I only visit London occasionally, but seems to me from the odd glimpse of
the Underground I get every couple of months that it's going downhill fast.
Am I just seeing the bad bits, or is this generally true? Took a Circle
train a couple of weeks ago and it was a complete pig-sty - covered in
graffiti, knee-deep in fast food wrappers (not to mention the actual fast
food) etc., and this was at 12.30pm.

I'm deeply cynical about the whole privatisation thing, so this obviously
colours my views. It no doubt looks like a wonderful idea on paper to the
Treasury economists with their theoretical models of how the world works.
Doesn't work in practice because people are greedy, inefficient and
generally behave in ways that no model can, er, model. (Just like that
other brilliant piece of economist's thinking: Marxism). I'd be fascinated
to know, for example, how many people are now involved in running the tube,
including all the private sector companies, lawyers, accountants, public
relations types etc.. I'd be prepared to bet that the number of those on 6
figure 'packages' (including directors, non-execs (pro-rated), etc etc.) has
gone through the roof compared with the previous arrangements.

Summary: it wasn't broke before, it was lunacy to try to 'fix' it like this.
Quote: for every economist, there's an equal and opposite economist.

Phew, glad I got that off my chest.

Pip pip


Andrew

On Wed, 3 Dec 2003 15:30:48 -0000, "nzuri" wrote:

I only visit London occasionally, but seems to me from the odd glimpse of
the Underground I get every couple of months that it's going downhill fast.
Am I just seeing the bad bits, or is this generally true? Took a Circle
train a couple of weeks ago and it was a complete pig-sty - covered in
graffiti, knee-deep in fast food wrappers (not to mention the actual fast
food) etc., and this was at 12.30pm.

I'm not sure about the privatisation thing myself, but it's the pax
who create the rubbish - not LU. If they weren't so f##king lazy
they'd hang on to it until they found a bin - irrespective of how long
that took :-(



--

ø¤º°`°º¤ø,,,,ø¤º°`°º¤ø,,,,ø¤º°`°º¤ø,,,,ø¤º°`°º¤ø
Please reply to the group
Replies to this address will bounce!
ø¤º°`°º¤ø,,,,ø¤º°`°º¤ø,,,,ø¤º°`°º¤ø,,,,ø¤º°`°º¤ø

"nzuri" wrote in message

I only visit London occasionally, but seems to me from the odd
glimpse of the Underground I get every couple of months that it's
going downhill fast. Am I just seeing the bad bits, or is this
generally true? Took a Circle train a couple of weeks ago and it was
a complete pig-sty - covered in graffiti, knee-deep in fast food
wrappers (not to mention the actual fast food) etc., and this was at
12.30pm.

I'm deeply cynical about the whole privatisation thing, so this
obviously colours my views. It no doubt looks like a wonderful idea
on paper to the Treasury economists with their theoretical models of
how the world works. Doesn't work in practice because people are
greedy, inefficient and generally behave in ways that no model can,
er, model. (Just like that other brilliant piece of economist's
thinking: Marxism). I'd be fascinated to know, for example, how many
people are now involved in running the tube, including all the
private sector companies, lawyers, accountants, public relations
types etc.. I'd be prepared to bet that the number of those on 6
figure 'packages' (including directors, non-execs (pro-rated), etc
etc.) has gone through the roof compared with the previous
arrangements.

Summary: it wasn't broke before, it was lunacy to try to 'fix' it
like this. Quote: for every economist, there's an equal and opposite
economist.

It's too early to say how it will work out long-term, but as an occasional
user, it seems to me that the Tube has become slightly less reliable
day-to-day since the PFI scheme came in. However, as it had been running in
shadow form for some time before then, the current poor performance is
probably the result of problems that pre-date the actual switchover.

Overall, I think it's almost inevitable that fracturing the organisation in
this way will increase costs, just as it did with BR (if only to pay for the
extra legal agreements that manage the inter-company interfaces). It
certainly isn't likely to help safety, though I suspect the two recent
derailments are almost certainly due to standards that have been falling for
some time and not as a result of PFI.

But, of course, every cloud has a silver lining -- the previously
loss-making WS Atkins is now doing rather well, thanks to the PFI deal:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/s...098527,00.html
Good news for Atkins shareholders, bad news for Londoners and British
taxpayers, I guess. I wonder, are Atkins Labour party donors?

Was it "broken" before and did it need fixing? Probably yes, because the
Tube had been suffering from low investment and bad management for a long,
long time.

But was this the right solution? I don't think so, and I imagine that most
people outside the Treasury and the PFI contractors doubt it as well.

Nigel Pendse wrote:

I agree with most of what you say, but not this bit ...

I suspect the two recent derailments are almost certainly due
to standards that have been falling for some time and not as a
result of PFI.

