On Mon, 16 Sep 2019 at 07:13, Jo <winfi...@gmail.com> wrote: > What about long_distance_bus, if you don't like coach? motorbus doesn't > really convey much information. All buses we are talking about have a motor. >
Indeed. Also, it's not a term I've encountered very often (if at all) in British English. > When I saw the initial conversation in Italian, I thought the person > asking was asking about coach buses that were transporting tourists on an > on demand, or on group reservation basis. For such buses there are > dedicated areas where they can load / unload people, but that's more like > parking. > Having had some time to think about it, and seeing the increasingly-diverging opinions here, it's time to give my current thinking on this. For me (an Englishman), a coach, in the context of buses, means a comfortable, long-distance bus with the capability of transporting luggage. Coaches are used on long-distance (several hours of travel time) routes and for transporting people on touring holidays ("It's Tuesday, so this must be Rome.") This accords with Wiktionary's definition 3 (British English) of a coach: https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/coach For me, a tourist bus is (usually) an open-topped, double-decker bus carrying tourists around a single town/city (and possibly a few nearby locations). How they get to that town/city is (usually) a different mode of transport. There is somebody (either the driver or a guide) giving a running commentary. Obviously, there are overlaps in that coaches taking people on holiday or to events are carrying tourists. A coach driver may make an occasional announcement, and there may even be a guide making announcements. But coaches are about long-distance travel (usually with luggage) whilst tourist buses cover short distances and have no special provision for stowing luggage. Tourist buses are ordinary (not very comfortable) buses, usually with the top cut off. Coaches are comfortable. Holiday coaches usually require you to book a ticket in advance; long-distance coaches permit (and sometimes require) reservations and often require you to buy a ticket from an office rather than on the bus. Tourist buses can sometimes be booked in advance but may permit you to simply board at one of their stops. In fact, if we're talking about Flixbus, Eurolines, Greyhound, etc. I think > highway=bus_stop is just fine. Add a tag for operator or network and it's > obvious and clear those are not bus stops for the local bus lines. > Those would be long-distance coaches running to a timetable, not coaches carrying people on holiday to a destination or event. For OSM purposes it's probably OK to treat them as buses, even though they may have only two stops (the two termini). However, these coach holidays https://www.richardsbros.co.uk/coach-holidays/ are not buses in the above sense. Booking is required. Luggage is carried. The pick-up point is fixed, the drop-off point(s) varies depending on the specific destination. The pick-up point may or may not be an ordinary bus stop, but usually isn't for most operators. These day tours https://www.richardsbros.co.uk/day-tours/ fall into the same broad category as the coach holidays. These are tourist buses https://edinburghtour.com/ -- Paul
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