Colin Rosenstiel wrote:
Cambridge, allegedly. No sign of a planning application. Note that
neither of these stations is run by FCC.

I thought it might have been Hitchin. If they're going in at Cambridge,
One must be installing them?

Hatfield is in the process of getting new ticket machines (foundation
work started this week) and hopefully they'll speed up the installation
of the new fence/wall work to stop people climbing over. An RPI chased
two kids that scaled the wall this morning, but didn't get them.
Surprised she didn't demand the driver hold the train (as done at St
Albans when someone jumped the gate, with the eventual result that a
request went out on the train for police assistance) but at 0818,
delayed trains DO count!!

Jonathan

Matthew wrote:


In London. Presuambly the names of other cards will also be used in
their own areas (Yorcard in south Yorkshire, etc). While the
compatibility issues does seem to get portrayed as evil TOCs conspiring
against cuddly Oysters out of pure malice, the desire of DfT and the
TOCs to have a national set of open standards rather than lots of
individual incompatible proprietary systems does strike me a good idea.
An awful lot of UK transport technology and planning seems to be a case
of "I wouldn't start from here", and getting a standardised system might
avoid another set of problems in the future.



Oystercards are now included in the ITSO spec, at page 88 of
http://itso.org.uk/content/Specifica..._1_2006-10.pdf

According to today's London Lite, Chiltern are to accept PAYG from June
at the rest of its Greater London stations (Northolt Park to Wembley
Stadium) .

They are also to retail cards outside London.

"We are also happy to announce that we are working very hard with
Transport for London on being the first train company to sell Oyster
Smartcards outside London. We will be launching this to our passengers
in 2007"

C2C are also reported to be enabling PAYG acceptance at Dagenham Dock
and Rainham.

Interest stuff Matthew, thanks for that!

I can't quite decipher from the ITSO specification exactly how Oyster
and the ITSO smartcard standard will work together, but it appears that
a combination smartcard that utilises both Oyster and the ITSO standard
will be possible, which is logical enough.

There's a myriad of implementation issues with regards to how Oyster
would work with a national ITSO standard travel smartcard, but given
that any such national smartcard is a long way off that's not something
to worry about too much. What is important is ensuring that future
Oyster equipment (Oyster scanners on gates and in ticket offices etc)
will be able to handle ITSO-standard smartcards as well - and it
appears that this will indeed be the case.

Also very interesting stuff regarding Chiltern. The bit about them
accepting Oyster PAYG for journeys within Greater London - i.e. within
the zones - is just an (overdue) logical development. It's a pretty
stupid situation from the passengers point of view where Oyster PAYG
can't be used at some intermediate stations.

The situation on the DC lines (Euston - Watford) at Kilburn High Street
and South Hampstead will be resolved when TfL take over from Silverlink
in November, which just leaves the 'one' lines from Liverpool Street up
to / Seven Sisters/ Tottenham Hale/ Walthamstow Central to be sorted
out. C2C accepting Oyster PAYG at Rainham and Degenham Dock is just a
logical development in that they are of course the only two stations
C2C has in the zones that don't currently accept PAYG.

However the stuff about Chiltern offering Oyster smartcards outside of
London is very interesting - so much so that I'm going to start a new
thread about it!

Jonathan Morris wrote:

Paul Corfield wrote:
I post here for *fun* - this isn't my job or even an extension of it. I
hope I add something to the group by commenting or sharing information.
If people are going to expect more from me than I can ever hope to
deliver - and it's happened once before - I'll simply have to go. (Don't
all cheer at once!).

Time to go on the defensive here...!

I am not holding you responsible WHATSOEVER, but when you stuck up for
them and other people criticised them, I felt it was okay to ask what
you thought about them. It doesn't matter either way, and it doesn't
bother me /that/ much.

Yes, I am concerned that people can avoid paying their fare as a
result. Part of this is because in the space of a week I had two people
double up on me, but I don't lose that much sleep over it. I'm not
about to pin them down to the ground and place them under citizens
arrest! Maybe I should (!) and the possible upside would be that you
wouldn't be reading this now; I'd be in hospital, or worse.

You got me wrong the last time too. I have an opinion, just like you
do, and it seems to be shared by passengers and officials alike. You
did say you were involved in their roll out so please excuse me if I
didn't see elsewhere that it was a long time ago. I am not fully up to
speed on when these gates first appeared anywhere, although I know
Kings Cross was obviously not the first.

