PMS and RCS Service Desk

Services published via ITPS may have a number of “Operating Characteristics”. Twelve of these characteristics exist, of which ten have no relevance to ticketing & information systems. The two that can have an effect are:

Q  Runs as required.

Y  Runs to Terminals/Yards as required.

The Q operating characteristic, in train operating terms, reserves a path for a train that does not generally run but which may need to run on occasions for a variety of reasons (engineering work, relief train, etc). Its presence in train schedule prevents any other service from being timetabled over that route at that time by accident.

As a consequence, any train with a Q operating characteristic at its origin will not be shown in PMS or in the timetable data that DTDS passes to public-facing systems. If one of these trains does actually run then an STP overlay will be published for the date/s in question, with the Q characteristic removed. When that occurs, it will be visible in PMS and in public enquiries just for the applicable date range.

Here are three examples of “Q Trains” used for the intended purpose (the Q character appears towards the end of the BS record)…

On those dates that Grand Central is unable to operate its services south of York this will run instead, allowing passengers to connect into other operator’s trains at York.

This Q Train only runs when Brighton & Hove Albion has a home game, allowing spectators to travel to the stadium at Falmer. For 29/4/17 this train had this STP overlay, with the Q characteristic removed and with the departure time amended…

This version of the train did appear in passenger enquiries and was shown in PMS.

And two examples of Q Trains used for non-standard purposes…

This train has no Q operating characteristic in the BS record so will be shown as an advertised passenger services from Birmingham New Street to Euston. However the Q has been added in the change of status (CR) records at Coventry and Northampton. These intermediate Q status changes are ignored.

The 9M48 0550 Glasgow Central-Euston train departs from Glasgow as a single Voyager unit but on arrival at Wolverhampton it couples up to a second Voyager unit. As the electronic reservations systems in Voyagers do not communicate between units a separate dummy train is required in NRS for the additional seating provided south of Wolverhampton. This is achieved by the creation of 1Z48 0945 Wolverhampton-Euston, but as a Q Train so that is does not appear as a duplicate service in passenger enquiries.

The Y operating characteristic was originally used to instruct train crew that they may have to take a train beyond its advertised destination, but in some instances these days Y is used to indicate an alternative route for passenger trains. Though this use of the Y operating characteristic in train planning is inconsistent such trains are accepted in PMS and in journey planners on the basis that, in most case, the train does run.