about, but also had some helpful and challenging insight in other areas,” says Mr Barlow.
DVSA earlier told routeone that it had received 38 applications for new ATFs since lifting the moratorium on accepting such submissions. Immediately before Christmas 2021, two of those were close to opening.