DVA Anita

Hmmm. It might be worth you trying to send off a Freedom of Information request to TfL about it, along with some of your other unanswered questions. You could get some definitive answers! That's not to say that there isn't the information on here buried away in one of our collective heads, but you will probably get an answer quicker through an FoI.

Good old Anita. I love it when she says WILLESSSSSden Green! But my favourite announcement of hers is "this train terminates at NEEEEEEEEEEEEEASden."

I also like the terse announcements of Michael Meech on the 1996 Stock.

It’s ‘Anita’, which I’ve seen acronymised as ‘ANITA’ to stand for ‘Another Naff In-Train Announcer’ but this is probably just a rumour!

FOI requests have already been made in the past and, alas, TfL have no record of who voiced these original announcements! She does, however, voice the U-Bahn announcements in English, which I have recordings of if anyone is interested!

Two things irritate me with Jubilee Line announcements. One is the excruciatingly plummy 1950s upper-class-twit add-on at certain stations, e.g. at Green Park "... Change here for the Piccadilly Line. Exit here for Buckingham Peless".

The other is the terse "The NEXT station is closed. This train will not be stopping at the NEXT station". Nice voice (presumably Michael Meech?), but why oh why can't the system cope with identifying the name of the next station, e.g. Bond Street, so people know where it's not stopping? The Northern and Bakerloo manage this at Embankment, so why is the Jubilee so lazy?

I do however share the general appreciation of Anita's ceremonious rendition of Willesden Green. A merry young female was mimicking it all the way from North Greenwich to Waterloo the other day ("This train terminates at WILLESden GREen").

Anyone who is interested to hear Micheal Meech's "This train will not stop at the next station" (Which I think is rarely heard) here is a Youtube clip:



Copy and paste link into your web browser's address bar and then skip ahead on the video to 1:28

I worked with Michael Meech for several years when he did the morning travel updates for the Underground. He was always bright and cheery when he came into the Head Controller's office early every (Mon-Fri) morning. And I think he was a bit of an enthusiast (he might not like me saying that!) and he was always willing to have explanations as to why things happened, rather than just 'report' them and take things at face value. A grand chap. Voices don't always indicate everything. Never judge a book by its cover, as the saying goes.

Those add-ons you describe are still Celia, though admittedly they sound different (more plummy, I agree) because many were re-recorded and so there is noticeable variation. I remember reading somewhere on here the assumption that the re-recordings were to make the announcements sound slightly more cheery, which makes sense as it prepares one for the even more cheery Anita to read out "NEEEEEEASSSSSSDEN!" Of course, the main driving force behind the re-recordings was to change "Docklands Light Railway" to "DLR"



True, the Bakerloo line specifies the station, but as far as I'm aware the Northern line just says "the next station is closed." Maybe the Jubilee line T/Ops should just stick to good old-fashioned driver-led announcements á la the Piccadilly line at Gloucester Road... obviously with this comes the risk of considerable variation in terms of quality of delivery!

I think that the Bakerloo line 1972 stock DVA is more up to date than the Jubilee and Northern line DVAs. As far as I'm aware, the Northern line DVA has pretty much been the same since the late 90s - although I think it has had various add ons and small updates, but nothing major. For example, before approaching a station like Moorgate on the Northern line, a "Please mind the gap between the train and the platform" announcement plays, which sounds slightly different to all of the other announcements. To my knowledge, the Northern line DVA announcements were experimentally changed on a few trains in 2002 to sound different, but these were not very successful, so they were changed back to the original announcements. The Jubilee line DVA was updated in 2004 (I think!), and that was to change ANITA's station announcements to Celia's and to add "The next station is" announcements, but ANITA's "This train terminates at [Insert train destination]" and "All change please!This train terminates here! All change!" announcements stayed on the trains. 

So I think the reason why the DVA does not announce the closed station (if it is closed) on the Northern and Jubilee lines because they've not been 100% updated, like the Bakerloo line DVA announcements were (Emma Clarke who replaced VERA) in the early 2000s. Does that make sense :-)? 

The male voice is manually selected by the driver, whereas the female voice (Anita) is triggered automatically.



Recorded at a later date, so just a case of the recording studio not advising Celia to blend into the existing tones!



Again, recorded at a later date but I too question why the two words in question weren't better enunciated.

Does anyone find it incredibly irritating that at every stop it now announces Thank You for travelling on the Jubilee line. Awful.

That's right, spinba11. Therefore you must have been incredibly unlucky that day, jammers!

I totally agree, I've had it a couple of times recently - the male voice proclaiming "Please take all your belongings with you. Thank you for travelling on the Jubilee line", at every station. Excruciating!

Here you go Phil, I've crossed it all out for you.

ANITA - A Noisy Interruption To All !