Systems whose declared mode is not to be trusted, and what they really are
Source:R/standard_modes.R
standard_mode_overrides.RdBritish timetable sources disagree with each other, and with themselves between years, about which light railways are trams, which are metros and which are heavy rail. This table settles it, so that a mode means the same thing in every source and a series built across them is comparable.
Details
Each row names a system, a regular expression matching the NaPTAN names of the stops it serves, and the `route_type` it should carry. `operator` is filled in only where the stops cannot identify the system on their own: the London Underground because not all of its stop names are marked ("Wembley Park" carries no suffix), the Birmingham Air-Rail Link because it has two stops one of which is a mainline station, and the Weardale Railway because its stops are named as ordinary rail stations.
`sources` limits a row to the converters whose data can contain that system, and exists because an operator code is not a stable identifier. NPTDR reuses codes freely between archives, so a rule keyed on one can fire on an unrelated operator in an earlier year: `CAB` is the London cable car in TransXChange from 2023, but in the 2010 and 2011 NPTDR archives it is somebody else entirely, and without this column those services were relabelled as an aerial lift two years before the cable car was built. Rows matched on stop names need no such limit - a stop called "Buchanan Street SPT Subway Station" is the Glasgow Subway in any year - so `"any"` is the normal value and only the operator-matched rows for systems that did not yet exist are restricted.
The rules are: heritage and minor railways are rail (2); the London Underground, the Tyne and Wear Metro, the Glasgow Subway and the Docklands Light Railway are metro (1); the airport people movers are trams (0); and the street and segregated tramways are trams (0). The London cable car is the one system none of those describe, and it takes the GTFS mode that does, aerial lift (6).
Examples
standard_mode_overrides()
#> system operator stop_pattern
#> 1 London Underground LUL Underground Station
#> 2 Tyne and Wear Metro <NA> Tyne and Wear Metro|Metro Station
#> 3 Glasgow Subway <NA> SPT Subway
#> 4 Docklands Light Railway <NA> DLR Station
#> 5 Manchester Metrolink <NA> Manchester Metrolink
#> 6 Midland Metro <NA> Midland Metro|West Midlands Metro
#> 7 Sheffield Supertram <NA> Sheffield Supertram
#> 8 Nottingham Express Transit <NA> Tram Stop
#> 9 Croydon Tramlink <NA> Tramlink
#> 10 Blackpool Tramway <NA> Blackpool Tramway
#> 11 Edinburgh Trams <NA> Edinburgh Tram
#> 12 Birmingham Air-Rail Link BHX Air.?Rail Link|Skytrain
#> 13 Gatwick Airport shuttle <NA> Terminal Shuttle
#> 14 Luton DART DART <NA>
#> 15 Heritage and minor railways <NA> Railway[)]|Rly[)]|[(]RHDR[)]|Mull Rail
#> 16 Weardale Railway WRLY <NA>
#> 17 London Cable Car CAB <NA>
#> 18 London Cable Car EAL <NA>
#> route_type sources
#> 1 1 any
#> 2 1 any
#> 3 1 any
#> 4 1 any
#> 5 0 any
#> 6 0 any
#> 7 0 any
#> 8 0 any
#> 9 0 any
#> 10 0 any
#> 11 0 any
#> 12 0 any
#> 13 0 any
#> 14 0 txc
#> 15 2 any
#> 16 2 any
#> 17 6 txc
#> 18 6 txc
#> note
#> 1 NPTDR files it as a bus in 2004; not all stop names are marked
#> 2
#> 3 TNDS files it as a tram
#> 4 TNDS files it as heavy rail
#> 5 NPTDR operator code changes every year
#> 6 called Metro, runs on the street
#> 7 NPTDR files it as a bus in most years
#> 8 NPTDR: tram in 2006-2008, metro in 2009-2011
#> 9
#> 10
#> 11
#> 12 two stops, one a mainline station, so matched on the operator
#> 13 TNDS files it as metro in five of eight snapshots
#> 14 TNDS files it as heavy rail; two stops, one a mainline station
#> 15 TNDS files the Bluebell as tram, rail and bus in different years
#> 16 stops are named as ordinary rail stations
#> 17 TNDS files it as heavy rail; stop names identify nothing
#> 18 the same cable car before the sponsor changed