A public transport timetable is a listing of the times that public transport services arrive and depart specified locations. Timetables are published in various forms from comprehensive books covering an entire system or continent to small cards that list the departure times from a single location.
Contents |
General
In the U.S., timetables for bus lines and some mass transit operations are called schedules instead.
In some large cities, such as London and New York, some rapid transit and urban bus services that run to a timetable are so frequent that consulting the timetable is unnecessary. In some cases public transport operators do not even publish public timetables for the times of day that their services are very frequent, or they may simply state 'services run every 3-5 minutes' (or words to that effect)
The first railway timetable compilation was published in 1839 by George Bradshaw.
In many modern public transport systems, timetables and rostering are designed by computer, with the operators specifying operating span, minimum frequencies, route length/time and other such factors. Design of the schedule may also aim to keep times memorable for customers, through the use of "clockface" timetabling—services departing at regular intervals, at the same times every hour.
Varieties
Tables with services in columns
Many timetables comprise tables with services shown in columns of a table, and stations or stops on the rows of the table.
There will generally be tables for each direction, and often separate (pairs of) tables for weekdays, Saturdays and Sundays.
Generally the times for each station or stop will be the departure time, except for the last stop of the service which will be the arrival time. At some stops if the service stops for some time, both arrival and departure times might be shown on consecutive rows.
As well as the times, the columns might include other information, often at the top of the columns, such as day(s) of operation, availability of on-board facilities such as refreshments, and a service number.
Tables with services in rows
Timetables with services arranged in rows of tables and stops or stations in columns are less common but otherwise similar to timetables with services in columns.
Times listed for a given stop
Some timetables, particularly posted on railway stations and bus stops, list times that services depart that location, sometimes along with other information such as destinations and stopping conditions.
As with other forms, there may be separate lists for different days of the week. There may be a separate list for each line/direction (this applies e.g. for train departures in the Netherlands), or a combined chronological list (as in the picture).
In mainland Europe train departures are listed on a yellow poster, and arrivals on a white poster. These posters are placed at entrances to stations and on platforms.
Dynamic displays
Dynamic displays in stations may be at a central place and list the next few departures for each line, or all departures for the next hour. Displays on platforms just show the next departure (or perhaps the next few) from that platform.
Journey planners
Internet-based programs allow one to enter departure and destination locations, as well as date, and departure or arrival time. These journey planners then give suitable departure times, with details for the whole journey. These may comprise more than one service or mode.
Timetables currently published in the world
International
- Thomas Cook European Timetable
It is monthly timetable book of major trains, some bus and ferry services in Europe.
- Thomas Cook Overseas Timetable
It is bi-monthly timetable book of major trains, and some bus and ferry services outside Europe.
- OAG Flight Guide
It is monthly air timetable book published by OAG (Official Airline Guide), and covers all airlines and airports in the world.
America
United States
- Amtrak System Timetable
It is official timetable book of Amtrak and published twice a year.
Asia
China
- China Railway Passenger Train Timetable （全国铁路旅客列车时刻表）
- China Railway Passenger Express Train Timetable（全国铁路旅客快车时刻表）
These handy books are published twice a year by China Railway Publishing in Chinese. The former timetable includes all trains, and the latter one includes fast express trains only.
India
- Trains at a Glance
It is a timetable book for travellers published once a year by English and Hindi.
Japan
- JTB Timetable （JTB時刻表）
- JR Timetable（JR時刻表）
These thick books are published every month and cover all stations and trains of JR, and long distance bus, ferry, air services in Japanese. In frequent JR urban lines, subway trains, private railways and urban bus, they have summary timetable only. Both are published about as many as 500,000 circulations and said to be the most published timetable in the world, although they are in decreasing trend recently.
South Korea
- Tourism Transport Timetable (월간 관광교통 시각표)
This handy timetable book is published every month and covers all trains, highway bus, ferry and domestic air services.
Europe
Germany
- Ihr Reiseplan
It is free timetable paper distributed in express train and has information about departure, arrival time of the train and also connecting services. Once “Kursbuch Gesamtausgabe” very thick timetable book had been published but now transferred to website.
Italy
- Pozzorario generale
It is a handy timetable book and covers most trains in Italy.
Switzerland
- Schweiz Offizielles Kursbuch
It is yearly thick timetable and consists of a railways booklet and a bus services booklet.
United Kingdom
- National Rail Timetable
It is an official timetable published by Network Rail. Book style timetable was now abolished and they provide PDF timetable file on website.
Netherlands
Train
The timetable book Spoorboekje is published yearly in December, and costs €5,50. It covers all operators of rail transport in the Netherlands, except those of heritage railways; it gives the departure times (and sometimes arrival times), but not the tracks. For international trains to and from the Netherlands, for the data for the parts abroad only a summary is given.
It provides tables with services in columns (see above), arranged by timetable number and direction (a and b). A train route can involve multiple timetable numbers; in addition to providing full information (all stations and all trains) for the railway stretch belonging to the timetable number, tables often provide selected information about the continuation of trains into stretches of other timetable numbers.
For train services which do not operate daily throughout the year there are indications for a few common restrictions such as "weekdays only" and "not on Sundays", and footnotes for other limitations.
Bus
Timetable booklets are published yearly. They come with a separate map, and cost money. Each covers one region of one bus company. They are arranged similarly to the spoorboekje, except that for each line and direction there are three separate tables: for Monday-Friday, for Saturday, and for Sunday. Also, they show the times for selected stops only.
In addition or instead, leaflets or smaller booklets with the timetable of a single line or a few lines are available free of charge.
Recent trend
Due to the development of internet and electric memory systems, conventional thick paper timetables are gradually replaced by website searching or CD-ROM style timetables and its publishing circulation is generally decreasing.
Formats
Timetables are published as books, booklets, folded or plain cards or paper, posters, on-line in HTML, pdf, and other formats, printed, hand-written on posters or blackboards, back-lit displays, and SMS messages [1].
Thomas Cook Publishing has published timetable books showing the schedules of major European railway services since 1873 (appearing monthly since 1883) and also produces a similar bi-monthly volume covering public transport services in the rest of the world. [2]
References
- ^ For an example of an SMS timetable, see Connex Melbourne's SMS timetable service
- ^ According to the Thomas Cook web-site (retrieved 6 March 2007)
See also
External links
- German Railways
- German Railways
- Swiss Railways
- Austrian Railways
- National Rail Timetable (United Kingdom)
- Trains at a Glance (India)
 |
Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Public transport schedules |
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||
This entry is from Wikipedia, the leading user-contributed encyclopedia. It may not have been reviewed by professional editors (see full disclaimer)
