The total provision of British bus services is a mixture of competitive private-sector commercial operation and local transport authority (LTA)-determined tendered operation. The transfer of the underlying data has involved manual re-entering from paper records to electronic systems, requiring a large amount of effort which is vulnerable to simple typing errors. Bus service data is needed by many stakeholders and some this data has already been computerised. In order to complete the process Electronic Bus Service Registration EBSR system was introduced. Operators retained responsibility for keeping their bus schedules and service registrations up to date, while LTAs continued to maintain the bus stop records. A six point formal process was agreed and EBSR was launched in 2008 with two pilot bus operators. The authors look at the rollout and evolution of EBSR and flag up the added benefits of the system and possible future uses. The electronic transfer of bus service data will improve the quality of the data coming into the journey planning systems that in turn will improve the quality of travel information provided to passengers. The two systems, TranXChange and NaPTAN, are summarised in an inset.
Abstract