While I'm sure it would be lovely to imagine that I'm personally
accountable for everything that happens on LU I'm afraid I'm not. I
can't take ownership of every issue or go round quoting one post from a
newsgroup as some grounds for doing something.

I have a great deal of respect for you, and your postings. I would have
to say that the gates are about the only thing I have a beef about, so
it's not all bad is it?

You obviously have an enormous "bee in your bonnet" about these gates
and you should therefore raise your concerns through the correct
channels if you have not already done so.

See my comment above. I have written on more than one occasion about
them, but I write a lot (such is life for a journalist) and that
doesn't mean it's a crusade or a personal attack on you.

FCC are already noticing the
problem with the new gates on the GN branch, where people are managing
to get through pretty easily.

I assume you have also complained to FCC.

I don't really need to complain. I have contacts that I can and do
speak to about such matters. I also deal with the PR for TfL and have
met them before (albeit about things like the journey planner service
and other online/mobile services and not so much the actual train
service), but it isn't a big enough deal to start complaining about the
gates. Should I meet anyone from TfL about something else, I may well
slip it in to conversation - we shall see.

I picked on you because you claimed to have some involvement and seem
to know just about everything you need to know about the tube. As I was
mistaken about all the facts, I can simply go away and whinge like
everyone else in private. Doesn't change the fact that the gates are
too slow though.

I have not been involved in Prestige or ticket gates for 8 years. The KX
gates are a further development of the Mk1 electric "slim" gate - I was
involved with that development and while not perfect [1] I think it has
done very well given it was used to extend LU gating and has been used
extensively on the TOCs. The fact I can talk about the gates is a sign
of my elephantine memory rather than knowledge of recent developments.

Fair enough.

Jonathan

I've no desire to start a spat, that's neither my style nor how things
are done here on utl.

However I would just say that it's possible you've slightly misjudged
the tone of utl - we don't do "picking" on people. I'd add that your
mild invective seems to have been fired by a misunderstanding of the
situation (I'm going to avoid the rather obvious ribbing one could make
about facts and journalists). Paul has not AFAICS specifically stuck up
for the KX gates whatsoever - as he says himself, he was involved in
the development of their predecessor, the Mk1 slim gate. If you search
the archives you'll see that these new KX gates have not got a good
write up (I've no idea if the gates FCC has used on the GN are the
conventional Mk1 or the newer model as used at KX).

I'm quite sure that if someone in LU came up to Paul and said "hey, our
new gates are the bees knees aren't they" he would demur, but I suspect
that the issue is well known about in LU so no-one would have the
temerity to say such a thing!

Anyway, the man posts here in his spare time, in an unofficial capacity
yet has the honesty to both post in his own name (something I've
totally failed to do) and not only acknoledge that he works for LU but
discuss some of the past projects he's been involved in. He has readily
spoken of some of the compromises that had to be made when it came to
gating the whole LU network, of the total reluctance of the TOCs to
even believe that the Oyster system was ever going to happen let alone
get involved in it, of the good and bad aspects of LU's working culture
and many other things. And I'm not suggesting that Paul is a wilting
violet, far from it, but why on earth would anyone wish to finish the
day at work and then sit down to read a load of people giving him a
hard time - especially for something he wasn't involved in. I don't
think I'd stick around.

OK, thankfully my spiel is over! I eagerly await accusations of my
outright brass neckery, considering my relative usenet newbie status
compared to your pedigree ;-)

By the by, I did once have someone try to sneek ahead of me through
ticket gates. They didn't succeed and ended up on the floor, much to
the amusement of the LU staff (and, dare I say, much to my
satisfaction!).

Mizter T wrote:
Paul has not AFAICS specifically stuck up
for the KX gates whatsoever - as he says himself, he was involved in
the development of their predecessor, the Mk1 slim gate. If you search
the archives you'll see that these new KX gates have not got a good
write up (I've no idea if the gates FCC has used on the GN are the
conventional Mk1 or the newer model as used at KX).

I think if you search the archives you'll see that I talked about it
before with Paul C, hence the 'not again' comment. I was led to believe
that Paul had been more involved than he was, but as I wasn't talking
in a professional journalist capacity (I am not working 24/7), perhaps
I didn't try and establish the real facts as hard as I should! Slap my
wrists by all means!

