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From The BBC (https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-66606587)


Are there any station names that need re-recording in the South West?

Worcestershire Parkway.

The recorded announcements on the Cotswold Line are such that everything is announced clearly, in a female voice, but Parkway is whispered in a male voice. I have been told that the DfT won't authorise the expenditure to re-record this. Surely that can't be true - this is an organisation that is spending £100 billion on HS2.

Apparently a female voice is coming very shortly, in fact some sets may already have had the update installed.

"Take care of the pennies and let the pounds run away with themselves" - surely not

Hooray!

Glad Euxton got rerecorded. Made to sound as Euston would be pronounced, and every local at Preston station groaned and winced. It's Ecks-t'n ! (where ' is a neutral 'e').

What linguists call 'schwa'. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schwa) 'Neutral e' is a more accessible description.  :)

So what's the difference between Exton and Euxton?

Nowt in't pronunciation!

Montpelier - which locals generally pronounce "Mon' pelly urr", with a glottal stop after the n - is pronounced various ways in recorded announcements. Station PA systems seem to pronounce it something like "Mong Peal-yur", whilst on-train it comes out something closer to "Mont Pelyah". On Bristol buses, when the system is working, upcoming stops are generally pronounced correctly in an entirely appropriate Bristol accent.

The female voice has arrived on the unit I'm on at the moment (800 321?) - but it's as quiet as the male voice that it has replaced.

On a related note, the English announcements on TfW trains always end with "Thank you". It rarely fits the rest of the announcement, eg something like "This is the train to Holyhead. Thank you." and ends up sounding ridiculous. I'm guessing it's a Welsh idiomatic turn of phrase unnecessarily translated directly into English. Can anyone confirm or have a better explanation?

...and following the Bannau Brycheiniog standardisation of the name for what many referred to as the Brecon Beacons, someone really should grasp the nettle and start the move towards a single name for all Welsh places, starting with those which are almost the same anyway such as Trefor/Trevor or Cricieth/Criccieth. It would simplify announcements and signs no end.  What was by many called Portmadoc has been universally known as Porthmadog for around 50 years with no apparent problems but the process seemed to stop there.

I thought that "Thank You" was Welsh for "Railway Station".    Thus "we are now arriving at Barry Island"  is "we are now arriving at Barry Island Railway Station".    Found it a bit irritating - who is being thanked for what? 

Is it just an ancient rumour that Woolhampton's station was called Midgham so that it was not confused with Wolverhampton. Seem to remember from my youth Wolverhampton being pronounced W'ampton.

I've just travelled from Westbury to Bruton and was shocked to hear the automated pronunciation of BruTon as "Bru'un" (a clear use of the gutteral 't').

The TMS update done on a handful of units a few months ago has been deemed a success, so the rest of the fleet will receive the update over the coming weeks.  There were a lot of other changes as well, though this is the element that will be most noticeable to passengers.

The one in Cornwall that irritates me most is Redruth. It's not "red ruth" but "reDRUTH", Similarly Liskeard should be LisCARD, not "LIScard, and Penzance should be "penZANS". One of the joys of rail travel used to be hearing the guard's accent change as you went along but now the endless stream of repeated recorded announcements ( à la "see it, say it, sorted") are pure noise pollution.

I uset to really like to hear Reg Brimmel at Evesham calling out as the train drew into the platform (with no PA) "Eve ee shum" which is the correct local pronunciation.  The posh, repetitive voice on the IET tannoy is just dull.  I'm sure most passengers' minds just screen all this out, and the repeated messages get no attention

I remember stopping at "Herriefaud".

OTC

As a student changing trains at Ipswich in the 1970s, I remember being temporarily bamboozled by someone with a broad Suffolk accent asking me "is that the low staffed train?"