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Post by roman80 on Mar 16, 2020 15:52:28 GMT
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Colin
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Post by Colin on Mar 17, 2020 5:27:12 GMT
Despite all the rumours, I’ve just booked on at Upminster and we are still running a full Monday to Friday timetable....
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Post by metrider on Mar 17, 2020 7:02:59 GMT
Mayor said on camera last night (BBC News around 19:00) that reduced service was being discussed, and when pressed what that might be, indicated that they were considering a Saturday timetable.
As for me, I'll be working from home after today....
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Post by Dstock7080 on Mar 17, 2020 8:24:37 GMT
Looking back at yesterdays (16/3) figures:
(no staff, maximum at varying times))
Piccadilly 8 cancelled
Victoria 8
Central 7
H&C/Circle 4
Jubilee 3
MET 3
Northern 2
District 1
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Post by aslefshrugged on Mar 17, 2020 12:09:32 GMT
I think Bank Holiday timetable would be more accurate as on Saturdays the early turns are relieving Night Tube drivers while the late turns are relieved by NT drivers.
The problem with that is that we work 36 hours per week (averaged out over 13 weeks, I seem to recall), at Leytonstone roughly 90% of Saturday duties are 7 hours 30 minutes or longer, there's no way we could work a Saturday/Bank Holiday roster Monday to Friday and stay within the 36 hour average. While there are agreements for overtime on Bank Holidays or engineering work there is no agreement for this as part of a revised timetable and considering that ASLEF have just voted for strike action it would be very unwise for management to try to impose longer working hours on the drivers.
Timetables and rosters dept. might have a busy time over the next few weeks...
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Post by North End on Mar 17, 2020 14:08:03 GMT
I think Bank Holiday timetable would be more accurate as on Saturdays the early turns are relieving Night Tube drivers while the late turns are relieved by NT drivers. The problem with that is that we work 36 hours per week (averaged out over 13 weeks, I seem to recall), at Leytonstone roughly 90% of Saturday duties are 7 hours 30 minutes or longer, there's no way we could work a Saturday/Bank Holiday roster Monday to Friday and stay within the 36 hour average. While there are agreements for overtime on Bank Holidays or engineering work there is no agreement for this as part of a revised timetable and considering that ASLEF have just voted for strike action it would be very unwise for management to try to impose longer working hours on the drivers. Timetables and rosters dept. might have a busy time over the next few weeks... A Saturday or Sunday service level with bespoke duties might be the way to go, but as you say how quickly could this be drawn up? |
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Post by Chris M on Mar 17, 2020 14:12:04 GMT
The average member of the public wont be able to tell the difference between a Saturday timetable and a weekday timetable that has been pruned to Saturday service levels, and even fewer will care.
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Post by North End on Mar 17, 2020 16:55:58 GMT
The average member of the public wont be able to tell the difference between a Saturday timetable and a weekday timetable that has been pruned to Saturday service levels, and even fewer will care. They will if the duty schedules don’t match up, as there will be mass cancellations leading to a highly gappy service - particularly on branches and at the extremes of the day. It really isn’t just a case of waking up and deciding to put on a green or yellow timetable on the day. It would perhaps be slightly easier if there was an overtime agreement like applies on bank holidays, but even if there was you couldn’t run like that for days on end. An emergency timetable may well be easier, especially if there’s time to do some basic planning, although this would be well below Saturday service levels. If we get to a situation where crew availability drops dramatically and becomes volatile then that may be the only viable option, as all drivers become spare and the crew managers simply allocate drivers to trains on the fly. Of course if a control room gets taken down then it’s all academic anyway. There are people who can cover signal desks, but not really controller desks. |
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Post by Chris M on Mar 17, 2020 18:40:30 GMT
Why would duty schedules not match up if operators are working weekday rosters and operating a weekday timetable but with some trains cancelled?