However, I am not having a go at Paul about the gates. I am not sure
why anyone should take a comment so personally - I didn't think he
designed or built them, nor installed them. I have used newsgroups
since the early 1990s and it's all about discussing things and sharing
opinions. People do, as a matter of course, disagree - but it's never
personal.

Jonathan

Jonathan Morris wrote:

Mizter T wrote:
Paul has not AFAICS specifically stuck up
for the KX gates whatsoever - as he says himself, he was involved in
the development of their predecessor, the Mk1 slim gate. If you search
the archives you'll see that these new KX gates have not got a good
write up (I've no idea if the gates FCC has used on the GN are the
conventional Mk1 or the newer model as used at KX).

I think if you search the archives you'll see that I talked about it
before with Paul C, hence the 'not again' comment. I was led to believe
that Paul had been more involved than he was, but as I wasn't talking
in a professional journalist capacity (I am not working 24/7), perhaps
I didn't try and establish the real facts as hard as I should! Slap my
wrists by all means!

However, I am not having a go at Paul about the gates. I am not sure
why anyone should take a comment so personally - I didn't think he
designed or built them, nor installed them. I have used newsgroups
since the early 1990s and it's all about discussing things and sharing
opinions. People do, as a matter of course, disagree - but it's never
personal.

Jonathan

I certainly didn't intend to suggest you were posting in your capacity
as a journalist! I didn't realise, as there were no clues in the
thread, that you and Paul had discussed this before.

The only point I was trying to make about Paul - and I've never met the
guy - is that he has put his head above the parapet and declared his
allegiance - well, the organisation he works for at least - and is thus
more liable to having people assail him for said organisations
failings. Others on this groups are, to some extent, in the same boat,
but perhaps because of his visibility he's more likely to be on the
receiving end. I don't know the specifics of why he unsubscribed from
utl in the past (I could search the archives but it really doesn't
interest me that much), just a vague notion that the hassle wasn't
worth it. It would be a shame to lose him from utl, he is one of many
great contributors that makes this newsgroup worthwhile.

Anyway I'm rambling, and given that I would have had no idea what a
newsgroup was in the early '90s I think it's probably time I stopped!
All I'll say is I look forward to future discourse with you and many
others on matters capital transportational here on utl.

In article .com, j
(Jonathan Morris) wrote:

Colin Rosenstiel wrote:
Cambridge, allegedly. No sign of a planning application. Note that
neither of these stations is run by FCC.

I thought it might have been Hitchin. If they're going in at
Cambridge, One must be installing them?

One might think that. :-)

Actually it is what I heard last year from One.

--
Colin Rosenstiel

Mizter T wrote:

The situation on the DC lines (Euston - Watford) at Kilburn High Street
and South Hampstead will be resolved when TfL take over from Silverlink
in November, which just leaves the 'one' lines from Liverpool Street up
to / Seven Sisters/ Tottenham Hale/ Walthamstow Central to be sorted
out. C2C accepting Oyster PAYG at Rainham and Degenham Dock is just a
logical development in that they are of course the only two stations
C2C has in the zones that don't currently accept PAYG.

Don't some of the late night services stop at Maryland & Forest Gate?
There's been a lot of advertising in leaflets (and rather less at stations
managed by "one") that PAYG is not valid there.

Mizter T wrote:
Matthew wrote:

In London. Presuambly the names of other cards will also be used in
their own areas (Yorcard in south Yorkshire, etc). While the
compatibility issues does seem to get portrayed as evil TOCs conspiring
against cuddly Oysters out of pure malice, the desire of DfT and the
TOCs to have a national set of open standards rather than lots of
individual incompatible proprietary systems does strike me a good idea.
An awful lot of UK transport technology and planning seems to be a case
of "I wouldn't start from here", and getting a standardised system might
avoid another set of problems in the future.


Oystercards are now included in the ITSO spec, at page 88 of
http://itso.org.uk/content/Specifica..._1_2006-10.pdf

According to today's London Lite, Chiltern are to accept PAYG from June
at the rest of its Greater London stations (Northolt Park to Wembley
Stadium) .

They are also to retail cards outside London.

