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Stephen Furley · July 19th 09, 11:34 AM posted to uk.railway,uk.transport.london

On 18/7/09 21:19, in article
, "Andy"
wrote:

On Jul 18, 8:58*pm, "Richard J." wrote:
Andy wrote on 18 July 2009 13:22:54 *...

On Jul 18, 12:58 pm, "Tim Fenton" wrote:
"Mizter T" wrote in message

...

Aren't they supposed to check at the end of the line or only when the
train is shunting do they check for people still on board?
The carriages only have to be checked when the train is about to do a
move which isn't "passenger certified" (or whatever the exact phrase is).
Isn't the loop at Kennington an instance, apart from the others you
mentioned, where the staff clear everyone out of the train first?
Not any more, the checks stopped a few months back, presumably because
a normal passenger wouldn't notice anything unusual until they arrive
at Kennington for the second time!!

They might notice that the train was running slowly (max 15 mph IIRC)
round a very sharply curved track, and might fear that they were being
dumped in a siding. *That's very similar to the circumstances at
Liverpool Street some time ago where I understand that a passenger
panicked, opened the inter-car door, and fell to his death. *I thought
it was that incident which led to detrainment procedures being tightened
up, so I'm very surprised if they've been relaxed again.
--

Going slowly around tightly curved track is not unique to the
Kennington loop though, for example Bank to Liverpool Street on the
Central line is slow and tightly curved as well. With respect, the
Kennington situation is quite different from the Liverpool Street
accident which happened on a train in dead end sidings. Trains are
still checked in these situations, just not at Kennington where I
believe the time taken was impacting too much on the service. Trains
would fairly regularly backup as far as Waterloo or Charing Cross when
there was a delay in the detraining. I'm sure a risk assessment was
undertaken and the slight increase in risk thought to be reasonable in
the circumstances.

I've been told, though I haven't been there since to try it, that not only
are the trains not checked, but riding round the City Hall loop in the 6
train on the New York Subway by passengers; a situation not unlike
Kennington, but with the addition of the long disused, but still largely
intact station on he loop, which is why I want to do it.