The service wouldn't have even headways, but that wouldn't be the end of the world
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Post by aslefshrugged on Mar 17, 2020 18:50:13 GMT
The average member of the public wont be able to tell the difference between a Saturday timetable and a weekday timetable that has been pruned to Saturday service levels, and even fewer will care. Up until I joined the Tube in December 1997 I probably wouldn't have been able to tell the difference and probably didn't much care either but back then I could never have imagined how complicated running a railway was.
Indeed all the evidence I've seen over the last 22 years suggests that apart from people who have worked on the operational side of public transport the vast majority don't have the slightest inkling of the level of complexity involved. 
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Post by North End on Mar 17, 2020 18:58:55 GMT
Why would duty schedules not match up if operators are working weekday rosters and operating a weekday timetable but with some trains cancelled? The service wouldn't have even headways, but that wouldn't be the end of the world Because people would still be coming in for their rostered duties. Moving someone from duty X to duty Y means people will be working different hours from what is contracted, which you can’t do on a wide basis (remember LUL drivers to not work overtime except in a couple of strictly controlled circumstances). Even if you could move drivers around to match up, too much of this will simply become too much to manage. Unless you can match the duties very closely to those trains cancelled (remember a typical duty will operate at least two trains, considerably more on lines which have stepping back), the service will very quickly degenerate into a mess. This will be all the more so if you have the further complication of drivers phoning in all the while to say they’re not coming in. Having said that, some strategic cancellations will at least free up some drivers to act as additional spares, but remember this isn’t a magic bullet as a driver isn’t truly spare unless all their trains are cancelled. One way or another this is going to result in an increasing workload for both the crew managers and service control - although it’s nothing the Central Line doesn’t already have to deal with on a typical weekend! Sadly the grapevine is already saying that the list of drivers off for self-isolation reasons is conspicuously similar to those notorious for poor attendance... |
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Post by Chris W on Mar 17, 2020 21:14:16 GMT
An email I've received late this afternoon: |
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Post by Chris M on Mar 17, 2020 22:02:56 GMT
You're still confusing two things I think - I'm saying run a Saturday level of service on a weekday, not a Saturday timetable.
I'm not suggesting that anybody does anything to change what duties people work - e.g. tomorrow is Wednesday so drivers will be turning up to work for a Wednesday duty, which is good because Wednesday duties are what is being operated. Instead of 58 Jubilee line trains being in service at 0900 only 48 of them will be, all of them departing their starting point at exactly the same time they normally would and the ten drivers be who would normally be operating trains will be spare. There would be 10 gaps in the service (circa 5 in each direction) where the missing trains would be, so instead of 28 gaps of three minutes between westbound trains, there would be 23 gaps of three minutes and 5 gaps of six minutes.
Bob is one of those 10 drivers. His Wednesday duty requires him to start at Nesden and have lunch at Stratford, his second train is not one of those cancelled and he has not been required to cover for a driver who is ill. He can just travel to Stratford as a passenger any train up to the one before he would have been driving. There seem to be no obvious issues with any of this.
Stepping back is something that will complicate matters, yes, but presumably there is a well-rehearsed plan for what happens when there is an unplanned cancellation that would work exactly as well in this situation?
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Post by spsmiler on Mar 17, 2020 22:21:45 GMT
I think what I am saying below would still be acceptable to this thread...
Today I have received an email from the London Transport Museum saying that it is now closing the museum, shop and canteen at Covent Garden plus the Depot at Acton Town until further notice. Also, all planned events between now and 31st May are being cancelled. This includes Hidden London tours. However the twitter facebook and instagram accounts will remain open. Plus of course its website.
Also closing from today are all five of the museums within the Science Museum group - this includes the National Railway Museum.
Another temporary closure is the Postal Museum - which of course will include the Mail Rail railway.
