On Sat, 26 Jul 2008 04:46:23 +0100, "Jonathan" wrote:


wrote in message
...
On 19 Jul, 02:28, "Jonathan" wrote:
Public transport has always been awful; and over the past couple of years
I've noticed that more and more often I'm squashed inside a bus or train,
with hardly enough room to breathe, because the company decided to cancel
earlier buses or trains without notice, and without making any
alternative
arrangements.

If there was a decent tube system in south london some of the pressure
would be taken off the overground trains. But the amount of overground
lines has always been used as an excuse for not further extending the
tube south of the river rather than thinking the services could
complement each other. The its-difficult-to-tunnel excuse no longer
holds water in the 21st century so I guess the only obstacle now would
be money as it ever was - we have tight fisted victorians to thank for
the piddly mainline loading gauge meaning we can't have double deck
trains , and the frankly farcical loading gauge on the deep level tube
lines.

B2003


Lots of people I've spoken to about the petition have made lots of seemingly
excellent suggestions as to how public transport might be improved in the
long term.

So what? In almost every case good and improved public transport will
create a surge in demand on not only the new service but on parts of the
network that feed it. Has the Jubilee Line Extension really eased
congestion or has it opened up new corridors and journey possibilities
that didn't exist before? Will London Overground and the ELLX create
sublime travelling conditions for orbital journeys for decades or will
there be a huge surge in demand within 18-24 months of it opening? I'd
suggest it would be latter.

But this misses the point of the petition, which is that transport operating
companies seem to routinely pull trains, buses and tubes out of service,
without putting any sort of substitute in place. The net result being that
drivers of services after large gaps attempt to solve the problem of the
backlog of passengers by cramming as many people into vehicles as possible.

Sorry but things go wrong for a whole pile of legitimate reasons and
sometimes due to complete cock ups. This happens to Tesco and Homebase
just like it happens to bus and rail companies. The consequence in
retail is that you can't buy what you want, you can't pay using your
preferred method of payment or else the frozen chicken is a strange
shade of green and is climbing out of the freezer. Nonetheless there
isn't a contingency range of stock or a secondary debit card payment
system. You go somewhere else or pay by cash. Only in the chicken
example might you be offered some compensation and a replacement - due
to legal issues and the desire to maintain a good corporate image.

Bus and train companies just do not have loads of vehicles and drivers
just waiting to spring into action to fill gaps. Most of the time there
will be no issue at all and certainly not the "safety risk" you seem to
imagine is waiting to leap out from behind a hedge and to inflict death
and destruction on standing passengers.

Have you travelled in the Far East? I have and can tell you that
travelling conditions there are far more crushed than here. They have
extremely efficient and reliable trains and well run bus networks and
yet there is no demand for constraints and restrictions due to safety
concerns. It is recognised that travel at peak times will mean a crush
and places like Tokyo, Hong Kong and Singapore all have well planned,
medium - long term strategies to keep building new lines, extensions,
resignalling and to buy more rolling stock. I'm of the opinion that all
of their good work will still result in overcrowding because the extra
capacity facilitates easier access to work and leisure facilities and
thus people travel more. Good and improved public transport also
triggers further economic development which creates more reasons for
people to travel - it's a viscious cycle but a positive one overall.

Ultimately, changes to the system will have to be made, and someone will
have to spend some money upgrading the transport system we have at present.

Fine - I completely agree with that but first I'd like the country to
work out some objectives and priorities for what it wants its transport
network to do and an agreed, long term way of delivering those
objectives and priorities. Until we do this we'll keep getting our
repeated lurches from left to right in our transport policies which gets
us nowhere.

But even if money is spent, unless transport operating companies stop
pulling vehicles out of service without notice and without providing a
substitute service, then passengers will continue to be frequently
jam-packed into carriages to a point where they almost cannot breathe, and
cannot exit without extreme difficulty.

Sorry but it's been like this for decades and will continue to be so. As
others have mentioned, the Central Line in the peak is as badly crowded
now as it was back in the 80s when I first used it and I dare say back
several decades before then when it had a bigger catchment area as other
tube and rail lines weren't in use.

You are demanding a panacea that is undeliverable. The alternative is a
fully reserved tube, bus and train service which is a palpable nonsense
because it is unmanageable in the context of almost all railway services
(TGV and Eurostar being particular exceptions). It would also be hugely
unpopular with the public because some people prefer to stand and it
would make journey times longer, the service less attractive and also
make the cost of any new line or extension unsustainable. The final
result would be to worsen safety because people would transfer to the
roads and use cars which are less safe than public transport.

This is the point of the petition.

I believe that that sort of gross-overcrowding situation is dangerous, and
will result in people being badly hurt or possibly even killed at some point
in the future.

You clearly do not understand what the safety regulations say in respect
of the (bus and rail) transport industry. There is no requirement to
provide seats for everyone - in fact just the opposite is allowed. There
is a test of reasonable practicality in terms of safety improvement and
that invokes whether it is value for money to spend the money. I have
to say that your perception of danger is out of kilter with that of many
other people and to try to use such an incorrect perception as the basis
of arguing for transport improvement is unlikely to secure any
improvement whatsoever. There are loads of other very good arguments
for improving public transport - I suggest you employ those instead.
--
Paul C


Admits to working for London Underground!