Over the past week or so, a series of new real-time signs have emerged along the Outer Link bus route (and potentially in other places too). The signs are very different to the old ones – and require you to pretty much stand right in front of them to see when your bus is coming:
While it’s certainly nice having this information, I must say that I vastly prefer the traditional signs – for one simple reason:
You can see them while sitting down in the bus shelter
Like most people, I tend to read a book, listen to music, check emails on my cellphone or other stuff like that while waiting for the bus. It’s nice with the traditional signs to be able to just glance up once in a while and see how many minutes away the buses are. If it says something like 6 minutes you know that you can relax and not have to compulsively look up the road to see if anything’s coming. The new signs are pretty useless for this purpose and I have found myself basically ignoring them aside from a glance when I first arrive at the stop.
So while they have a use, I just don’t think they’re anywhere near as useful as the traditional signs. I also found out this morning that these signs also show “DLY”, which means the system is still as buggered as it’s always been.
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Is it me or is that LCD panel facing the road, not the bus stop?
You are correct.
They have something similar in Melbourne but it is part of a bigger ‘totem’ carrying timtable information and maps. There they face the bus stop (rather than passing traffic!) and the time and route of the next bus takes up about 3/4 of the screen so it is visible from a couple of metres away.
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3563/3389057343_ee070bbc87_o.jpg
It looks like the ones above will have a series of small lines that you have to get your face into to read. Perhaps a software update could change it so it displays the next route number and minutes until arrival in the top half, then a list of the subsequent buses in the bottom half.
Oh and they could turn them around to face the bus stop!
They are, at least, solar powered.
The legibility of such a small LCD panel is a major fail,but I would hope this is partially alleviated by the on demand audio announcements What was the volume on it like?,
Frankly didn’t believe the blog till I saw the photo.
Looks like a parking meter and ‘admins’ take on the convenience of what punters want is spot on.
Another example of too much money, too much technology and not enough commonsense.
It smells like a vendor pushing their technology rather than AT looking for a solution. They look like parking meters adapted.
Unless they double as something else. Perhaps they are part of a backhaul wireless telemetry for the busses?
I assume they would have done a real world trial before ordering 100s of these things, but did anyone ever see it happen anywhere? Using a parking meter design might almost make sense if it still dispensed tickets and allowed you to top up your Hop, but it doesn’t look like this is possible.
However, as admin points out, there is a fundamental problem with the unreliability of the existing system that they should be addressing first or asking the vendor for a refund please.
They definitely look like adapted parking meters and if AT is going to be rolling these out it would have made sense to have functionality that enables people to top up their HOP card with it as then at least it would have been more useful to people
That’s a good point actually.
What is that big yellow button for? The perforated thing beside it looks like a speaker.
Yes it is a speaker. The button is for those who have sight impairements (i.e. cannot read the screen). When you push the button you get a voice announcement of the upcoming services (a similar button is on the existing RTI signs).
I quite agree with the general tenor of the comments here; this real time sign box suggests an overseas firm is dumping some outmoded parking meter equipment in New Zealand (at bargain basement rates, one hopes). The appearance of the thing, the clunky application of the Maxx logo, the miniscule black and white screen, etc, etc, all seems to indicate that AT have reached a new low in design standards. Aside from anything else, the screen reminds me of the one in the Apple Macintosh I used to use way back in the 1980s (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macintosh). It was great at the time but even then I almost needed a magnifying glass to read the text. Actually, more than anything, it reminds me of an early Baird television such as the 1936 Baird-T5 (http://www.tvhistory.tv/1936-Baird-T5.JPG). Retro, possibly; retrogressive, actually.
I think you will find that the technology is produced by the Parking technology section of CHS Global, which is based in Albany (Auckland, not New York). I.e. this technology is made in NZ. Not that this mitigates it’s other issues …
Stu
Thanks for the information. It pains me to say it but the local origin of this thing rather explains why it is so poorly designed: developed on the cheap, deploying redundant technology, under-tested and prone to aesthetic gimmicks. What I don’t understand is why AT didn’t consider combining the rtpid with a cash ticket vending machine so that, eventually, when all local passengers are using Hop smart cards they can start withdrawing cash handling responsibilities from bus drivers. Doing so would inter alia speed up boarding, ensure adherence to the timetable as well as making life easier for drivers.
I think these ones cost about a 10th of the bigger, flasher, better signs used elsewhere.
Shame they can’t slot in a decent sized screen for people to read easily.
I wonder how many of these are going to be rolled out over the next little while?
A+ for intention
C- for usefulness to general public
Will be very interesting to see how many bus users actively go up and look at this sign – maybe only when they first arrive at the stop, then they sit down and wait until the bus says it was going to arrive? Sometimes optimistic given the delay (DLY) scenario and problems someone mentioned earlier. Probably won’t have a lot of people hopping up and down to get an update on their bus.
Well i tried today, catching the Link on Ponsonby rd, no info at all. Usless. And the one across the rd has its solar panel facing well west of north.
Maybe they are going to become some sort of ticketing machine for integrated ticketing?