Simon
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Post by North End on Mar 17, 2020 23:35:33 GMT
You're still confusing two things I think - I'm saying run a Saturday level of service on a weekday, not a Saturday timetable. I'm not suggesting that anybody does anything to change what duties people work - e.g. tomorrow is Wednesday so drivers will be turning up to work for a Wednesday duty, which is good because Wednesday duties are what is being operated. Instead of 58 Jubilee line trains being in service at 0900 only 48 of them will be, all of them departing their starting point at exactly the same time they normally would and the ten drivers be who would normally be operating trains will be spare. There would be 10 gaps in the service (circa 5 in each direction) where the missing trains would be, so instead of 28 gaps of three minutes between westbound trains, there would be 23 gaps of three minutes and 5 gaps of six minutes. Bob is one of those 10 drivers. His Wednesday duty requires him to start at Nesden and have lunch at Stratford, his second train is not one of those cancelled and he has not been required to cover for a driver who is ill. He can just travel to Stratford as a passenger any train up to the one before he would have been driving. There seem to be no obvious issues with any of this. Stepping back is something that will complicate matters, yes, but presumably there is a well-rehearsed plan for what happens when there is an unplanned cancellation that would work exactly as well in this situation? Yes you can do that, however remember each duty will normally drive at least two trains (there are a very small handful which only do one). So if you have the first train cancelled the driver isn’t able to do much as he will still need to work his second train, which may involve having to spend time travelling from one end of the line to the other to be in the right place to pick it up. So in reality your spare driver can only do about 2 to 3 hours work, which may well not be a lot of use. As regards stepping back yes there’s methods for dealing with cancelled trains. Normally for a given cancellation when you have a train cancelled and a driver missing everything else would be stepped up round it until train and crew diagrams match again. With a specific train being cancelled but a driver waiting you’d just tell the driver to go to next pickup, which again doesn’t release him to do much useful. Meanwhile with all this going on you’ve heavily increased the workload for everyone, created a very gappy service even if service control are able to devote all their time to monitoring and managing the gaps, and not done much useful apart from save on the number of trains required for service. By regulating the gaps you’ve also now made a number of trains run late, which may well cause further problems, or require interventions to put right. If the duties were structured in such a way that specific duties worked the peak-hour extra trains then you could cancel these and juggle the coverage to ensure these duties were the uncovered ones. Unfortunately the duty schedules aren’t set up like this. If crew availability falls off a cliff then emergency timetable will be the only viable option. Perhaps we should take bets as to how long it may take for that point to arrive?! If it’s going to be the case that anyone with diabetes is required to stay at home then nothing even close to any normal timetabled service will be viable. An emergency timetable is very labour intensive for the crew managers, ironically not so for service control apart from at the start and end of service, and as such it is not viable to run anything too ambitious, and the service provision particularly in the late evening will be bare minimum. Looking through the crew forecasts for the area I am familiar with, today seems to be the day when the crew availability is going to pass the tipping point where multiple cancellations are going to occur, although as I write this it may be mitigated by one out of the four depots having sufficient spares still to bail out the other three depots. It won’t take too many more drivers to become unavailable for normal timetables to become unviable. |
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Post by Colin on Mar 18, 2020 5:18:14 GMT
You're still confusing two things I think - I'm saying run a Saturday level of service on a weekday, not a Saturday timetable. Indeed - everybody seems to be running away with the idea that we’ll actually implement a different timetable at short notice and that’s simply not the case at all. We’ll either cancel a number of trains - either to suit the way a given line works (ie, one could take out the Newbury Park - White City’s on the central as an example) or to suit uncovered duties (driver gone sick perhaps)..........if it gets really drastic we’ll simply throw the planned timetable out of the window and run an “emergency timetable” where all drivers become spare to their rostered book on / book off times and are put on trains running at a frequency determined by service control. Anyway, the District has 12 planned cancellations this morning - 8 originating from Upminster depot and 4 originating from the west end of the line. |
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Post by Dstock7080 on Mar 18, 2020 6:42:28 GMT
Looking back at yesterdays (17/3) figures:
(no staff, maximum at varying times)
Victoria 20 cancelled
Piccadilly 13
District 11
Central 9
H&C/Circle 9
Northern 6
Bakerloo 4
MET 4
Jubilee 1
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Post by Dom K on Mar 18, 2020 9:25:09 GMT
It would be good if TFL turned off the peak time fares during this time
