I'm vaguely aware of impending doom on the Overground, but amazed by
the lack of publicity so far.

Hidden away on the Network Rail site[1], there are a selection of
factsheets. One seems to suggest that Gospel Oak - Stratford will be
closed from Christmas till April[2], the other says that Richmond -
Stratford will be closed from Christmas till Easter[3].

These are pretty major closures, happening less than two months away,
and the only hints from TfL that anything's going to happen at all are
some cryptic clues on the Planned Works pages[4].

Any bets on when TfL are going to let passengers know what's actually
happening?
Does anyone know if it will be the whole line that's closing, or just
the eastern section?
And is there any information on when services will start running
through from the ELL to Highbury?

- martin


[1] http://www.networkrail.co.uk/aspx/5651.aspx
[2] http://tinyurl.com/yl8pq7s [PowerPoint file]
[3] http://tinyurl.com/yfebtht [PDF file]
[4] http://www.tfl.gov.uk/tfl/livetravel...ll-future.html

The press release which is clearly linked from your first link says
clearly what is going to happen through 2009 and in to 2010.

Yes but the first link (which I had seen) does *not* mention the full
closure of the NLL between Stratford and Gospel Oak from Christmas
through to April 2010 in its list of "The planned London Overground
service disruptions starting in 2009". It omits the third bullet in
para 6 of the PR. I'll accept that is more likely to be cock-up rather
than conspiracy but it does matter to those of us who, for example, are
already buying theatre titckets for 2010.

Any bets on when TfL are going to let passengers know what's actually
happening?

On past practice probably about 4-6 weeks before the major changes
occur. Therefore I'd expect something imminently - say in the next 10
days? There needs to be info out there well before Christmas
because people won't have a train service once they go back to work
in the New Year!

It is to the credit of TfL that their journey planner already seems to
know the NLL is out for that period. It would be better though if it
made some mention of the lack of that route. I can envisage people
being a bit puzzled otherwise by the results of (for example) searching
for Stratford-Highbury & Islington. Is there some threshold at which a
closure becomes semi-permanent and so is not mentioned?


--
R

"neverwas" wrote

The press release which is clearly linked from your first link says
clearly what is going to happen through 2009 and in to 2010.

Yes but the first link (which I had seen) does *not* mention the full
closure of the NLL between Stratford and Gospel Oak from Christmas through
to April 2010 in its list of "The planned London Overground service
disruptions starting in 2009". It omits the third bullet in para 6 of the
PR. I'll accept that is more likely to be cock-up rather than conspiracy
but it does matter to those of us who, for example, are already buying
theatre titckets for 2010.

Any bets on when TfL are going to let passengers know what's actually
happening?

On past practice probably about 4-6 weeks before the major changes
occur. Therefore I'd expect something imminently - say in the next 10
days? There needs to be info out there well before Christmas
because people won't have a train service once they go back to work
in the New Year!

Through trains from Stratford to Richmond are in the train service database
at least up to 5th February 2010.

In message of Sat, 7 Nov
2009 10:03:13 in uk.transport.london, Paul Corfield
writes
On Thu, 05 Nov 2009 09:24:58 GMT, "neverwas"
wrote:

It is to the credit of TfL that their journey planner already seems to
know the NLL is out for that period. I

It does? I can't the journey planner to recognise that the year 2010
exists!

Nor can I. ;( I even tried:
http://journeyplanner.tfl.gov.uk/use...language=en&se
ssionID=0&ptOptionsActive=-1&type_destination=stop&name_destination=GUNN
ERSBURY&type_origin=stop&name_origin=HOMERTON&itdD ate=20100102

It changes the 2010 date to the corresponding date in 2009.

I suspect a Journey Planner year should be a rolling period of about 12
months about the current month rather than the 12 months of the current
calendar year.

[snip]
--
Walter Briscoe

It is to the credit of TfL that their journey planner already seems
to know the NLL is out for that period. I

It does? I can't the journey planner to recognise that the year 2010
exists!

Nor can I. ;( I even tried:

It's a fair cop 'guvs. I cocked up. It never occurred to me to pay any
attention to the year.

snip

I suspect a Journey Planner year should be a rolling period of about
12 months about the current month rather than the 12 months of the
current calendar year.

I also see that the Journey Planner indicates that inf. about services
over the Christmas period (including Christmas Eve) will be available
mid-December. That seem to be rather a poor show for people wanting to
plan now (including for instance booking journeys through London). Just
out of interest, is it a matter of management still being in negotiation
with unions/staff?
--
R

I know a bit about what is going on in relation to the NLL works. The
NLL closure was originally planned for 16 weeks starting after xmas,
however this has now been delayed until mid february. The reason for
the delay is that Network Rail have been unable to confirm closure
dates, as they do not have the required signalling software ready for
the new signalling between Camden and Stratford. If the route closes
in mid febraury (20th) then the route would repeon in early june (16
weeks). The closure will still be between Gospel Oak and Stratford.

During the closure replacement buses will run Stratford to Hampstead
Heath at 3 buses per hour. C Rd & Barnsbury won't be served. I would
imagine they will be a bit busy, so good luck trying to get on them at
Stratford in the morning! In addition the rail service will be reduced
Willesden to Gospel Oak from 6tph to 4tph. The trains terminating at
Gospel Oak will run at uneven headway so that trains for instance
arriving at gospel oak arrive at xx.10, xx30, xx40 and xx00.

Not sure why this isn't being made public yet. Although as people say
on here people like to know so that they can plan what they do.
Appears in this case to be a NR issue, but this doesn't excuse TfL not
keeping people informed. I expect their comms people are still trying
to work out how to put the River Thames back on the tube map, so don't
have time to worry about this!

There will be an xmas closure for 9 days over the xmas period on the
NLL for work to be done as well.

snip
Many thanks for that.


puzzled

Better that than mushroomed (in the sense of kept in the dark
and.......)
--
R

snipped

many thanks.

Looks as if it'll be a good job we are still a two-car household!

--
R

neverwas wrote:
It is to the credit of TfL that their journey planner already seems
to know the NLL is out for that period. I
It does? I can't the journey planner to recognise that the year 2010
exists!
Nor can I. ;( I even tried:

It's a fair cop 'guvs. I cocked up. It never occurred to me to pay any
attention to the year.

snip

I suspect a Journey Planner year should be a rolling period of about
12 months about the current month rather than the 12 months of the
current calendar year.

I also see that the Journey Planner indicates that inf. about services
over the Christmas period (including Christmas Eve) will be available
mid-December. That seem to be rather a poor show for people wanting to
plan now (including for instance booking journeys through London). Just
out of interest, is it a matter of management still being in negotiation
with unions/staff?

What does happen with staff when a line is put out of service? What has
also happened with staff from the East London Line and what will happen
with them once the line goes back into service, which I understand to be
23 May 2010.

Paul Corfield wrote:
On Sun, 08 Nov 2009 11:31:40 GMT, "neverwas"
wrote:

I also see that the Journey Planner indicates that inf. about services
over the Christmas period (including Christmas Eve) will be available
mid-December. That seem to be rather a poor show for people wanting to
plan now (including for instance booking journeys through London). Just
out of interest, is it a matter of management still being in negotiation
with unions/staff?

I doubt that is the reason. I've seen an internal notice outlining the
LUL plans - from memory nothing terribly serious and I expect the LUL
Real Time page will show quite clearly what is shut down for engineering
works on any given day. There is a 6 month look ahead list so this is
not a secret.

I heard about plans to shut down the line during the first quarter of
this year.