I have travelled several times on the Silverlink Gospel Oak to Barking
service in the past fortnight. What has shocked me is the apparent
large-scale fare evasion on this route.

There is always a guard present on the train but he/she never
materialises to check tickets. I have heard dozens of people say that
they never buy tickets as there is no deterrent factor (many stations
are open and unstaffed, e.g. Leytonstone High Road). Access from the
overground to the underground at Blackhorse Road os open, so anybody
can access the underground without a ticket.

It really annoys me when Silverlink seems to be doing nothing about
this. Talking to several fare-paying regulars on this line,
ticketless travel is rife. Northbound trains in the morning also tend
to be cancelled, leaving many customers unable to board at
imtermediate stations, such as Leytonstone, due to the 2 carriage
train being full.

I hope tFL will take a hard line on the revenut side of things when
they take over this line later this year.

On Mar 6, 1:00 pm, "Andrea" wrote:
I have travelled several times on the Silverlink Gospel Oak to Barking
service in the past fortnight. What has shocked me is the apparent
large-scale fare evasion on this route.

I imagine most legitimate travellers will have period tickets, and
therefore it will be pretty hard to judge whether or not they are
evading fares.

There is always a guard present on the train but he/she never
materialises to check tickets.

It isn't feasible for guards to do ticket inspections on lines like
the NLL/Goblin, where loadings are tight and stops are only a few
minutes apart - indeed AIUI Silverlink Metro guards aren't even
revenue trained. I'm hoping London Overground will adopt the DOO route
and redeploy surplus guards into revenue protection (given that LO
trains have much the same passenger characteristics as LU, where DOO
works just fine). But RPIs aren't much use when a train is full-and-
standing.

I have heard dozens of people say that
they never buy tickets as there is no deterrent factor (many stations
are open and unstaffed, e.g. Leytonstone High Road).

Dozens? Did you carry out a survey or something?

Access from the
overground to the underground at Blackhorse Road os open, so anybody
can access the underground without a ticket.

....which is useful if they want to go to Finsbury Park, but otherwise
not much help, since every other plausible destination is barriered
during the day (OK, possibly you could go to Chigwell or Chesham).

It really annoys me when Silverlink seems to be doing nothing about
this. Talking to several fare-paying regulars on this line,
ticketless travel is rife.

Silverlink recently imposed a penalty fare scheme, which sounds rather
unlike "doing nothing about this".

Northbound trains in the morning also tend
to be cancelled, leaving many customers unable to board at
imtermediate stations, such as Leytonstone, due to the 2 carriage
train being full.

Northbound? I'd tend to say "westbound" myself... anyway, yes, this
sucks [both the short trains and the relative unreliability] and is a
common problem on NLL/GOBLIN services. I'm deeply sceptical that
better revenue protection would make much of a difference to # of pax
though - how many people genuinely travel in the peak just for the
hell of it?

I hope tFL will take a hard line on the revenut side of things when
they take over this line later this year.

I hope they take a hard line on the revenue issue off-peak, because of
the knock-on security implications (ie antisocialists tend to travel
without tickets, and there are too many of them on the GOBLIN and NLL
- although they wisely avoid peak services). If it's cost-effective to
provide gates etc to enforce payment on-peak, I hope they do that too;
if it isn't then I'd rather they spent our money on improving the
service...

--
John Band
john at johnband dot org
www.johnband.org

On Tue, 6 Mar 2007, John B wrote:

On Mar 6, 1:00 pm, "Andrea" wrote:

Access from the overground to the underground at Blackhorse Road os
open, so anybody can access the underground without a ticket.

...which is useful if they want to go to Finsbury Park, but otherwise
not much help, since every other plausible destination is barriered
during the day (OK, possibly you could go to Chigwell or Chesham).

Unless you know the secret end-run at Paddington!

tom

--
ø¤º°`°º¤ø,,,,ø¤º°`°º¤ø,,,,ø¤º°`°º¤ø,,,,ø¤º°`°º¤ø

On 6 Mar 2007 05:00:54 -0800, "Andrea" wrote:

I have travelled several times on the Silverlink Gospel Oak to Barking
service in the past fortnight. What has shocked me is the apparent
large-scale fare evasion on this route.

There is always a guard present on the train but he/she never
materialises to check tickets. I have heard dozens of people say that
they never buy tickets as there is no deterrent factor (many stations
are open and unstaffed, e.g. Leytonstone High Road). Access from the
overground to the underground at Blackhorse Road os open, so anybody
can access the underground without a ticket.

It really annoys me when Silverlink seems to be doing nothing about
this. Talking to several fare-paying regulars on this line,
ticketless travel is rife. Northbound trains in the morning also tend
to be cancelled, leaving many customers unable to board at
imtermediate stations, such as Leytonstone, due to the 2 carriage
train being full.