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Post by aslefshrugged on Mar 18, 2020 10:35:38 GMT
You're still confusing two things I think - I'm saying run a Saturday level of service on a weekday, not a Saturday timetable. Indeed - everybody seems to be running away with the idea that we’ll actually implement a different timetable at short notice and that’s simply not the case at all. We’ll either cancel a number of trains - either to suit the way a given line works (ie, one could take out the Newbury Park - White City’s on the central as an example) or to suit uncovered duties (driver gone sick perhaps)..........if it gets really drastic we’ll simply throw the planned timetable out of the window and run an “emergency timetable” where all drivers become spare to their rostered book on / book off times and are put on trains running at a frequency determined by service control. Anyway, the District has 12 planned cancellations this morning - 8 originating from Upminster depot and 4 originating from the west end of the line. Cancelling the Newbury Park - White City would be easy because there aren't any, none of the trains follow the same route all day. |
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North End
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Post by North End on Mar 18, 2020 12:44:15 GMT
Indeed - everybody seems to be running away with the idea that we’ll actually implement a different timetable at short notice and that’s simply not the case at all. We’ll either cancel a number of trains - either to suit the way a given line works (ie, one could take out the Newbury Park - White City’s on the central as an example) or to suit uncovered duties (driver gone sick perhaps)..........if it gets really drastic we’ll simply throw the planned timetable out of the window and run an “emergency timetable” where all drivers become spare to their rostered book on / book off times and are put on trains running at a frequency determined by service control. Anyway, the District has 12 planned cancellations this morning - 8 originating from Upminster depot and 4 originating from the west end of the line. Cancelling the Newbury Park - White City would be easy because there aren't any, none of the trains follow the same route all day. I can’t see how they will be able to do anything other than run an ad-hoc emergency service. Any change to the normal duty schedules requires 28 days notice, and in any case would take time to be drawn up. Saturday service I think is out as that still requires a lot of resources to run and is probably in excess of what is now required. The only viable option I can see is struggle on with the normal service until crew availability makes this completely unviable (I expect this point will arrive within the next few days) and then move to a special for the duration of the 28 days plus however long it takes to have new duty schedules drawn up. Meanwhile draw up a more formal emergency timetable and duty schedules, which with the ever-changing nature of the situation combined with predictions that cases in London are going to spiral then for it work work they will need plenty of spare turns incorporated. I’m not sure if it might be possible to come to some agreement to reduce the 28 days, which might be in everyone’s interest to give people back a degree of certainty. |
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Post by philthetube on Mar 18, 2020 13:32:51 GMT
Run an allocation of trains per depot, whatever each one can cope with, staff book on at normal times and are allocated runs by the train manager, for example, give Neasden a 15 minute Watfore service, Harrow a 15 min Uxbridge and Ricky a half hourly Amersham/ Chesham, running through the city as available
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Post by Colin on Mar 18, 2020 14:02:36 GMT
Cancelling the Newbury Park - White City would be easy because there aren't any, none of the trains follow the same route all day. Ah! It has been about 8 years since I last looked at a Central line timetable   I can’t see how they will be able to do anything other than run an ad-hoc emergency service. Any change to the normal duty schedules requires 28 days notice, and in any case would take time to be drawn up. **snip** part of quote removed **snip** I’m not sure if it might be possible to come to some agreement to reduce the 28 days, which might be in everyone’s interest to give people back a degree of certainty. Again I think we need to get away from this idea that LU will implement any form of scheduled timetable with scheduled duties. By the time you mess about with 28 day agreements it'll all be over and in any case the sheduling department are all now working from home. Sadiq Khan said we'll provide a saturday or sunday type service and it seems to have been interpreted as a gospel statement that that is exactly what will be provided. You all need to not take his words so literally!! On the train side we'll continue to book on as rostered. There is no other way of working. That is what we do and that does give us all the certainty that's needed. In the first instance we'll attempt to operate the timetable appropriate to the given day with planned cancellations. As you say North End, once we tip over the balance of not being able to run the timetable for the day with planned cancellations, we then switch to all drivers becoming spare (matching their rostered book on / book off times) and service control implements a service that can be operated with the resources that are available. As an example, the District would normally work like this: Upminster & Barking operates a 10 minute Upminster - Richmond service Earls Court operates a 10 minute Wimbledon - Edgware Road service Acton Town operates a 10 minute Ealing - High Street Ken service Other lines have pre planned ways of working like we have on the District and they'll simply implement them. EDIT: its perhaps worth noting that Earls Court already have 19 duties uncovered on both saturday and sunday this coming weekend - this is not coronavirus related and has been known about for some time, so the District will definately not have a full service on saturday or sunday! |
