Background and context

A consultation was carried out in 2017: Local Bus Services in Scotland – Improving the Framework for Delivery, which provided a high level overview of the appetite for bus open data in Scotland. The consultation found that the majority of respondents agreed with Transport Scotland’s proposals to require the operators of local services to release data on routes, timetables, punctuality and fares in a specified format. This was part of the evidence which informed bus provisions within the 2019 Act, including the information Ministers could require by section 40 (Bus Open Data).

Most respondents also agreed that data provided by operators should be stored in a central data hub. Relating to both the general concept of open data and a central hub, respondents often commented that these proposals would improve data consistency, accessibility of data and transparency. The consultation found that:

• Most respondents (96%) agreed that bus operators should release data on routes, timetables, punctuality and fares.
• Respondents believed the data could be used for different means, including transparency, increase Local Authority scrutiny on bus reliability cost etc and could ensure a more accurate information regarding buses.
• Some respondents made suggestions for how open data could be collated and accessed. A few of these respondents suggested consulting local authorities, Regional Transport Partnerships and transport operators who already hold data to ensure there is no unnecessary duplication of effort. Another suggestion was that Electronic Bus Service Registration (EBSR) could be used as a vehicle to collate open bus data.
• Most respondents (92%) agreed that data provided by bus operators should be stored in a central data hub, with recognised benefits including quality checking, ease of access, public accountability, and data security.

There is a general requirement under the Transport (Scotland) Act 2001 for Local Traffic Authorities to require bus operators to make information available to the public, although it is up to the operator how this is achieved and in what format. As such, many operators provide information to the public though their own websites. This can range from downloadable pdfs of fares and timetables to interactive journey planners and apps that include fares data and live service updates, this can therefore be inconsistent from the perspective of a passenger comparing the information between two or more operators.

Transport Scotland works with ‘Traveline Scotland’ to provide open data travel information services. The Traveline Scotland central data hub is used to capture timetable and other travel information for the whole of Scotland and provide it to the public in an accessible way, via website, app and the Traveline call centre. Traveline Scotland has been in place since 2001, the journey planning service was recently improved and relaunched in September 2024, and functions as Scotland’s central ‘hub’ of travel information.

It is a legal requirement for almost all bus services to be registered with the Traffic Commissioner, the body responsible for the registration of bus services and heavy goods vehicles in the UK. In most cases, this information is not provided directly to Traveline Scotland by operators. Instead, information is supplied to Local Transport Authorities (LTAs) as part of the registration process, many of whom will also carry out a “sense check” on the data. The information is then forwarded by the LTA to Traveline and used to create the UK wide Traveline National Data Set (TNDS) database which in turn populates their journey planners.

The TNDS contains public transport timetables for bus, light rail, tram and ferry services in Great Britain and is compiled from data from Traveline Scotland, the English Traveline regions, and Traveline Wales. Use of TNDS data by third parties is subject to users signing a specific licence agreement. For example, the Scottish public transport information used by Google journey planning comes from the TNDS.

In Scotland, fares are not included as standard in the information published through Traveline Scotland, although the voluntary sharing of fares information to Traveline Scotland has grown in recent years. We believe that this may be because information about fares is not part of the registration process with the Traffic Commissioner, and so LTAs would not have sight of fare information to pass on. Bus operators are required by law (The Public Service Vehicles (Registration of local services) (Scotland) Regulations 2001) to make fares information available to the public on board buses, which means that information about fares cannot be considered commercially confidential, but potentially some operators may have concerns about fares being easily compared between operators, as passengers may use the information to opt to wait for a cheaper service. Transport Scotland would like to see fares information included in the data provided to Traveline Scotland in order to allow passengers to make informed choices.

In the 2017 consultation for the Transport (Scotland) Act 2019, 92% of respondents agreed that any data provided by operators should be stored in a central data hub. This would deliver value for money, capitalising on the processes established between operators, local authorities and DTDS to deliver that project. Our vision is for the central data hub to be the sole trusted source for all journey planning information in Scotland