"Graeme Wall" wrote in message
...

I know, I just remembered that useless bit of information so went along
with
the gag.

Ah - bloody useless, this typing business, isn't it - no inflection? Give
me the spoken word any time!

;-)

Ian

In message
"Ian F." wrote:

"Graeme Wall" wrote in message
...

I know, I just remembered that useless bit of information so went along
with
the gag.

Ah - bloody useless, this typing business, isn't it - no inflection? Give
me the spoken word any time!

;-)


grin
--
Graeme Wall
This address is not read, substitute trains for rail.
Transport Miscellany at http://www.greywall.demon.co.uk/rail/index.html

"Ian Jelf" wrote in message
...
In message , Chris Tolley
writes
Ian Jelf wrote:
In message , Ian F.

Of course, dropping the "road" changes things considerably. "Essex
Road" becomes "Essex", which is an entirely different kettle of fish


I know why visitors from the US do it; as pointed out elsewhere, they
do it at home. But it really annoys me because of the confusion it
causes. When in Rome.......

And you think that telling American visitors to London to behave as if
they are in Rome will lessen the confusion ... g

Do you know, as I wrote that I *wondered* if anyone would pick up on it
and perhaps I should have employed a different phrase! :-))

You know, there could be a nifty little game in here, sort of missing words
version of Mornington Crescent...Start at Tottenham, go to Oxford, then on
to Gloucester and so on..:-)
--
Cheers, Steve.
Change from jealous to sad to reply.

On Wed, 18 Jan 2006 18:58:06 -0000, Martin Underwood wrote in
, seen in
uk.railway:

What a mess our rail system has become: [...] Maybe I'm biassed because I can
remember a time when the railways were operated as a single entity with
joined-up thinking!

I'll tell you summat for nowt: it wasn't any time in the past 17
years.

BR didn't do joined up thinking, not in 1993, not in 1953.
It _was_ (IMO) better than the current joke, but don't make the
mistake of believing it was all that much better. The cracks just
weren't as obvious to outsiders.
--
Ross, in Lincoln, most likely being cynical or sarcastic, as ever.
Reply-to will bounce. Replace the junk-trap with my name to e-mail me.

Demonstration of poor photography at http://ross.photobook.org.uk
AD: http://www.merciacharters.co.uk for European charters gripped by me

On Thu, 19 Jan 2006 11:45:38 -0000, wrote in
, seen in uk.railway:

[...]
A typical sequence of events might go something like this:

1. A passenger arrives at HEX ticket office.

2. The passenger sees the sign saying travelcards aren't valid.

3. Despite having a travelcard, the passenger buys a HEX ticket anyway.

No, sorry, your argument fails there. The typical passenger arriving
at the HEx ticket office isn't going have a ticket - that's why
they're at the ticket office.

The rest of your argument now also fails.

[...]
--
Ross, in Lincoln, most likely being cynical or sarcastic, as ever.
Reply-to will bounce. Replace the junk-trap with my name to e-mail me.

Demonstration of poor photography at http://ross.photobook.org.uk
AD: http://www.merciacharters.co.uk for European charters gripped by me

Jack Taylor wrote:

wrote:
Graeme Wall wrote:

There isn't a TOC which runs the HEX service. HEX is operated by HEX
for the BAA.

So you're saying that HEX is a company that operates trains, but it's
not a train operating company...?

It is a train operating company (a company that runs additional trains on
the national network). It is not a Train Operating Company (a company that
has bought the franchise to operate a specified set of services within a
geographical area, according to DfT minimum service requirements), the
successors to the BR Train Operating Units.

TLAs don't have to be capitalized in their expanded form to be
abbreviated.

They don't even have to be separate words! TNT is trinitrotoluene,
unless you're referring to the company that started out as Thomas
Nationwide Transport before it went global...

--
Aidan Stanger
http://www.bettercrossrail.co.uk

Ian Jelf wrote:
, Ian writes
"d" wrote...

Of course, dropping the "road" changes things considerably. "Essex
Road" becomes "Essex", which is an entirely different kettle of fish
I know why visitors from the US do it; as pointed out elsewhere, they
do it at home. But it really annoys me because of the confusion it
causes. When in Rome.......

Meeting someone on the corner of Oxford and Tottenham becomes something of
a challenge! ;-)

But one that's worth persuing to see Spurs knocked out of the Cup!

Regular utl readers might remember my tale of some Americans I met some
years ago in Oxford who were looking for Selfridges. After a great
deal of discussion and confusion, I eventually ascertained that they
were staying in London, had been wandering around Hyde Park looking for
"Oxford" (ie Oxford Street) and some helpful passer-by had managed to
put them on the Oxford Tube coach which stops at Marble Arch. An hour
and a half later (but bizarrely not really seeming to think that
anything was amiss) they arrived at Gloucester Green Bus Station
and.......

Does anyone know which event happened first: Selfridges stopping selling
fridges, or Selfridges closing their Oxford store?

[Yes there really was a Selfridges in Oxford, back when Oxford beating
Spurs wasn't considered a major upset...]

--
Aidan Stanger
http://www.bettercrossrail.co.uk

Ross wrote:
On Thu, 19 Jan 2006 11:45:38 -0000, wrote in
, seen in uk.railway:

[...]
A typical sequence of events might go something like this:

1. A passenger arrives at HEX ticket office.

2. The passenger sees the sign saying travelcards aren't valid.

3. Despite having a travelcard, the passenger buys a HEX ticket anyway.

No, sorry, your argument fails there. The typical passenger arriving
at the HEx ticket office isn't going have a ticket - that's why
they're at the ticket office.

Even at Paddington?

I'd have thought a 'typical' passenger would arrive by rail (either
'mainline' or LU), and therefore be likely to have a travelcard.

I don't have any figures though, but even if it's not 'typical', I'm
sure many people would have been in this situation and may then have
seen signs saying 'travelcards not valid', and then bought full priced
tickets on top.

I used travel to Paddington on a Z1-6 travel card, which I used daily
to get from Angel to Barnehurst. When using Heathrow (often) I would
use this card to get to Paddington and then buy a HEX. I am sure I am
not unique in this sense.

When going to Heathrow and I am paying for tickets myself (i.e. not on
business) I take the tube to Heathrow, as I planned to last weekend. I
did spot that the Picadilly line was down on my way there, and that
Z1-6 travel cards were valid on the HEX. I was annoyed, since I went to
Paddington on my Oyster pre-pay (which I had intended to go to Heathrow
with) and then bought a Z1-6 paper ticket at Paddington, so I wasted a
single on my Oyster. I thought I should have been able to use my Oyster
on the HEX given the circumstances. I don't really care about the
technicalities why this may have not been possible - from a passenger
point of view I am railroaded into using Oyster and then later
penalised for using it.

Bob Wood wrote:

So if they arrived at Gloucester, how did they turn up in Oxford? I
don't seem to be following this very well.
:-)

Gloucester Green is the name of the main bus station in Oxford.

Neil