Weekend Closures 1/2/3 May

Whoops -sorry Mr MetControl,about wrong thread.Please direct me to the correct path.
Meanwhile this morning even one of the few remaining undisrupted lines the Bakerloo has severe delays.So even fewer options at this moment.Bad day all round.

I can confirm trains have been running on the JLE this Bank holiday weekend, have had a few problems, Traction current problems, signalling problems with the new set up, but they have been running.

Well ironing out problems with the new setup is of course what testing is all about. But were multiple trains out, or meant to be out, continuously for all 76 hours of the shutdown? There is a huge amount that could be completed in that time with adequate planning.

As far as shutting the line down to test the signalling and then getting traction current problems is concerned, someone should be having some very serious words with whoever is responsible for the power supply side.

Oh, please do. I'd love to know how you intend to renew a crossover just outside a terminal station with limited access for Engineering Trains, complete with digging out the ballast, reinstating the point mechanisms and various safety modifications, plus the reinstatement and testing of all the associated systems during engineering hours alone.

Once you've told me, I'll let you sign for the next Points & Crossings renewal design that I have to check, and when it doens't go to your plan it won't be my problem.

In the meantime, as you evidently have very little to contribute to this forum except to criticise LU, perhaps you might consider posting this sort of thing somewere else where you may enjoy more support?

Note: I've just finished nights on one of these projects and the last thing I want to read when I wake up is this sort of demoralising rubbish.

Well I see one our resident critics has arrived onto this thread. Hello once again Diana. Been to any "praising us up" threads lately. No didn't think so. Wrong sort of bandwagon.

Anyway, June/July this year will see a multi-week shutdown of the H&C between Edgware Road and Hammersmith. From what I hear, there will be more shutdowns of this sort. We will see what our critics think of these - no doubt also the wrong way to do things.

I have said before that of course it is not just the public that have to endure the closures. Staff still have to come to work - even if there is less railway for them to work on. Just because we work for LU does not mean we deserve extended travelling time.

But the difference is (I hope) that LU staff know that work is being done, and some of that work - in particular line upgrades such as the Jubilee - will come to an end, leaving behind a much more modern and reliable line.

Continually comparing us to "other metro systems" is also pointless really. None of the "other metro systems" is as old, or was left as neglected as ours. Yes, the age-old excuse, but unfortunately whichever way you cut it, it's the truth.

Weekends such as the one just gone are by no means ideal. Then again, take the example of the Met Line works. They were carried out a) to take advantage of the 3-day weekend and b) to avoid major works over the forthcoming football matches at Wembley, such as the FA Cup. It is unfortunate that in juggling this shutdown it ended up meeting with several other shutdowns.

But as I said before, the work has to be done, so when, exactly, should it be done?

Goodness me, boys, what a lot of comments about poor little me, some more vituperative than others. It's enough to make a girl blush!


Now you see, when you write that the points that I make are "demoralising rubbish" to those working on the projects, you are missing the point. The real demoralisation is to the citizens of London, who pay the highest Metro fares in the world, a further substantial amount in council tax subsidy, and get the worst service in terms of availability that there is. That's the real demoralisation. The system is provided for the benefit of the residents and visitors of London to travel around on, at all times, which they are not getting. It is not provided to make the engineers on the job feel good despite it being constantly shut down at weekends.


Excuse me, but what part of the Jubilee Line Extension, which comes my way, and which has been out of service most weekends for several years now, is so old or so neglected? As far as I recall it opened in 1999, after a substantial delay because they couldn't get the signals working, and now, less than 10 years later, they were replaced and they still can't get the signals working. This is brand new kit on both occasions. To have completely messed up the signalling project twice on one of the NEWEST metro lines in Europe is what I am encountering constantly. So less of the "oldest" excuses, please.


So, it has taken a 3-day Bank Holiday weekend to renew a crossover. Given the number of these on the system, and how long they typically last, it therefore seems that we can never have any Bank Holiday service ever again. Has TfL and their predecessors not had 150 years of experience of replacing these as a matter of course? How is it that all the huge investment in plant and machinery has led to such projects taking longer than a generation ago, rather than being done much more straightforwardly. It's all standard parts, but somehow the skills to do the job effectively seem to have been somehow lost along the way.