True for Hammersmith, but there is no evidence that the Camden Town
derailment was due to falling standards. At present the cause looks like a
system design weakness not previously understood (where system = track +
train).
--
Richard J.
(to e-mail me, swap uk and yon in address)

I'm not sure about the privatisation thing myself, but it's the pax
who create the rubbish - not LU. If they weren't so f##king lazy
they'd hang on to it until they found a bin - irrespective of how long
that took :-(

Once boarded a "First train" early in the morn and went just two stops and
noticed where the only other person had sat was a fresh Banana skin after he
alighted - left for the cleaners and other passengers. and that was about
5.30AM.
Most people see the tube trains as a dumping ground as well as a moving
restaurant (19 hrs a day)

If only we did like Singapore for ex - NO litter Eating or Drinking - apart
from YOBS doing grafitti - the Burgerless carriage may encourage people to
look after it more?

only meee wrote:
I'm not sure about the privatisation thing myself, but it's
the pax
who create the rubbish - not LU. If they weren't so f##king
lazy
they'd hang on to it until they found a bin - irrespective
of how long
that took :-(

Once boarded a "First train" early in the morn and went
just two stops and noticed where the only other person had
sat was a fresh Banana skin after he alighted - left for
the cleaners and other passengers. and that was about
5.30AM.
Most people see the tube trains as a dumping ground as
well as a moving restaurant (19 hrs a day)

If only we did like Singapore for ex - NO litter Eating or
Drinking - apart from YOBS doing grafitti - the Burgerless
carriage may encourage people to look after it more?

Going back some years there were two letters in the Standard on this subject
either on the same day or within a few days. The first was from someone who
passed through Victoria LU station having arrived on the first train and
said "It shone like a new pin". They returned late in the evening from
somehwere out in the country and the same station looked like a pigsty. They
came to the relaisation that "It is the passengers who make the Underground
dirty".

The second letter was from a Dover - Calais ferry passenger. They used the
toilets upon boarding and said they were immaculate. The person then used
the same toilets just before disembarking and found them in a disgusting
state. The comment was, "Come on BR you can do better". (The ferry operator
was then Sealink of which BR was a part. I did say it was some years ago.)

Thanks all - interesting comments. I suspect cognitive dissonance (see
http://www.dmu.ac.uk/~jamesa/learning/dissonance.htm) has a big part to play
in the implementation of policies like the LUL PFI (and, for that, matter,
the decision to back the Bush invasion of Iraq). Once the powers that be
decided to adopt the policy, they screened out all the evidence that it
would probably be a bad decision in the long term, otherwise there's too
much 'dissonance'. The likes the SRA still maintain that rail privatisation
was a 'good thing'. I doubt, however, that anyone will ever get any kind of
fix on the overall real costs: indeed, the aforementioned cognitive
dissonance would virtually prevent them from doing so.

And no, I'm not connected with the industry in any way at all (apart from
being an occasional user) - just an interested observer.

Onwards and upwards!

Andrew

In article , only meee wrote:

Once boarded a "First train" early in the morn and went just two stops and
noticed where the only other person had sat was a fresh Banana skin after he
alighted - left for the cleaners and other passengers. and that was about
5.30AM.
Most people see the tube trains as a dumping ground as well as a moving
restaurant (19 hrs a day)

Is there anything stopping LU from putting a few bins in the carriages?
At least then people would have somewhere other than the floor/seats to
put their rubbish...

Niklas
--
"The 2 minute silence will begin when the fire alarm is activated in all
buildings." -- Internal e-mail at my place of employment.

Niklas Karlsson wrote:
In article , only meee wrote:

Once boarded a "First train" early in the morn and went just two
stops and noticed where the only other person had sat was a fresh
Banana skin after he alighted - left for the cleaners and other
passengers. and that was about
5.30AM.
Most people see the tube trains as a dumping ground as well as a
moving restaurant (19 hrs a day)

Is there anything stopping LU from putting a few bins in the
carriages? At least then people would have somewhere other than
the floor/seats to put their rubbish...

But you'd need a bin by every set of doors to be effective. I'd rather
have the standing room.
--
Richard J.
(to e-mail me, swap uk and yon in address)

(Niklas Karlsson) wrote the following in:


In article , only meee
wrote:

Once boarded a "First train" early in the morn and went just two
stops and noticed where the only other person had sat was a fresh
Banana skin after he alighted - left for the cleaners and other
passengers. and that was about 5.30AM.
Most people see the tube trains as a dumping ground as well as a
moving restaurant (19 hrs a day)

Is there anything stopping LU from putting a few bins in the
carriages?

Yes. Terrorism.

--
message by Robin May, but you can call me Mr Smith.
Enjoy the Routemaster while you still can.

Another high quality lesson from Robin May:
Your and you're are different words!