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Post by piccboy on Mar 18, 2020 15:00:39 GMT
As an example, the District would normally work like this: Upminster & Barking operates a 10 minute Upminster - Richmond service Earls Court operates a 10 minute Wimbledon - Edgware Road service Acton Town operates a 10 minute Ealing - High Street Ken service Other lines have pre planned ways of working like we have on the District and they'll simply implement them. I think there is a case for suspending District between High Street Kensington and Edgware Road. Last night they were only running 2/3rds of Edgware Road trains due to Operational difficulties, I believe that the resources to operate SMA 2 could be better used to support the remaining services. To offset the lack of District to Edgware Road, perhaps an enhanced Circle Line service which could be done by going old school Circle i.e. drop the Edgware Road, with step backs at Edgware Road to provide PNR facilities for Drivers. One other observation from Yesterday was that I was driving a Westbound Richmond service arriving at South Kensington just gone 5pm, and even after loading passengers there, I still had vacant seats. However, slightly earlier on the same train I observed, between Mile End and Aldgate East that Eastbound trains were pretty packed, more or less normal. So maybe we need a more East end of line enhanced Emergency timetable for this particular occasion? |
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Post by North End on Mar 18, 2020 15:38:30 GMT
Cancelling the Newbury Park - White City would be easy because there aren't any, none of the trains follow the same route all day. Ah! It has been about 8 years since I last looked at a Central line timetable I can’t see how they will be able to do anything other than run an ad-hoc emergency service. Any change to the normal duty schedules requires 28 days notice, and in any case would take time to be drawn up. **snip** part of quote removed **snip** I’m not sure if it might be possible to come to some agreement to reduce the 28 days, which might be in everyone’s interest to give people back a degree of certainty. Again I think we need to get away from this idea that LU will implement any form of scheduled timetable with scheduled duties. By the time you mess about with 28 day agreements it'll all be over and in any case the sheduling department are all now working from home. Sadiq Khan said we'll provide a saturday or sunday type service and it seems to have been interpreted as a gospel statement that that is exactly what will be provided. You all need to not take his words so literally!! On the train side we'll continue to book on as rostered. There is no other way of working. That is what we do and that does give us all the certainty that's needed. In the first instance we'll attempt to operate the timetable appropriate to the given day with planned cancellations. As you say North End, once we tip over the balance of not being able to run the timetable for the day with planned cancellations, we then switch to all drivers becoming spare (matching their rostered book on / book off times) and service control implements a service that can be operated with the resources that are available. As an example, the District would normally work like this: Upminster & Barking operates a 10 minute Upminster - Richmond service Earls Court operates a 10 minute Wimbledon - Edgware Road service Acton Town operates a 10 minute Ealing - High Street Ken service Other lines have pre planned ways of working like we have on the District and they'll simply implement them. EDIT: its perhaps worth noting that Earls Court already have 19 duties uncovered on both saturday and sunday this coming weekend - this is not coronavirus related and has been known about for some time, so the District will definately not have a full service on saturday or sunday! It will depend how long this goes on for. I don’t think a special could be run for weeks on end, remember that running a special is very labour intensive for crew managers, and is seriously problematic to close down at the end of the day. Notwithstanding your valid point about the availability of schedulers, IMV if this goes on longer term then something more formal would have to be devised. There are some people locally on the lines, certainly where I am, that could and have in the past devised things informally (ie not through duty schedules). It wouldn’t be that hard to come up with a skeleton service (like every 10 mins) and allocate crews based on existing duty times with anyone not on a train being spare. The big snag is of course having it loaded into the signalling system. Khan has no hope of a Saturday service that’s for sure. |
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Post by philthetube on Mar 18, 2020 17:58:18 GMT
There is actually very little difference between Saturday and daily service apart form less trains in the Morning peak
I a special was to be run there would have to be an early close to sort out the finishing issues such as having crews finishing in the right place.
