My minigolfing of regional rail branding across Europe continues, and now we show train names/brands across the Netherlands on Railfinder! And as a bonus we now also show line numbers where we have that data.

Big thanks to @partim for explaining the systems-within-systems for how NL regional rail is organised & marketed. Saved quite some research!

If you see any train branding/names/lines that’s off (in NL or elsewhere), I always want to hear that feedback for my next minigolfing session.

(I have found some missing cross-border data while working on this, which I’ll try to get fixed. If you see something missing, that’s still welcome feedback in case it’s a case I didn’t see yet.)

@stefanlindbohm https://www.railfinder.eu/search?from=14988&to=16049&date=2026-03-09&p=A

you don't seem to know that trains are trains in the UK 🤔

is it blocked by making a narrower icon to reflect the restricted loading gauge?

(and yes i was checking for hovercraft)

Portsmouth and Southsea to Sandown, 2026-03-09

Railfinder

@stefanlindbohm oh, also, the ferry definitely isn't operated by South West Trains and they get a bit shirty if you imply they are

and the wording on "operated by [XYZ] service" is a bit awkward :)

@bovine3dom It’s not us implying this is the case – it’s the data sent by RDG to UIC! Same with the names of UK TOC’s (”Service” is part of the name). I have fixed some of them to have the actual current company names, but I don’t have a complete list so I kinda fix case by case when I run into something that seems wrong. Next up South West Trains, I guess :)
@stefanlindbohm @bovine3dom In which case, “First Great Western Service” should also become “Great Western Railway.” Also with the green GWR logo added?

@partim @bovine3dom Fixed Great Western, South Western and Wightlink (the ferry in Portsmouth).

The hovercraft seems to not be integrated in rail ticketing and use ports slightly off from the stations, or..?

@stefanlindbohm @bovine3dom It actually is and it’s even cheaper to buy a rail ticket with at least one stop on the Island Line. They even throw in the bus from Portsmouth and Southsea station to Southsea Hoverport.

@partim @bovine3dom Hmmmmmmmmm, where did the timetable for the hovercraft go then? What are the station/port names I should look at?

The connection we’re looking at in the results is the Wightlink catamaran as far as I can tell(?).

@stefanlindbohm Southsea Hoverport SHV, Ryde Hoverport XRD

you seem to also be missing West Cowes WTW, East Cowes ECW, Yarmouth YMH (not to be confused with Great Yarmouth)

which given those ones are only on the Isle of Wight there are probably a few others missing too 🤔

@partim

@stefanlindbohm https://www.railfinder.eu/search?from=16289&to=25173&date=2026-03-09&p=A i wasn't really expecting to see the ferry here but i am a bit surprised that you're going for chronological departures, i thought you were only defaulting to that for short routes?

@partim

Harwich Town to Amsterdam, 2026-03-09

Railfinder

@bovine3dom ”Short” is currently defined as ”any journey is less than 9 hours”. Should that limit be shorter than that maybe?

If you’re thinking of the cross-channel ferries, connecting those ports is also on the todo list. Taking those a few routes at a time as well. (Tips on good foot passenger ferries welcome!)

@partim

@stefanlindbohm @bovine3dom @partim Nine does seem a bit long for that, maybe 4-6 hours?

@HaTetsu yeah i would probably say that at 4+ hours i am no longer really picking a most convenient time for me to leave, i am picking the best journey possible and working out the rest of the day around that

@stefanlindbohm @partim

@bovine3dom @HaTetsu @partim Thanks for this feedback! I’ll do some experimentation in this range, sounds reasonable.

I think the reason for the longer times was that I skewed my testing a bit too much to Sweden where travel times are longer vs amount of options. The ”Best” sorting would probably work fine there too, however.

@stefanlindbohm @bovine3dom The hovercraft goes from “Southsea Hoverport” (SHV) to “Ryde Hoverport” (XRD). The shuttle bus goes from “Portsmouth and Southsea.”

The regular ferry goes from Portsmouth Harbour.

@partim @bovine3dom Got it! Those are not reported to MERITS so we’d have to dig them up from the NAP source and merge it in that case. That’s going to be a future-me problem for now :)

@stefanlindbohm it's already in fahrtle 😎

```
{"source":"gb_great-britain.gtfs","trip_id":"VJ10d2eb16251fd58986cd0c100f571d1b44bcd2ea","stop_id":"9300RYH1","stop_lat":50.73262,"stop_lon":-1.1578635,...
```

Transitous are using a feed provided by an autism-friendly transport app under ODbL terms

@partim

@bovine3dom Showoff! :)

@partim

@stefanlindbohm you might seriously find fahrtle useful for scouting out ferry routes

i spent a stupid amount of time learning how to get transport data out of OSM and so now i have ferry data at useful zoom levels rather than only when you're zoomed in really close

it's all open source of course but learning how it works is probably less useful than the output

@partim

@bovine3dom Oooh nice thinking. I did find a specific ferry map that I used when making some ferry research last, but I’ll use fahrtle next time!

