The Scottish Bus Open Data Consultation

As fares information is not currently mandatory in Scotland, only certain operators currently share this information. Traveline Scotland also converts a small number of proprietary data formats from Electronic Ticket Machines to an in-house standard for use in the passenger information system. This is not an automated process, and while the fares data that is currently supplied is of good quality, it is not in a consistent format which creates inefficiency in data transformation. Traveline Scotland is adopting NeTEx for fares data in Scotland and we expect from discussions with industry that operators will begin to voluntarily provide fares data in this standard.

Operators will shortly have a statutory responsibility to make fares information available in an open format, in the open data repository. Third parties may assist operators with complying with this duty, but compliance will be the responsibility of operators.

We propose to require data to be submitted in the NetEx standard. This would align with the Department for Transport’s approach, providing cross-border consistency. We also propose that fares information be phased in over time, with simple ticket information brought in first, followed by complex ticket information, in order to give bus operators a reasonable period to put the necessary systems in place.