Rail companies are ditching phrases such as ‘this train terminates here’ to make ‘language easy to understand’ for all.
The term will instead sound more like ‘this train ends its journey here’ – as part of a year-long drive by Britain’s railway companies to simplify how they talk to passengers.
On-board announcements across three rail companies are being altered as bosses think the word ‘terminate’ is too ‘jargony’.
Language companies have reportedly praised the move, saying it would make travelling easier for foreign passengers.
The word ‘terminates’ is expected to be phased out gradually over the next few years as the new wording is installed on public address systems as standard.
Rail companies are ditching phrases such as ‘this train terminates here’ to make ‘language easy to understand’ for all (File image)
Language companies have reportedly praised the move, saying it would make travelling easier for foreign passengers (File image)
A Great Western Railway (GWR) spokesperson said: ‘We give our teams a fair bit of leeway in how they make announcements clear and engaging for customers.
‘Every now and then we tweak our guidance to colleagues, and terminating ‘terminates’ seems like a sensible move to make way for something less jargony and needlessly bureaucratic.’
A spokesman for the Rail Delivery Group (RDG) said: ‘We are always looking at how we can improve communication to customers and part of that is about making the language easy to understand for everyone.
‘Some onboard announcements have been updated by train operators following an in-depth review of customer feedback.
‘This is part of the Smarter Information, Smarter Journeys programme to improve customer information.’
Tony Maher, of the Plain English campaign, said getting rid of the word ‘terminates’ from train announcements could make it easier for passengers who have English as their second language, according to The Telegraph.
