Too many trains on the line ....
 

You couldn't make it up! On the Picadilly line Thursday morning about 7am. I get on at Osterley when I have to get into London for 9am. About 5 mins in we start stopping outside stations, crawling for a few yeard then stopping again. Here we go I thought. Anyhow, the driver came on th line and sais 'sorry for the delay but's caused by lots of trains on the line' ...!!

FFS!! You couldn't make it up. Don't they run to a timetable? Don't they use the same timetable EVERY day so this is not unexpected. And as for saying 'maybe there was a breakdown or something' the guy I went to see said it happned the previous day to him near West Ham.

What a way to run a railway! Good job it's not public transport ... ooops! It is isn't it .... at least that's what Ken keeps telling us.

Dave

PS: and I had to stand from Osterley to central London (c. 40 mins!!!)

Just another way of saying some other trains are late. I get it on the way up to Hertford, if a slow train is late I get caught behind it and the same stop-start stuff happens. At least you get told, my operator is worthless thieving scum in my opinion and they don't even bother to tell passengers what's going on :)

I had the exact same thing TWICE yesterday...once coming into London Bridge from Greenwich and then again coming into Wimbledon from Waterloo :rolleyes:

It's not hard to understand why, there are normally 76 trains along the Piccadilly line during peak periods and any of these could be held up due to any number of reasons - faulty train, signal problems, passenger illness etc so any delay of more than 1-2 minutes will have a flow on effect to every other train backed up behind.

Not sure what Ken can do, unless you have an idea on how to make a 100% reliable train service that is completely unaffected by faults, passengers etc.

Come on. Most other European countries can get their trains to work on time almost all of the time. If this was a one off then fine. But it wasn't judging from the first time I mentioned it at my destination. This country won't get public transport working inany shape or form until people are put in charge that a) know what they're doing and b) have some common sense! Whilst self-serving politicians like Red Ken are in charge we have no hope ...

Dave

But to be fair no other country in Europe has anything like the population or extensive public transport network (let alone the age of tunnels) that London does.

I hate all politicians because they are self-serving by nature but I really don't see what anyone could do other than investing tens of billions into new infrastructure, and in the case of the tube that would mean digging/redigging larger tunnels to make capacity higher. And this country doesn't do big infrastructure projects well.

Our train service is fantastic, I have never seen a train arrive or depart late.

They are always clean and unless there is a beerfest on you can 99% of the time get a seat and it never has rips, graffiti, chewing gum or other bodily fluids on it.

There is also a cultural difference too.

I agree. I see middle aged businessmen in impeccable suits sitting on the train with their bloody feet on the seat opposite. Makes my blood boil! I might have to sit on that the next day. Woe betide anyone that tells these people not to do it, more than likely met with a punch in the face.

I hate people.

It could make the existing ones run more efficiently. Last time I was in Munich when one train left the platform the next one was arrving at the other end of the platform. All that that takes is a decent signalling system. Apparently there is one being fitted to LU as we speak - from what I have heard. I'm not expecting great improvements from it ....

Dave