Sure. Diana's family, as I may have mentioned before, in part come from Russia, scene of a short (volcanic ash permitting!) current visit this week. You boys would be surprised at the low levels of investment funds that have been available here in recent years, and astounded at the poor pay compared to your own of the teams actually working on the tracks and in the design offices. But the service goes on perfectly, absolutely uninterrupted, all day, every day. This is all in single-track tube tunnels, by the way. Russian visitors to our house in London cannot believe the weekend shutdowns.

Track maintenance and renewals are done properly, incrementally, night by night. The immaculate permanent way standards, by the way, would make you all envious (this will be only too apparent when we return to Heathrow and get that lunging, swaying, jolting ride on the Piccadilly from Acton Town to Hammersmith). A major new junction on one of the lines in St Petersburg was built around an existing tunnel without more than a couple of evening's interruption in total when they finally connected it up. On the Moscow lines which have some open air sections, they ran uninterrupted all through this last winter when it was regularly 30 below zero, and the snowfall was such that people started to run out of space for where to push it (it's still around in places, by the way). Never a break in service, always works, scarcely even a hiccup in train intervals.

By the way, operations side people can come to Moscow and see how a Circle Line (the Êîëüöåâàÿ Line en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Koltsevaya_Line ) can be run properly, round and round, maintaining headways of 90 seconds, carrying huge crowds with seemingly never an interruption. Certainly I have never experienced one. Which is more than could be said for my experiences on the much smaller-scale Circle Line, that TfL gave up on as "too difficult".

Goodness, what a lot of writing. Sorry f you have had to plough through it all.

Paris gave up on its Circle Line before it was complete - before 1907 Line 6 was known as Line 2sud, with the intention of forming a circle, but through services over Lines 2nord and 2sud were never operated.

Whilst the delays on the JLE section are hard to justify, you have to remember that is it the whole line being upgraded, not just the new bit. Large sections of the old bit run next to those nasty big ( ) Met line trains with their electrically noisy 1950/60s technology.


Part of the problem is that it isn't all 'standard parts', at many locations parts have to be custom made to fit.

As I am sure you are aware, our climate is one of the most unique in the world. As I am sure you are also aware, the snowfall of the last couple of years was also fairly unusual.

As has been mentioned (in particular around the time of the snow) there will never be the sort of investment needed in making our network fully snow-proof for events which may only happen once every 15-20 years. If it becomes more regular, I am sure those in power will allow us to purchase what is needed (and that is also key to a lot of your points - we don't always have complete control over what can and can not be done / spent.)



From what I can see, that Circle Line is just that. One line, in a Circle, running round and round. Of course it works. It does have to cross other lines using flat junctions. It has somewhere to queue trains up before the next circuit - meaning you can install hefty layovers after each trip and ensure a supply of trains is ready and waiting.

Our Circle simply did/does not have that scope. A total of 6 flat junctions, and the best layover we could install was a few minutes at either Aldgate or Edgware Road. There is nowhere to "queue" trains and lay them over.

Not about giving up. It's about improving the basically unworkable.

I think if we were top take the width of a deep level tube tunnel and that of Moscow Metro tunnel, we would see they are wider and that the trains are also.

But this really is an aside, you seem to have quibbled the most trivial of points to avoid the overriding theme. Are you running for parliament today? ;D How would you manage the upgrade of a tube system without closures?

The bit I saw that read that (and I'm not sure where it was) implied to me that they'd run the new signalling in parallel to the existing stuff... so I'm sure running a cable between (say) Ickenham and Ruislip could be done during evening shutdown for example but other things might require longer shutdowns - but maybe just a week of early closures for example?

As for early finishes, they may have (largely) worked ok on the Victoria line, but remember its relatively short and all its stations (bar Pimlico) interchange with another rail line. Admittedly with varying degrees of usefulness as a substitute route, but I'd suggest most journeys would have <30 mins delay. If you look at most other Underground services, the scope for alternative rail routes between stations is much more limited, buses would have to be used/provided and delays to passengers are more likely to be longer.

It would have a negative impact on people who work late (or nights) and to sports, leisure and entertainment, a big element of London's economy.

Indeed - there's nothing new under the sun, really.

I have thought how much extra work could take place if the network closed just an hour early on a Sunday - Thursday night.

Improve the night bus network so every line has a replacement night bus like the N155 does for the Northern Line and you'd discount much of the issues with an early closure.