The Information Deficit Increases

I know I've discussed this subject several times already, but I'm going to revisit it with good reason.

Over the past couple of weeks, new bus stop indicators have been erected on routes in and around Aberdare. The main reason for the change seems to be that the new signs include up-to-date contact details for Traveline Cymru.

Here are the old and new signs from the same location – outside Aberdare Library – so you can see the difference for yourselves.

 

 

 

 

 

 

I think the new signs look much clearer than the old ones, some of which were really starting to show their age. In addition, they no longer list services like the X55 (Aberdare to Swansea) which were discontinued the best part of a decade ago.

But there's a snag. Have a look at the whole signpost.

Have you spotted it yet?

Yeah, you've got it – there's nowhere for the timetable(s) to be displayed.

On the old stands (or a fair percentage of them, at least), there was a rectangular panel at approximately elbow height, where a list of departure times and destinations could be displayed. (I say could, because in a lot of cases the information was either outdated or missing entirely.) Here's a recent example, on a bus stand (without a shelter) a short distance from my home.

This sign was clear, concise and easy to digest. (The fact that you often had to stand around in the pissing rain to read it is a side issue.)

The replacement stand has next to no information. Sure, it tells you what buses serve that stop, but not how long you'll have to wait for one to come along.

There are two consecutive bus shelters along the route of Stagecoach buses 7, 8, 9, and 11C towards Aberdare. One shelter has an internal panel with a similar display to that in the previous photo. The other doesn't have an internal panel – instead, the information was attached to the post outside. I say was because … Well, you can work it for yourselves, I'm sure.

Now, it could just be me, but I find it much quicker and far more convenient to glance at a printed piece of paper to find out my bus time, than to fuck around trying to get any sense out of Traveline Cymru (see 'What Do You Want?' – 'Information' from the very early days of this blog). And do passengers customers really want to be using their smartphones outdoors, in all weathers, to try and find out when the next bus might come along?

Just for the record, here's the sum total of timetable information available to the travelling public outside Aberdare Library at the time of writing.

Precisely fuck all, in other words.

There's not much more information available inside Aberdare Library, for that matter. They no longer carry the handy Stagecoach bus or Arriva Trains Wales timetables to pick up and slip in your pocket. As for train timetables in general, here's what I've just found behind the counter in the so-called 'reference' department.

In case you think your eyes are deceiving you, they aren't.

It's over a decade out of date, but this is the best that the central source of printed and online information in Aberdare can provide.

If you're thinking that this is just another excuse to bitch about the apparent uselessness of Rhondda Cynon Taf County Borough Council, you're wrong. I was in Glynneath on Thursday afternoon, and I found this bus stop at the western end of the village, just before the turning to the Morfa Glas estate.

Well played, Neath Port Talbot CBC – now you're getting the idea!