I imagine Silverlink have taken the view that as they are losing the
service they will simply keep it ticking over until handover. I imagine
they have no incentive to really pursue revenue protection given that
most of the stations are unmanned (they only staff Gospel Oak directly,
Bhr Rd is LU and Barking is C2C). I'd also guess that all of their
costs are covered either by franchise payments or TfL "top up" payments
for the extra peak, evening and Sunday services that run. As the line is
unlikely ever to make a profit they have probably adopted a "no minimum"
philosophy.

Years ago the guards did wander through the trains checking tickets but
stations are quite close together which makes it something of a slog to
keep returning to the back cab to control the doors.

Not heard about trains being cancelled on a regular basis though. It
used to be awful with the old slam door trains but they were on their
absolute last legs so it was perhaps understandable if nonetheless very
irritating if you were delayed in consequence.

I hope tFL will take a hard line on the revenut side of things when
they take over this line later this year.

As I understand TfL are taking the revenue risk on the North London
Railway concession they may well take a different line on revenue
matters. However I would argue they have a big task to get these
stations upgraded to the point where ticket selling could actually take
place at most of them and where there'd be decent staff accommodation.
They may simply put in portacabins as a first step which may well help
but the layout of the stations is not what I'd call particularly
convenient even for that approach. I very much doubt you'd see ticket
gates going in but I might be proved wrong on that score.

It will be interesting to see what actually happens to this line. The
plans are fine in theory but Network Rail have to spend money to sort
out the decaying bridges and viaducts before you can get any real
performance out of the line. It's currently very slow due to
infrastructure restrictions on the western part of the line. I just
don't see this line being the priority given the pressures to raise
capacity on the North London Line and to build the ELLX.
--
Paul C


Admits to working for London Underground!

John B wrote:

On Mar 6, 1:00 pm, "Andrea" wrote:
I have travelled several times on the Silverlink Gospel Oak to Barking
service in the past fortnight. What has shocked me is the apparent
large-scale fare evasion on this route.

I imagine most legitimate travellers will have period tickets, and
therefore it will be pretty hard to judge whether or not they are
evading fares.

There is always a guard present on the train but he/she never
materialises to check tickets.

It isn't feasible for guards to do ticket inspections on lines like
the NLL/Goblin, where loadings are tight and stops are only a few
minutes apart - indeed AIUI Silverlink Metro guards aren't even
revenue trained. I'm hoping London Overground will adopt the DOO route
and redeploy surplus guards into revenue protection (given that LO
trains have much the same passenger characteristics as LU, where DOO
works just fine). But RPIs aren't much use when a train is full-and-
standing.


Goblin is different though John. Unless things have changed very
recently it is not part of Silverlink's penalty fare scheme. I'm not
sure what the current situation is regarding ticket issuing facilities
at Goblin stations, which are largely unmanned, but I believe in the
past some stations didn't have ticket machines.

I'm no expert on Gospel Oak - Barking line, but I have used it a
number of times - there are conductors/guards on board who check and
sell tickets, but I think I've been on board Goblin trains where there
hasn't been a conductor. I don't know if the line is capable of DOO or
not though.


I have heard dozens of people say that
they never buy tickets as there is no deterrent factor (many stations
are open and unstaffed, e.g. Leytonstone High Road).

Dozens? Did you carry out a survey or something?

Access from the
overground to the underground at Blackhorse Road os open, so anybody
can access the underground without a ticket.

...which is useful if they want to go to Finsbury Park, but otherwise
not much help, since every other plausible destination is barriered
during the day (OK, possibly you could go to Chigwell or Chesham).

It really annoys me when Silverlink seems to be doing nothing about
this. Talking to several fare-paying regulars on this line,
ticketless travel is rife.

Silverlink recently imposed a penalty fare scheme, which sounds rather
unlike "doing nothing about this".


Silverlink Metro bizarrely didn't even operate a Penalty Fares scheme
until January or February 2006! I think I've read that perhaps they
used to operate one, perhaps in their previous guise as North London
Railways (the immediate post-privatisation franchise), but stopped for
some reason.

Anyway Silverlink Metro's idea of revenue protection is pretty shabby.
I use the NLL fairly often and I've never had my ticket checked on
board, nor at any ungated station. Willesden Junction is the one
exception - there's often a team of RPIs in the passage checking
tickets of those interchanging between the high level (NLL and WLL)
platforms and the low level DC (Bakerloo and Euston-Watford)
platforms.


Northbound trains in the morning also tend
to be cancelled, leaving many customers unable to board at
imtermediate stations, such as Leytonstone, due to the 2 carriage
train being full.

Northbound? I'd tend to say "westbound" myself... anyway, yes, this
sucks [both the short trains and the relative unreliability] and is a
common problem on NLL/GOBLIN services. I'm deeply sceptical that
better revenue protection would make much of a difference to # of pax
though - how many people genuinely travel in the peak just for the
hell of it?


TfL hopes to provide more trains on Goblin, and longer term plans
include electrifying the line, though as this would require loot from
central government I'd advise you not to hold your breath!


I hope tFL will take a hard line on the revenut side of things when
they take over this line later this year.

