Blocked Tubes
Wednesday, April 4th, 2012 11:07 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
caddymanIt’s a topic I have and will continue to return to time and time again: the London Underground.
When it works, it’s great. When it works, it’s simply the best way of getting around large chunks of the capital, especially at off peak times when you can actually get a seat. In fact, it’s so good that you know you’ve been in London too long when you find yourself griping about the fact that you have to wait more than three minutes for a train.
But when it goes wrong. Oh dear.
Today it went wrong, but to be fair, it wasn’t the Underground’s fault. It was someone under a train at St John’s Wood, which caused the suspension, during the morning rush, of the entire Jubilee Line. There’s no point grumbling about the unfortunate under the train. It was either an accident, or the person was so despondent or depressed that they jumped. Either way, it’s something to be sorry about, rather than rant or grumble.
The problem is, though, that the system just breaks down.
All the time.
Bits of rail break, trains stop working, power fails and signals break down. Now I understand that on a system as large and as ancient as the London Underground, things will go wrong – people will be taken ill (even if they don’t go under trains willingly or unwillingly) and equipment will fail, but the thing is that the equipment failures are nearly always in the same place. Aldgate in particular seems to be a maintenance disaster. I know that a number of lines are routed through the same stretch of track there and that usage is heavy, but that just means surely, that all that investment we are told about continually – the stuff that means half the system is suspended for maintenance every bloody weekend and has been for as long as I can remember – really ought to be diverted in part at least to those areas that get worn out quicker.
I expect that we would be told that this is precisely what happens, but damn it, for the amount of money the commuter pays to use the system and for the amount of reported inward investment, it barely seems to improve.
I really am not looking forward to the Olympics from the point of view of a commuter, even if the impossible happens and the Tube system works at optimal efficiency for the entire period. But it won’t. Something will break down, someone will get ill, a driver will go on strike because he can’t afford a second home in the country and 100 days holiday isn’t enough.
We are living in an age of the unobtrusive upgrade. That is to say the upgrades have no noticeable effect on the performance of the system. It makes the painting of the Forth Bridge look like a one-time deal.
The country that invented the railway and probably the underground railway, too has forgotten how to do it.
Mind you, the upgraded Blackfriar’s Station looks quite nice insofar as a station can.
When it works, it’s great. When it works, it’s simply the best way of getting around large chunks of the capital, especially at off peak times when you can actually get a seat. In fact, it’s so good that you know you’ve been in London too long when you find yourself griping about the fact that you have to wait more than three minutes for a train.
But when it goes wrong. Oh dear.
Today it went wrong, but to be fair, it wasn’t the Underground’s fault. It was someone under a train at St John’s Wood, which caused the suspension, during the morning rush, of the entire Jubilee Line. There’s no point grumbling about the unfortunate under the train. It was either an accident, or the person was so despondent or depressed that they jumped. Either way, it’s something to be sorry about, rather than rant or grumble.
The problem is, though, that the system just breaks down.
All the time.
Bits of rail break, trains stop working, power fails and signals break down. Now I understand that on a system as large and as ancient as the London Underground, things will go wrong – people will be taken ill (even if they don’t go under trains willingly or unwillingly) and equipment will fail, but the thing is that the equipment failures are nearly always in the same place. Aldgate in particular seems to be a maintenance disaster. I know that a number of lines are routed through the same stretch of track there and that usage is heavy, but that just means surely, that all that investment we are told about continually – the stuff that means half the system is suspended for maintenance every bloody weekend and has been for as long as I can remember – really ought to be diverted in part at least to those areas that get worn out quicker.
I expect that we would be told that this is precisely what happens, but damn it, for the amount of money the commuter pays to use the system and for the amount of reported inward investment, it barely seems to improve.
I really am not looking forward to the Olympics from the point of view of a commuter, even if the impossible happens and the Tube system works at optimal efficiency for the entire period. But it won’t. Something will break down, someone will get ill, a driver will go on strike because he can’t afford a second home in the country and 100 days holiday isn’t enough.
We are living in an age of the unobtrusive upgrade. That is to say the upgrades have no noticeable effect on the performance of the system. It makes the painting of the Forth Bridge look like a one-time deal.
The country that invented the railway and probably the underground railway, too has forgotten how to do it.
Mind you, the upgraded Blackfriar’s Station looks quite nice insofar as a station can.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2012-04-04 12:00 pm (UTC)And, yes, the Tube is the oldest (and deepest) underground railway network in the world.
I noticed that most of the Piccadilly Line was suspended yesterday (or was it Monday?) due to a fire alert. I dread the day that something unfortunate happens to the District Line.
What larks!
(no subject)
Date: 2012-04-05 08:28 am (UTC)