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Post by North End on Mar 18, 2020 18:16:04 GMT
There is actually very little difference between Saturday and daily service apart form less trains in the Morning peak I a special was to be run there would have to be an early close to sort out the finishing issues such as having crews finishing in the right place. Yea both very relevant points. The problem with a special is that everyone has their own ways of running it (in terms of control staff and train crew managers), and as we know the Underground works on rosters so every day will have a different combination of staff running it. Something more formal would be needed to keep running it on a regular basis - normally it’s only reserved for the worst days. Some lines have more experience doing it than others - on the Northern it happens once or twice a year at most, sometimes not at all, with the most common instances being strike days or in the aftermath of a major failure that’s gone on for many hours. Be aware some operating staff will have never done it. Obviously with low passenger numbers then things should be preferable to a strike day when passenger numbers are essentially the same as normal so they need every train they can get, with this that won’t apply. |
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Post by zbang on Mar 18, 2020 18:47:23 GMT
The big snag is of course having it loaded into the signalling system.
I don't know how much work that is and I'm quite curious, but does such a large change obligate some non-service testing? I kind of assume (hope?) that TfL has a simulator to test things like new WTTs.
How would the depot staff be affected? On the one hand, fewer trains in service means fewer to fix and make-ready; OTOH it means that more stock is available in-depot for repairs. Is it possible that overhaul schedules might be brought in since the trains aren't out on the road?
WTT- working time table OTOH- on the other hand TfL- need you ask? |
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Post by North End on Mar 18, 2020 18:54:58 GMT
The big snag is of course having it loaded into the signalling system. I don't know how much work that is and I'm quite curious, but does such a large change obligate some non-service testing? I kind of assume (hope?) that TfL has a simulator to test things like new WTTs.
How would the depot staff be affected? On the one hand, fewer trains in service means fewer to fix and make-ready; OTOH it means that more stock is available in-depot for repairs. Is it possible that overhaul schedules might be brought in since the trains aren't out on the road?
WTT- working time table OTOH- on the other hand TfL- need you ask? Normally a timetable is loaded into the signalling system each night for the following day, this isn’t a new thing even the old programme machines used to have the timetable on them. For most if not all of the current systems running a special isn’t a problem. For example with Seltrac it’s a simple matter of assigning each train to a chosen journey, and the train will run up and down all day doing what has been assigned. The difficulty is this doesn’t cover coming in and out of service nor does it offer any regulation of intervals, all of which has to be monitored and managed by the signallers. As I’ve alluded to elsewhere, whilst lines have their guidelines on roughly what to run during a special, this is often as simple as “x trains to run between Y and Z”. There is no detailed plan of when first and last trains might be, for example, except that normally the night duty trains will be “made up” when the night duties book on. Given the objective of any service is going to be oriented towards key shift workers, things like first and last trains plus branch services are going to be important. I’m not sure what testing occurs for a new timetable, in theory it should be quite practicable as all of the newer systems have quite realistic simulators. Naturally it’s not always easy to predict passenger behaviours though! As for depots, this is another reason why something more formal will eventually need to happen. For the now any special is going to result in a drastic reduction in the numbers of trains required, more than likely the depots will just declare their normal requirements and the operating department will just take what they want / need. If maintenance staff start falling away then the declaration will simply reduce. |
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North End
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Post by North End on Mar 18, 2020 19:49:50 GMT
I don't know how much work that is and I'm quite curious, but does such a large change obligate some non-service testing? I kind of assume (hope?) that TfL has a simulator to test things like new WTTs.
