Source recovery

Manual fallback routes for fragile Brighton sources.

Recovery routes for core Brighton sources that may block simple fetches, time out, or return utility navigation instead of publishable items.

This playbook is for operator recovery only. It does not bypass source terms, publish claims, send subscriber email or contact public bodies.

Source qualityQA JSONSource registryCivic records

Latest recovery queue

From raw-2026-06-17.json: 4 core failures and 5 navigation-heavy source outputs.

core failure - Government and records

Brighton & Hove consultations

Status: fetch failed

Checked: 2026-06-17T05:22:00.949Z

Manual verification required before related claims enter a send candidate.

core failure - Safety

Sussex Police news

Status: 403

Checked: 2026-06-17T05:22:17.561Z

Manual verification required before related claims enter a send candidate.

high failure - Health

NHS Sussex news

Status: 503

Checked: 2026-06-17T05:22:21.715Z

Manual verification required before related claims enter a send candidate.

Weak candidates - Government and records

Brighton & Hove City Council

7 of 12 candidates look like navigation, utility or directory links.

Samples: Go to the home page; Benefits and financial advice; Births, deaths, marriages, civil partnership and citizenship; Business and Trade

Weak candidates - Travel

Brighton & Hove roads and highways

7 of 12 candidates look like navigation, utility or directory links.

Samples: Go to the home page; Benefits and financial advice; Births, deaths, marriages, civil partnership and citizenship; Business and Trade

Weak candidates - Government and records

Brighton & Hove licensing

7 of 12 candidates look like navigation, utility or directory links.

Samples: Go to the home page; Benefits and financial advice; Births, deaths, marriages, civil partnership and citizenship; Business and Trade

Weak candidates - Education and research

Brighton & Hove school term and holiday dates

7 of 12 candidates look like navigation, utility or directory links.

Samples: Go to the home page; Benefits and financial advice; Births, deaths, marriages, civil partnership and citizenship; Business and Trade

Weak candidates - Daily services

Brighton & Hove rubbish, recycling and streets

7 of 12 candidates look like navigation, utility or directory links.

Samples: Go to the home page; Benefits and financial advice; Births, deaths, marriages, civil partnership and citizenship; Business and Trade

Failure signals

These conditions require manual verification before any item is promoted into a live issue.

Failure signal

403 or bot block

The source is still usable for manual editorial checks, but the automated fetch should not be treated as authoritative.

Operator move: Open the source in a browser, record the source URL used, and keep the issue item as manual-verified until a stable feed or approved adapter exists.

Failure signal

Fetch failed or timeout

The source may be down, blocking server-side requests, or slow from the runner network.

Operator move: Retry once later, then use the manual fallback route and mark the source report with checkedAt, status and fallback notes.

Failure signal

Navigation-heavy candidates

The page returned valid HTML but mostly menus, privacy links or service directories.

Operator move: Use the source for official discovery only; do not promote a candidate unless the title is date-specific, record-specific or service-specific.

Recovery routes

Use these fallback routes for blocked, failed or navigation-heavy core sources. Local media can help discovery, but original records still carry the claim.

Route 1 - brighton-buses-service-updates

Brighton & Hove Buses service updates

Observed issue: HTTP 403 in raw-2026-06-15 automated fetch

Publish rule: Use only route numbers, dates and disruption text visible on the operator-opened source page at edit time.

Fallback searches: site:buses.co.uk/service-updates Brighton Hove Buses disruption; Brighton Hove Buses service updates today; Brighton Hove Buses X service disruption

Adapter idea: Add a browser-rendered fetch or approved public feed if the bus site exposes one; keep server-side fetch failures non-fatal while manual verification is logged.

Route 2 - brighton-hove-consultations

Brighton & Hove consultations

Observed issue: fetch failed in raw-2026-06-15 automated fetch

Publish rule: Quote consultation title, closing date and public-body route only after checking the current consultation page.

Fallback searches: site:consultations.brighton-hove.gov.uk Brighton consultation; Brighton Hove council consultations open; Brighton Hove consultation closes

Adapter idea: Probe the consultation platform for RSS, JSON or sitemap routes before writing a scraper.

Route 3 - brighton-hove-council

Brighton & Hove City Council

Observed issue: Returns valid HTML, but raw candidate extraction includes navigation links

Publish rule: Use date-specific council news pages or service pages; exclude directory navigation and broad service-category links from issue lead slots.

Fallback searches: site:brighton-hove.gov.uk/news Brighton Hove council news; Brighton Hove council news today; Brighton Hove council press release

Adapter idea: Prefer an RSS/sitemap/news-list adapter over generic anchor extraction for council pages.

Route 4 - brighton-hove-democracy

Brighton & Hove council meetings and decisions

Observed issue: Returns committee portal navigation and legacy council links before agenda records

Publish rule: Use committee name, meeting date, agenda/minute title and direct democracy URL; never infer a decision from an agenda without minutes or decision records.

Fallback searches: site:democracy.brighton-hove.gov.uk Brighton Hove agenda; Brighton Hove council committee agenda; Brighton Hove delegated decision

Adapter idea: Build an adapter against the democracy platform's meeting calendar pages instead of the cover page.

Route 5 - planning

Planning, licensing and public record portals

Observed issue: Public portals can block, redirect or require form-driven search

Publish rule: Use application reference, address, status and direct portal link only after manual record check.

Fallback searches: Brighton Hove planning application weekly list; Brighton Hove licensing applications; site:planningapps.brighton-hove.gov.uk Brighton Hove planning

Adapter idea: Store application references and weekly-list URLs; avoid fragile HTML scraping of search results until stable routes are confirmed.

Route 6 - nhs-sussex-news

NHS Sussex news

Observed issue: HTTP 503 on 2026-06-15 probe from the runner

Publish rule: Use only current NHS Sussex pages or linked NHS service pages for health-service wording; do not rewrite local-media health claims without original NHS confirmation.

Fallback searches: site:sussex.ics.nhs.uk/news Brighton NHS Sussex; NHS Sussex news Brighton Hove; NHS Sussex pharmacy GP Brighton

Adapter idea: Keep as manual-check unless the site exposes an RSS, sitemap or press-feed route that returns stable public pages from the runner.

Route 7 - south-downs-planning

South Downs National Park planning register

Observed issue: Form-driven planning portal; currently reachable but needs record-level manual checks

Publish rule: Use application reference, address, status and direct register URL only after opening the current record.

Fallback searches: site:planningpublicaccess.southdowns.gov.uk Brighton South Downs planning; South Downs National Park planning Patcham; South Downs planning Woodingdean Ovingdean

Adapter idea: Track weekly-list or advanced-search URLs before attempting automated extraction from the portal.

Operator checklist

Run this after source fetches and before live issue approval.

Boundary

No scraping workaround, subscriber send, public post or civic claim goes live from this page. It is a recovery guide for human-verified source checks.