As part of a new digital trial, London North Eastern Railway (LNER) is pioneering new technology that will make it easier for customers to find the correct place to board their trains.
The technology being trialled is a first for the railway, and consists of new digital display screens that have been installed at Doncaster station to show customers the layout of their trains, and the appropriate place to wait on the platform for the correct place to board their coach.
The aim of the new signs is to make boarding simpler and smoother while improving punctuality. Trials of the display is being carried out on two platforms at the station for three months.
As well as showing where to wait for customers' booked seats. the displays also show where available seats can be found, station stops, arrival times, and the locations on the train of the onboard Café Bar, bicycle spaces, and priority seats.
If the trial is a success, the screens could be rolled out across the eleven stations that are managed by London North Eastern Railway.
At the 2022 UK Business Tech Awards, the company's LNER app gained the App of the Year Award. The app provides customers with a greater choice and flexibility when making their travel plans, including fee-free seat reservations and accessing One-Click Delay Repay.
In another innovation, the railway is trialling Edgecasting, which allows customers on certain Azuma trains to stream thousands of shows from the ITV Hub. This is the first time that such a facility has been made available in the UK, and allows passengers to enjoy the on-demand content without eating into their personal data allowance or using the onboard WiFi.
According to the latest results published by the Office of Rail and Road (ORR) last month, London North Eastern Railway was shown to have welcomed back to its services more customers compared with pre-pandemic usage than any other franchised operator. This is a record fifth consecutive quarter in which the company has topped the table, with passenger numbers now exceeding pre-Covid levels and the railway's data showing over 15 million passengers.
Danny Gonzalez, Chief Digital and Innovation Officer at LNER, said: “We believe digital innovation and our work to continually improve our customer experience are key parts of LNER's success in leading the industry when it comes to welcoming people back to rail. The new information screens being trialled at Doncaster are just the latest way we are working to make travel simpler and smarter.
“Our customers can already sign-up for live journey updates via the award-winning LNER app and use a QR code to order refreshments directly to their seat through our ‘Let's Eat At Your Seat' service in Standard and we have further exciting digital innovations ahead as we put our customers first.”
If only LNER could make its website user-friendly too!
Some aspects are designed to make booking difficult.
PS
The descriptive info blurb is five years out of date!
Becoming less of a transport network,
more of an entertainment business?
Very good idea. Those information departures screens should be installed at other stations on the ECML and on other major lines.
Durham has had them for several months now. High-level screens show the make-up of incoming trains and the zones in which to stand, markings for which have been on platforms for a few years already.
I have seen elsewhere recently that same tech was recently launched for a metro/lrt in the US (I think via Reece Martin’s blog on substack or London reconnections Friday reads link)
So may be first for heavy rail, and a little pioneering for UK, but not completely first in public transport worldwide