@partim

@bovine3dom Oh haha, look at that. There have been assumptions made in the past that resulted in those train icons going missing. UK rail is funny compared to the rest of Europe in that there are no train categories really, that’s what bit me here. I’ll fix for our next import! Thanks for finding!
@stefanlindbohm @bovine3dom You probably also want to drop the train numbers. They aren’t used in any public communication and I think not even internally really.

@partim Yep will do! What’s missing is a database migration to add a field so we can configure it, but that’s just not ended up at the top of my todo list yet :). Many other changes that just require me to fiddle around in our admin are easier when I need a bit of a light/dumb task in between the main development work.

@bovine3dom

@stefanlindbohm @partim I see the cross-border Koleje Dolnośląskie trains to Lichkov are still listed as Leo Express ;P
Of course, you're probably not focusing on Poland yet

@HaTetsu Hanggg onnnn, is that wrong? I haven’t done anything here – that’s how they get sent to us (we just add the Leo Express logo).

Are you saying they are not in fact operated by Leo Express or that it would be more appropriate to use some generic KD branding for them? (What would that branding be?)

@stefanlindbohm They are all operated by KD and Leo Express is mostly their partner for Czechia compliance, but the issue is slightly confounded by the fact that Leo does sell tickets for those trains all the way to Wrocław. But you wouldn't be able to tell by looking at the train or any passenger info on the Polish side (which is pretty much the whole route of the train)

@HaTetsu Ah, got it! So once we have KD branding in Poland, we should just apply it to those cross-borders trains reported as Leo Express also.

There’s lots of good info being provided for Poland actually. It’s not our strategic focus yet, but my fingers itch a bit to set everything up properly for journey planning at least :)

@stefanlindbohm KD train branding is pretty generic, though it depends on what source you're looking at. In PKP PLK timetables they use the generic Os (Osobowy) and OsP (Osobowy Przyspieszony) categories, the latter generally also carry some name starting with "KD Sprinter", which can probably be used as the brand in those cases. In their own timetables and GTFS, they use line numbers starting with D and assigned by route, but again, those aren't entered into PLK systems, so station announcements don't include them

@HaTetsu Ha, always these fun loops of data sharing. Are KD part of a regional rail system of sort, either common ticketing or common network maps?

For example, in Germany all regional rail is coordinated so we just use ”Regio” as the brand for everything because there are no clear boundaries.

In Switzerland we use the train category names the same for all operators but show the different logos.

Basically we’re looking for something that is recognisable by train livery and station signs IRL.

@stefanlindbohm In Poland, always use the train operator's brand - as I understand it, our law is kind of deficient when it comes to railway ticket integration and assumes the operator handles ticket issuance and passenger service, except in the case of 'municipal' railway operators, of which there is formally only one - SKM Warszawa. That one is fully integrated into Warsaw's urban network and uses their "WTP" ticketing and branding, although I don't think it's worth making an exception to the rule there. Elsewhere, there is no (and cannot be) fully integrated ticketing in the sense of the regional railway not issuing its own tickets at all, like you see in Germany or Sweden. The operator is always prominent, even where semi-integrated tariffs and (voivodeship-planned) networks do exist, especially if you're travelling on single tickets (such tariffs are handled by voivodeships contractually requiring operators to incorporate the tariff and any future changes into their own offer, where the voivodeship doesn't outright own the operator)

A branding quirk reflected in station announcements is that Polregio refers to its trains as REGIO, while voivodeship railways are best recognized under their own name, though for timetable purposes they use the generic "Osobowy" category. This is kind of like Sprinter vs Stoptrein in the Netherlands

@stefanlindbohm Most intermodal integration takes the form of railways agreeing to accept municipal time-based tickets on certain routes and timetables outside of Warsaw are rarely regular or complicated enough to make common route maps that show anything more than "well, the trains run this way" (and it was only last decade that we've largely dropped the habit of only making separate bus and tram maps, anyway)
@HaTetsu You’re a total rockstar. Thanks for all this info! I guess my next minigolfing will have to be Poland :)

@stefanlindbohm That reminds me, I haven't put up the English version of a little thing a made a couple months ago (alt text and detailed description in Polish at https://mastodon.com.pl/@HaTetsu/115860768353886923)

It's a map of Polish voivodeships by how regional rail line numbers are shown to passengers, which you can see is quite uneven

(It's modified from https://
commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:POL_location_map.svg byHiuppo, licensed CC-BY-SA 3.0)