"We are also happy to announce that we are working very hard with
Transport for London on being the first train company to sell Oyster
Smartcards outside London. We will be launching this to our passengers
in 2007"

C2C are also reported to be enabling PAYG acceptance at Dagenham Dock
and Rainham.

Interest stuff Matthew, thanks for that!

I can't quite decipher from the ITSO specification exactly how Oyster
and the ITSO smartcard standard will work together, but it appears that
a combination smartcard that utilises both Oyster and the ITSO standard
will be possible, which is logical enough.

There's a myriad of implementation issues with regards to how Oyster
would work with a national ITSO standard travel smartcard, but given
that any such national smartcard is a long way off that's not something
to worry about too much.

Something can handle PAYG for a priv dog travelling first class from St
Ives to Kyle of Lochalsh via sleeper, LU and Denton (with Plusbus) is
probably a long way off, but other more regional smart cards are out
there. A card which could be used on both Tramlink and Supertram or the
Underground and the Subway isn't unimaginable.


What is important is ensuring that future
Oyster equipment (Oyster scanners on gates and in ticket offices etc)
will be able to handle ITSO-standard smartcards as well - and it
appears that this will indeed be the case.

Also very interesting stuff regarding Chiltern. The bit about them
accepting Oyster PAYG for journeys within Greater London - i.e. within
the zones - is just an (overdue) logical development. It's a pretty
stupid situation from the passengers point of view where Oyster PAYG
can't be used at some intermediate stations.

The situation on the DC lines (Euston - Watford) at Kilburn High Street
and South Hampstead will be resolved when TfL take over from Silverlink
in November, which just leaves the 'one' lines from Liverpool Street up
to / Seven Sisters/ Tottenham Hale/ Walthamstow Central to be sorted
out. C2C accepting Oyster PAYG at Rainham and Degenham Dock is just a
logical development in that they are of course the only two stations
C2C has in the zones that don't currently accept PAYG.


Did I see somewhere that c2c want to have Oyster (/ITSO) valid for their
whole network? About 10 years ago I went to a talk by the then-MD, who
mentioned plans to gate the whole lot and introduce whizzo high-tech new
tickets.


However the stuff about Chiltern offering Oyster smartcards outside of
London is very interesting - so much so that I'm going to start a new
thread about it!



--
Arthur Figgis Surrey, UK

On Fri, 12 Jan 2007 18:14:39 -0000, Tim Roll-Pickering wrote:

The situation on the DC lines (Euston - Watford) at Kilburn High Street
and South Hampstead will be resolved when TfL take over from Silverlink
in November, which just leaves the 'one' lines from Liverpool Street up
to / Seven Sisters/ Tottenham Hale/ Walthamstow Central to be sorted
out. C2C accepting Oyster PAYG at Rainham and Degenham Dock is just a
logical development in that they are of course the only two stations
C2C has in the zones that don't currently accept PAYG.

Don't some of the late night services stop at Maryland & Forest Gate?
There's been a lot of advertising in leaflets (and rather less at stations
managed by "one") that PAYG is not valid there.

No, they pass through non-stop.

However, the stations are still physically on the line of route
between Liverpool Street and Upminster, so if it weren't for the
prohibition, you'd be able to use PAYG to them on 'one' services.

On 12 Jan 2007 05:02:01 -0800, Jonathan Morris wrote:

Paul has not AFAICS specifically stuck up
for the KX gates whatsoever - as he says himself, he was involved in
the development of their predecessor, the Mk1 slim gate. If you search
the archives you'll see that these new KX gates have not got a good
write up (I've no idea if the gates FCC has used on the GN are the
conventional Mk1 or the newer model as used at KX).

I think if you search the archives you'll see that I talked about it
before with Paul C, hence the 'not again' comment. I was led to believe
that Paul had been more involved than he was, but as I wasn't talking
in a professional journalist capacity (I am not working 24/7), perhaps
I didn't try and establish the real facts as hard as I should! Slap my
wrists by all means!

However, I am not having a go at Paul about the gates. I am not sure
why anyone should take a comment so personally - I didn't think he
designed or built them, nor installed them. I have used newsgroups
since the early 1990s and it's all about discussing things and sharing
opinions. People do, as a matter of course, disagree - but it's never
personal.

I think it's worth adding that usually, when someone replies to a
post, they're directing their comments at the group in general, rather
than specifically the poster of the post they're replying to. This is
often the case even when the reply seems rather direct.