On 5 Aug 2009, at 13:05, Frankie Roberto wrote:
On Wed, Aug 5, 2009 at 12:38 PM, Roger Slevin
<[email protected]> wrote:
Before anyone answers your question, please bear in mind that there
is no clear definition of a “coach” ... and I have dealt with a
feedback to traveline on this very point only this morning. A
limited stop service between Cambridge and Oxford operated by
vehicles which have “coach-style” seats and which the operator
refers to as “coaches” runs a limited stop service between the two
cities (the X5) – so we call this a coach. The complaint came from
someone who had been unable to find this service as a “bus” because
he saw a “coach” as being something which you had to prebook, and
which expected a significant number of passengers to have luggage
which went into luggage lockers under (or at the back of) the vehicle.
Whilst I agree that there's no hard-and-fast distinction between
buses and coaches, I think that using route=bus-coach is just going
to confuse people!
I'd suggest using either route=bus or route=coach, and simply going
with whichever feels most correct (based upon what the route calls
itself or how people generally refer to it).
This doesn't resolve the potential ambiguities, but renderers and
routing software would be advised to use a bit leeway when doing
searches.
I understood that one difference in the UK is if it was under 50km the
operator could reclaim tax on their fuel. There is also evidently a 50
km rule about tachographs, where drivers operating longer routes need
tachos, but ones on shorter routes (urban buses) don't.
I think it is also useful to distinguish the sort of seating. I was on
a coach last week, big leather seats and air-conditioning - very
comfortable and reasonably quick. No toilet which surprised me, but it
was only a 1 hour journey so I guess that is fair-enough. The
experience of using a normal urban bus would have been very poor in
comparison and I wouldn't have taken it.
Personally I would vote for the distinction to be retained on the
basis of the distance and type of vehicle.
Regards,
peter
Frankie
--
Frankie Roberto
Experience Designer, Rattle
0114 2706977
http://www.rattlecentral.com
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