Northern set to introduce British Sign Language announcements on train services

Train operator Northern is planning to introduce BSL announcements on its trains, following successful trials.

All Northern train services will introduce BSL announcements on board in 2025, after they were trialled on trains travelling between Leeds and York via Harrogate, and Manchester Victoria and Leeds via Rochdale, over this year.

BSL interpreters will appear on the on-board screens to announce upcoming stops.

The on-board screen announcements will use AI software to edit videos of BSL interpreters signing the name of each station. Northern, the second largest train operator in the UK, runs 2,500 services a day to over 500 stations across the North West, Yorkshire and parts of the Midlands.

Matt Rice, Northern's chief operating officer, said, "It’s fantastic to see these sign language announcements have been well received by our customers during the recent trial and we can now press ahead with rolling them out on all of our services."

Census data released in 2021 revealed that British Sign Language (BSL) was the primary language for 22,000 people in England and Wales and 25,000 across the entire UK.

Statistics from 2022 show that there are around 151,000 BSL users in total.

Northern is now exploring future plans to introduce BSL announcements to inform passengers of delays and cancellations.

This comes after the train operator reported an average of 140 train cancellations per day in 2023, more than 6 per cent of services planned. The operator apologised for the disruption, blaming its poor performance on staff sickness and low availability on Sundays.