How would the depot staff be affected? On the one hand, fewer trains in service means fewer to fix and make-ready; OTOH it means that more stock is available in-depot for repairs. Is it possible that overhaul schedules might be brought in since the trains aren't out on the road?
WTT- working time table OTOH- on the other hand TfL- need you ask? Normally a timetable is loaded into the signalling system each night for the following day, this isn’t a new thing even the old programme machines used to have the timetable on them. For most if not all of the current systems running a special isn’t a problem. For example with Seltrac it’s a simple matter of assigning each train to a chosen journey, and the train will run up and down all day doing what has been assigned. The difficulty is this doesn’t cover coming in and out of service nor does it offer any regulation of intervals, all of which has to be monitored and managed by the signallers. As I’ve alluded to elsewhere, whilst lines have their guidelines on roughly what to run during a special, this is often as simple as “x trains to run between Y and Z”. There is no detailed plan of when first and last trains might be, for example, except that normally the night duty trains will be “made up” when the night duties book on. Given the objective of any service is going to be oriented towards key shift workers, things like first and last trains plus branch services are going to be important. I’m not sure what testing occurs for a new timetable, in theory it should be quite practicable as all of the newer systems have quite realistic simulators. Naturally it’s not always easy to predict passenger behaviours though! As for depots, this is another reason why something more formal will eventually need to happen. For the now any special is going to result in a drastic reduction in the numbers of trains required, more than likely the depots will just declare their normal requirements and the operating department will just take what they want / need. If maintenance staff start falling away then the declaration will simply reduce. Night Tube suspended with immediate effect, Waterloo & City Line suspended after tomorrow, also plans being worked on for some targeted station closures. The retrenchment has begun... |
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Post by DWS on Mar 18, 2020 21:46:31 GMT
Normally a timetable is loaded into the signalling system each night for the following day, this isn’t a new thing even the old programme machines used to have the timetable on them. For most if not all of the current systems running a special isn’t a problem. For example with Seltrac it’s a simple matter of assigning each train to a chosen journey, and the train will run up and down all day doing what has been assigned. The difficulty is this doesn’t cover coming in and out of service nor does it offer any regulation of intervals, all of which has to be monitored and managed by the signallers. As I’ve alluded to elsewhere, whilst lines have their guidelines on roughly what to run during a special, this is often as simple as “x trains to run between Y and Z”. There is no detailed plan of when first and last trains might be, for example, except that normally the night duty trains will be “made up” when the night duties book on. Given the objective of any service is going to be oriented towards key shift workers, things like first and last trains plus branch services are going to be important. I’m not sure what testing occurs for a new timetable, in theory it should be quite practicable as all of the newer systems have quite realistic simulators. Naturally it’s not always easy to predict passenger behaviours though! As for depots, this is another reason why something more formal will eventually need to happen. For the now any special is going to result in a drastic reduction in the numbers of trains required, more than likely the depots will just declare their normal requirements and the operating department will just take what they want / need. If maintenance staff start falling away then the declaration will simply reduce. Night Tube suspended with immediate effect, Waterloo & City Line suspended after tomorrow, also plans being worked on for some targeted station closures. The retrenchment has begun... Where has it been announced about the changes to Night Tube, Waterloo & City Line etc ? |
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