I hope they take a hard line on the revenue issue off-peak, because of
the knock-on security implications (ie antisocialists tend to travel
without tickets, and there are too many of them on the GOBLIN and NLL
- although they wisely avoid peak services). If it's cost-effective to
provide gates etc to enforce payment on-peak, I hope they do that too;
if it isn't then I'd rather they spent our money on improving the
service...


Antisocialists - what a word!
Yes I broadly agree with your notions above. Gates aren't going to be
practical anyway at a good number of locations where there isn't a
station building.

On Mar 6, 5:51 pm, Paul Corfield wrote:
I just don't see this line being the priority given the
pressures to raise capacity on the North London Line and to
build the ELLX.

Perhaps the best way to raise capacity on the NLL _is_ to do the
infrastructure works on the GOBLIN, as you can then employ economies
of scale and add OHLE while doing so. Hey presto - an electrified
diversionary route that might be usable for some of the freight trains
that use the Gospel Oak - Stratford segment of the NLL.

Andrea wrote:
I have travelled several times on the Silverlink Gospel Oak to Barking
service in the past fortnight. What has shocked me is the apparent
large-scale fare evasion on this route.

There is always a guard present on the train but he/she never
materialises to check tickets. I have heard dozens of people say that
they never buy tickets as there is no deterrent factor (many stations
are open and unstaffed, e.g. Leytonstone High Road). Access from the
overground to the underground at Blackhorse Road os open, so anybody
can access the underground without a ticket.

It really annoys me when Silverlink seems to be doing nothing about
this. Talking to several fare-paying regulars on this line,
ticketless travel is rife. Northbound trains in the morning also tend
to be cancelled, leaving many customers unable to board at
imtermediate stations, such as Leytonstone, due to the 2 carriage
train being full.

I hope tFL will take a hard line on the revenut side of things when
they take over this line later this year.

By shear coincidence I traveled on the line today, on the 1338 from
Barking. Not only did the guard check the tickets i overheard explain
that PAYG was not valid and a fare was required. He later asked someone
without any ticket to pay. When the person said he was unable to, the
guard watched him leave the train at the next station and made sure that
he didn't jump back on before the doors closed

Mike Roberts

In article m,
John B wrote:
There is always a guard present on the train but he/she never
materialises to check tickets.

It isn't feasible for guards to do ticket inspections on lines like
the NLL/Goblin, where loadings are tight and stops are only a few
minutes apart - indeed AIUI Silverlink Metro guards aren't even
revenue trained.

I think I've seen all the regular guards go through with a
portable ticket machine. And they /do/ check the tickets -
rarely in the morning peaks, occasionally in the evening peaks
and often off-peak (it must be admited that I don't often
travel off-peak).

It really annoys me when Silverlink seems to be doing nothing about
this. Talking to several fare-paying regulars on this line,
ticketless travel is rife.

In the last 6 months I've handed over my Oyster many times
(and had it looked at - but not scanned - many more times).

Silverlink recently imposed a penalty fare scheme, which sounds rather
unlike "doing nothing about this".

But the penalty fare scheme doesn't operate on the goblin.

Northbound trains in the morning also tend
to be cancelled, leaving many customers unable to board at
imtermediate stations, such as Leytonstone, due to the 2 carriage
train being full.

This problem is a PITA - and seems to be worse now that there
are 3TPH in the peaks. Can't think of any reason why they may
be linked.... ;-)

--
Shenanigans! Shenanigans! Best of 3!
-- Flash

Andrea; wrote:

There is always a guard present on the train but he/she never
materialises to check tickets.

What times do you travel? When I've travelled on it there's almost always
been ticket inspections (although as I tend to travel almost the entire
route that increases the likeliehood).

I have heard dozens of people say that
they never buy tickets as there is no deterrent factor (many stations
are open and unstaffed, e.g. Leytonstone High Road).

Erm yes - but if it's a case of "buy the ticket on the train" and no seller
comes along what can you do? There isn't a machine at Wanstead Park (my
local station) and I understand this is the case at most stations. (And for
that matter Forest Gate-Wanstead Park isn't a valid out of station
interchange so I doubt you could buy a ticket there.) So is someone fare
evading if they have no opportunity to buy a fare?

Mizter T wrote:

Goblin is different though John. Unless things have changed very
recently it is not part of Silverlink's penalty fare scheme. I'm not
sure what the current situation is regarding ticket issuing facilities
at Goblin stations, which are largely unmanned, but I believe in the
past some stations didn't have ticket machines.

I believe this is still the case - there certainly wasn't one at Wanstead
Park or Woodgrange Park when I last looked.

Antisocialists - what a word!
Yes I broadly agree with your notions above. Gates aren't going to be
practical anyway at a good number of locations where there isn't a
station building.

Or even then - most of the stations have steps up or down to street level
from each platform. I can't imagine where you could put a barrier there -
especially since if the line is to get longer trains the entire platforms
will be needed.