Cooling things down

Quite a lot. Even if it isn't very hot outside, packed trains become very hot indeed, very fast, especially if they're stopped.

Define "better purposes". Air conditioning is supposed to be a godsend for baked passengers!



As has been said up-post, the trains in tunnels get even hotter. Temperatures are rising. Furthermore, do not assume that air conditioning is only cold. It could very well be a full package deal of HVAC _{(Heating, Ventilation and Air Conditioning)} that is useful year-round.



"Improving the infrastructure" is right, yes, but it covers everything, including installing air conditioning!

Evacuating trains stuck in between stations, aka track detrainments, is a last resort; haven't the Big People like Colin and Artery made that point? I'm pretty sure they did, and possibly to you directly.



Are you suggesting articulated air conditioning units, like articulated bogies? Oh God.

1) They will almost certainly be a pain to maintain, and heavy modifications will have to be made to the roof.
2) If they are portable, they will vanish. It's happened before.



Are you suggesting making the deep level lines into a sort of partial atmospheric railway? That wouldn't really help the motion of the trains, but it will help ventilation, which is a major issue.



A method used before was giving out free bottles of water. I believe it worked. You are still highly encouraged to bring water. This obviously conflicts with the lack of sufficient toilets, but that's a different matter.



Oh God, no! They have a proposal based on water ice, though; it's train mounted, and requires open areas. It's been explained elsewhere on this Forum.

Please remember that conventional air conditioning has already been applied to the S stock and appears to work well. I rather think this contract applies to the S stock.

If the train can be shifted to a station, it will be. I do not dispute that response times are sub-optimal, however; if it is the only way to get passengers out, then only is it used. That is what I mean by "last resort". If it wasn't required by existing rules, why would it be done?



My point is that LU trains will require cooling regardless of whether or not they are held at sticks for indecent periods of time.

Please don't use the "other systems" card. We're sick and tired of having to explain how and why it doesn't apply to London Underground.

Yes.

Even with stopping, the journey from White City to Mile End on the Central Line can be very warm when the carriages are full of people.

Agreed Andrew. Must be done in an integrated fashion though. There is no sense cooling the cars until the tunnels and stations are properly cooled though. If only the trains were cooled, they would have the net effect of heating the tunnel even more, and benefit of having cooled cars would be lost as the cars would take hot air from the stations on each time it stopped, reducing any benefit.

The best solution would be to control the tunnel and station temperatures and just have normal vent systems on the trains (but drawing air in from the tunnel at a reasonable temperature rather than the 30-40 degree tunnel temperatures that can be experienced in the summer).

The problem is, we Brits just are not used to these sort of temperatures. I've never witnessed or experienced, personally how our European or other International counterparts cope. Agreed, installing HVAC systems retrospectively into a system not able to accommodate it, is hideously expensive, but one that should be thought about for future modernisation. Yes, temperatures are rising, worldwide it seems and I don't think anything will reduce it. The heat has to be dispersed somewhere!

If people can't cope with the heat on the tube for say 30 minutes, how the heck do people manage when they jet off to Tunisia of somewhere for the likes of 10 days and sit in the sun all day?

"Oh different kind of heat" I hear you say... Heat is heat!!! Makes no difference where in the world you are, or if you are inside a 'slow roasting cooker' as I heard one person describe the tube system! ;D

For example, in Malaysia, tourists don't like the heat (nobody does), but everyone takes it in their stride.

LOL. Artery, have you seen a cartoon showing a Tube train as a series of microwave ovens instead of cars? ;D ;D ;D

Went for a night out in London a couple months back, friends birthday. Was pouring down, utterly pouring!! Eventually we had to get a Bakerloo from Piccadilly to Embankment. I tell you something for nothing, the heat was deffinitely a selling point that night!! That is it was, untill the station shut down because of a power failure on the Bakerloo.

Ventilation shafts work well, on the 1940's section of the jubilee line (Finchley Road to Baker St) there are quite a few and you can hear the air pressure and a slamming on the train doors as you go past them, Iv'e always found that section of the line to be quite cool in summer as well as on the extension, sadly theres no space to dig ventilation shafts in central london anymore and the cost would probably be monumental.

Every time I go SB on the Bakerloo around that area, it feels like going into a furnace, yet the NB is cooler. Difference in ventilation shafts?

So what is the temperature in a train carriage in London?

Is there any temperature information to compare London to other countries?

I have lived through a few hot summers in Japan. Outside temperature reaching 40 degrees. The underground trains do feel cooler but sometimes they are still 35 degrees. Human bodies can only feel variation. However any prolonged stays in a train do start getting hot.

Normally for me 30 degrees is comfortable and 35 is bearable anything above 35 is uncomfortable.

Personally cooling train carriages is not the answer. Cooling the tunnels is. This creates a difference which will be felt through existing air conditioning units.

I would go further and use the heat from tunnels to raise the temperature of the stations as then stepping from the platform into the train will feel good.

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Someone mentioned that hot temperature always feels the same however this is not quite true as there is a dry heat and a wet heat. High humidity is much harder to cope with.
It is worth thinking about the humidity levels in tunnels as I expect them to be quite high. Reducing humidity would make people more comfortable.

Standard AC is fine in nice wide tunnels like the Sub-Surface Lines or the New York Subway which is why S Stock will have AC but in the narrow, deep level tunnels there is simply nowhere for the heat to go, the benefits of AC inside the saloons would be negated by the temperature outside. In addition the tunnels are fully of equipment, signals, comms, power and if these overheat they stop working, not a good idea.

Basically this is going to cost A LOT of money which simply isn’t (and has never been) available. The DfT have just cut TfL’s budget, the GLA don’t have the ability to raise the kind of money needed and after the collapse of PPP any private finance deal would need so many conditions to ensure that the taxpayer didn’t end up footing the bill again that the bankers wouldn’t touch it with a barge pole.

Sorry but “real world” answer is that you are going to be sweating for a long time to come.

Splashdown, would that paint work under the inch of dust that would accumulate after a week?

The most realistic solution is more ventilation. Cooling will be nice, but ventilation has to come first.

Ventilation, ventilation, ventilation. This is the mantra I learned from Charlie J. ;D Well, sort of.

Splashdown, why do you keep chanting about moving trains and quick detrainments? I'm sure you know of the word "obvious".

+1

I forgot the Other Mantra.

Money Money Money... ;D