Anybody know why the North Kent line was chosen as the ON pilot,
rather than the Bexleyheath or Sidcup lines.

Seems perverse on the face of it that the areas which already benefit
from the Jubilee Line extension to North Greenwich get extra services.

"Gary Jenkins" wrote in message
om...



Anybody know why the North Kent line was chosen as the ON pilot,
rather than the Bexleyheath or Sidcup lines.

Seems perverse on the face of it that the areas which already benefit
from the Jubilee Line extension to North Greenwich get extra services.

Yes, I share your puzzlement.

I guess it could be down to Greenwich and Bexley councils lobbying for this
particular line (Greenwich obviously because of Greenwich and Woolwich
Arsenal, and Bexley would no doubt choose the North Kent to help promote the
relatively poor northern part of the borough). What was particularly
irritating though, was a removal of a Sidcup line service (the approx 19.19
Cannon Street to Crayford/Dartford) when the ON timetable revision was
announced! Outrageous - that was a 10 carriage train with plenty of
capacity and was very useful to catch at London Bridge when the 19.12 to
Dartford was delayed (which happens far too often).

In general, I don't think increasing frequency should be the priority for
the Dartford lines. I would far rather they concentrate on reliability AND
the station and train environments. Most of the Networkers are in a pretty
disgusting state and some of the stations look virtually abandoned. There
is so much more that needs to be done that doesn't depend on the rail
infrastrucure and it's very frustrating to see it not happening!

Nick

(Gary Jenkins) wrote in message . com...

Anybody know why the North Kent line was chosen as the ON pilot,
rather than the Bexleyheath or Sidcup lines.

Seems perverse on the face of it that the areas which already benefit
from the Jubilee Line extension to North Greenwich get extra services.

The Sidcup line is also an ON pilot route.

And I wouldn't dare try classing one tube station (North Greenwich)
with an inadequate bus network on poorly-planned new roads feeding out
of it as "extra services" until you've tried it...

Speaking from the Greenwich line, I'm finding the extra Cannon Street
services (until 8.30pm) very useful indeed. They should be running on
all three Dartford lines, until later if possible.

It's bizarre, though, that some stations now get a better service
off-peak than they do during the peaks.

Now, how about a decent service on Saturday nights and Sunday, eh?

Darryl