Mind the gap at Bethnal Green

It's a bog standard installation when Metronet do a station refurb - it's no wonder therefore that they collapsed under financial difficulties when they spend money on stuff that isn't needed!

Embankment was one of the very first MTG sites way back in 1979. I was involved in that installation as we were based on the station in those days having a room on the w/e eastbound District. The MTG worked properly for about a week before the timing went awry as I recall, because it was a 16 track tape recorder controlled by track circuits and in the peak it rewound so often that the taped stretched all too easily and the announcement quickly became slurred so that the announcer sounded rather drunk, but worse the stretched tape meant that the announcements got further out of sync with each successive train.

Any section 12 station can automatically have MTG announcements because the PA system comes as standard with two DVAs, one for standard messages, no smoking etc, and the other for emergency which is tied to control of the UTS gates, Fire Detection system, CCTV etc. Prior to the recommendations from the Kings Cross fire enquiry MTG was usually a standalone announcement system connected to the local PA rather than being an integral part of it.

Waterloo is the site I remember for it's gap, a colleague installed the original MTG there many years ago and he's a long tiome dead now.

This is Metronet we're talking about, why would they do anymore than the barest minimums possible? It's obviously TfLs idea, as Gloucester Road Piccadilly line (which I assume is a TubeLines station) has the same announcement and is straight as a ruler.

Also, Waterloo on the Bakerloo line has the old fashioned Mind The Gap announcement, Westminster westbound on the Circle and District does as well.

How about Piccadilly Circus, Bakerloo? Much needed there!

Sounds rather obsessed now doesn't it!

I swear u could count the stations with "gaps" on yr fingers at one time. Now they refer even when the train is too high up.

I never get it tbh. Just like Holborn on the Picc: the gap looks just the same as Covent Garden and Russell Square to me.

Another way of telling which infraco a station falls under is to have a look at the station groups I listed in this thread - the list needs updating following the transfer of London Overground stations etc (I may well sticky the list as a separate thread for ease of reference), but it does give you a general idea.

To be pedantic though, Earls Court, Gloucester Road & South Kensington Piccadilly platforms are actually the responsibility of Tubelines; as the stations are the overall responsibility of Metronet (for now at least) though, Metronet acts on behalf of Tubelines. Who said PPP was a farce? ;D ;D ;D ;D

So do the mind the gap anouncements come under the "platform" or the "station"?

Perhaps some of these managers should pay more attention to the large gap - between their ears . . .

preston road has pointless mind the gap anounncements too

People have to justify their positions!

The DSM grade never existed before the days of 'Action Stations' other initiatives and devolution. As it was relayed at the time to those of us outside the operating division of LU the idea of the DSM was to consolidate many functions of various existing supervisory grades and then to effectively do themselves out of a job as the new line organisations grew from the remnants of the old. It was also once mooted that the Duty Station Manager, Duty Crew Manager and Duty Train Manager were all to be amalgamated into the DMT grade.
When originally introduced many DSMs appeared to be apparently well educated ex-university types and were certainly not railwaymen by any stretch of the imagination being directly recruited from without LUL. It is of course not only the DSM grade that sometimes appeared clueless as the Station Supervisor grade went the same way for a while especially when booking office staff were crosstrained into the grade, the result being a mix of experienced and knowledgable Station supervisors and quite a few airheads who didn't know how to correctly clip and scotch points, were unaware of specific fire safety systems and sometimes had to be bullied into doing the right thing by the line controller.
One would've thought that 15 years on the dross would've been cast adrift but many of the best managers took their money and ran when they saw what was coming! Old habits die hard and dead wood is more often ignored than disposed off, it has always been the LT/LU way!

Yes I know that, having spent seven years with the Post Office before moving to LT although it made major changes which I saw the tail end of joining the year after it became a corporation. A few years after I left BT did a great deal of pruning, these days the organisation is far less than it was when I was part of it. The aim was to cut the national telephone engineering staff from thousands of skilled engineers to just eleven but it has a way to go yet though it was a good aim back in 1974. which we all laughed at, at the time!

Tube Lines and Metronet share responsibility for engineering support. Although Earls Court station complex is a Metronet asset for instance the District & Piccadilly control room is a Tube Lines responsibility as is the entire control room relay room complex. Tube lines does maintenance throughout the Picc except between Barons Court and East of Acton Town which is maintained by Metronet.
The whole of Acton Town station complex except the staff canteen is a Tube Lines asset and Tube Lines maintain the District line track and signalling between east of Acton Town (basically the end of the sidings) and Ealing Broadway but IIRC Ealing Broadway station complex is a Central Line Metronet asset except for the IMR and signal cabin.

It's all very straightforward really!

Defects are reported to the relevant Line Service centre, these are line based even though they are operated by InfraCos and they know who is responsible for each asset type at each station they are responsible for and the tracks between.

One element of my job was to take tunnel telephone, signal telephone, station to station telephone and direct line telephone faults as well as signal failures directly from the Piccadilly Line Service Centre or indirectly via one of my Shift Operations Managers.

The Tube Lines LSCs are all housed in a single complex at Tube lines HQ in Docklands these days although they were initially located at Earls Court (Picc), Leicester Square (Northern) and Neasden (Jubilee).

Yep quite right and it helps that most of the FRCs are/were manned by former colleagues from the same department, namely linemen and supervisors from the telephone maintenance section and former colleagues of mine from my days in the comms installation section.