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Post by longhedge on Feb 2, 2014 9:28:41 GMT
I joined a train at Denmark Hill about a month ago which departed 2 minutes early. (This is unusual as most trains arrive on time / late due to late running Southeastern services). Subsequently, I joined one at Wandsworth Road which left about 1 and half minutes early; I mentioned this to the driver at Clapham Junction, as on this occasion 3 people just missed the train and one looked unhappy, and he advised that they are allowed to depart early on this line. It happened again yesterday at Wandsworth Road - just over a minute early. I wonder why this route is operated so, especially as all this means is that the train waits longer outside Clapham Junction station, awaiting Platform 2 to be available. I perhaps should add I have a radio controlled watch whci is always correct.
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Post by Deleted on Feb 2, 2014 10:39:18 GMT
I joined a train at Denmark Hill about a month ago which departed 2 minutes early. (This is unusual as most trains arrive on time / late due to late running Southeastern services). Subsequently, I joined one at Wandsworth Road which left about 1 and half minutes early; I mentioned this to the driver at Clapham Junction, as on this occasion 3 people just missed the train and one looked unhappy, and he advised that they are allowed to depart early on this line. It happened again yesterday at Wandsworth Road - just over a minute early. I wonder why this route is operated so, especially as all this means is that the train waits longer outside Clapham Junction station, awaiting Platform 2 to be available. I perhaps should add I have a radio controlled watch whci is always correct. I am glad you brought this up again, as it has been a issue that I have touched on before and have started noticing again recently. On one Saturday last month I recorded 5 trains that ran between 1 and 4 minutes early between Denmark Hill and Clapham Junction. However it is not just happening on the south London line as I was on a eastbound train yesterday morning from Willesden Junction to Gospel Oak which arrived early and ran consistently 3 minutes early, it did then wait at gospel oak for around 5 minutes. Maybe one of the problems is not having guards anymore as they did seem to at least keep the trains running to time. |
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Post by Deleted on Feb 2, 2014 10:39:33 GMT
Hmmm, I've got a friend who works on LO, apparently since they went OPO/DOO there have been quite a few incidents of leaving early on the North London Line and there have been complaints. They're not supposed to leave early on the NLL, I doubt if they're allowed to leave early anywhere on LO, frankly I've never heard of any railway where trains are allowed to leave early, I think someone was telling you porkies.
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Post by redbond on Feb 2, 2014 11:50:22 GMT
For some reason we are now being issued with diagrams and not schedule cards. This was brought in after the NLL went DOO. The drivers complained about the schedule cards having too much information, depsite ELL having used them without any issue for four years now. Instead of showing arrival and departure times for all stations, it just shows times for 'key' stations. We have to wait for the correct time at these stations only. From memory, the key stations are Highbury, Dalston, Surrey Quays, New Cross, New Cross Gate, Crystal Palace, Norwood Junction, West Croydon, Queens Road Peckham, Peckham Rye and Clapham Junction.
I personally don't agree with it, and I will keep to the times at each station, especially on the SLL, either from memory or glancing at the CIS screen on the platform when I pull in. Before I could see that I would have 6 minutes between Peckham Rye and Denmark Hill and drive along at about 25mph, however now I will travel at as fast a permissible speed I can and suffer a longer dwell time as I don't know how long we have.
Also not forgetting that we don't drive to timetable on the 'up' between Surrey Quays and Dalston Junction. There's also some anger from drivers about a 'trial' management are trying to do on a few specific trains departing Crystal Palace and West Croydon in morning and evening. On these if we have a proceed signal and are ready to go we are to depart early. There's something going on behind the scenes between LOROL and Southern I'm sure, so management think that creating a SPAD risk is acceptable. If we leave Crystal Palace early, all we are doing is leaving the platform early, we will still be held at the signal on the Up Sydenham Spur to join the Up London Bridge Slow waiting a Southern train. ASLEF told us to go by the diagram's departure time. We do, hasn't stopped some managers waiting on the platform to ask drivers of said trains "are you ok to depart early?".
Either have the service timetabled or not, mixing and matching as they please is unacceptable in my opinion. If there's issues with the delay fines they're having to pay then that's a scheduling issue that needs to be taken up not pushed down on to the drivers.
If your train departs early, complain to TfL, it's not the drivers fault though, they're just following instructions.
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Post by norbitonflyer on Feb 2, 2014 11:59:11 GMT
, frankly I've never heard of any railway where trains are allowed to leave early, Depends on your definition of "early", but at SWT stations their policy is to press the "doors close" button 30 seconds before the advertised departure time (sometimes before everyone who wishes to has alighted, let alone boarded), and the wheels are often turning before the seconds display reaches "00". SWT have serious problems understanding the difference between "running" a service and "providing" a service. |
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Post by Deleted on Feb 2, 2014 14:39:44 GMT
, frankly I've never heard of any railway where trains are allowed to leave early, Depends on your definition of "early", but at SWT stations their policy is to press the "doors close" button 30 seconds before the advertised departure time (sometimes before everyone who wishes to has alighted, let alone boarded), and the wheels are often turning before the seconds display reaches "00". SWT have serious problems understanding the difference between "running" a service and "providing" a service. A lot of TOCs do this, but it's always well advertised (posters and frequent announcements). The general public have serious problems understanding that the time on their timetable isn't the time they should turn up at the station. |
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Post by norbitonflyer on Feb 2, 2014 20:10:53 GMT
(sometimes before everyone who wishes to has alighted, let alone boarded), SWT have serious problems understanding the difference between "running" a service and "providing" a service. The general public have serious problems understanding that the time on their timetable isn't the time they should turn up at the station. Closing the doors before everyone who wants to leave the train has been able to do so (let alone anyone wanting to board it) just because the timetable only allows 30 seconds dwell time is surely a classic case of the tail wagging the dog. If the be-all and end-all is running the service to time, why bother opening the doors at all? And it is not uncommon for SWT to announce a platform at Waterloo so soon before departure that not everyone has time to reach the barrier, let battle the tsunami of arriving passengers to reach the train itself.. |
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Post by messiah on Feb 7, 2014 18:25:30 GMT
A lot of TOCs do this, but it's always well advertised (posters and frequent announcements). The general public have serious problems understanding that the time on their timetable isn't the time they should turn up at the station. Or maybe more sensibly, the timetable should run so that the train departs when it is timetabled to, and the extra 30 seconds required is timetabled in after the departure times rather than before? Or is that too much common sense? |
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