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Quick question: the strange abbreviations for months of the year on train tickets - why is that?
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Dec 5, 2014 18:42
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| # ? May 27, 2024 22:31 |
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I was told that it was to make tampering with them more difficult (JUN and JUL are very similar, for instance, hence them using JLY instead).
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Dec 5, 2014 20:23
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thehustler posted:Quick question: the strange abbreviations for months of the year on train tickets - why is that? You can read more about weird poo poo about tickets and fares on LR here, but yeah, essentially it was to make fraud more difficult.
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Dec 5, 2014 22:52
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Finsbury Park lol whoever wrote that contingency plan document is in hiding
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Dec 27, 2014 23:02
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Cerv posted:Finsbury Park Paddington too. I've turned my off my blackberry, I'm on annual leave so bugger off.
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Dec 27, 2014 23:15
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Eeh everyone will moan for a few days and the ORR will get a long boring report about the overrun being due to some quirky wizardry about interlocking or accidentally ordering the wrong kind of ballast or something, it's not so bad. I once heard an amazing tale from the Public-Private-Partnership days on London Underground where Metronet shut down the entire western end of the District line for a weekend to upgrade the points west of Earls Court, but then didn't order the parts thus wasting £££ and causing problems for no gain at all. Also Metronet were buying bits for the CIS screens off eBay because the company that had originally made them for LT didn't exist any more. Good job, the private sector! I'm glad that whole scheme didn't end up costing the taxpayers millions because oh wait it did and Tube Lines was nationalised by Boris Johnson of all people jesus christ private rail infrastructure must be a disaster.
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Dec 28, 2014 02:05
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So I've found the first people against the wall: not Tories, not Space Invader eaters, but… The Pacer Preservation Society. 
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Dec 30, 2014 23:57
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TinTower posted:So I've found the first people against the wall: not Tories, not Space Invader eaters, but… There isn't a level of hell deep enough for these sick fucks
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Dec 31, 2014 02:40
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TinTower posted:So I've found the first people against the wall: not Tories, not Space Invader eaters, but… quote:They are historically important in the DMU story and would be useful addition to many preserved railways. What, in case it gets really cold and you need something that can be burned for warmth?
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Dec 31, 2014 12:09
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Imagine if Snowpiercer was filmed with Pacers.
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Dec 31, 2014 12:25
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TinTower posted:More Northern news: Clegg appears to have found a backbone, and is kind of getting sick of Pacers (well, aren't we all?). The idea of Pacers running until 2029 as some industry spokesmen are saying beggars belief. Oh so that's what they're running on the Saltburn branch, are they supposed to smell perpetually like burning engine?
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Dec 31, 2014 12:29
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TinTower posted:So I've found the first people against the wall: not Tories, not Space Invader eaters, but… I remember this getting emailed round at work while an office full of designers looked at in in horror. In other news, my boss (well, bosses, bosses, bosses, boss) has been given an MBE.
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Dec 31, 2014 12:39
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OwlFancier posted:Oh so that's what they're running on the Saltburn branch, are they supposed to smell perpetually like burning engine? Pretty much. Pacers are literally bus bodies welded onto train wheels.
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Dec 31, 2014 12:42
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TinTower posted:Pretty much. Pacers are literally bus bodies welded onto train wheels. When you say literally, do you actually mean literally? Because that was what I thought when I got into one for the first time, it looks exactly like the inside of an old bus, only bigger.
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Dec 31, 2014 12:48
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OwlFancier posted:When you say literally, do you actually mean literally? Because that was what I thought when I got into one for the first time, it looks exactly like the inside of an old bus, only bigger. Literally literally. It's why you can see British Leyland branding on some of the parts.
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Dec 31, 2014 12:59
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TinTower posted:Literally literally. It's why you can see British Leyland branding on some of the parts. Jesus... So essentially the bus companies are retiring their buses faster than the train companies are retiring their trains made out of surplus bus parts?
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Dec 31, 2014 13:12
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OwlFancier posted:Jesus... No, the buses were retired decades ago.
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Dec 31, 2014 13:16
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The thing about Pacers that make them worse than Sprinters (which are also bus bodies) is that the chassis they were built on were modified freight wagons, so are single axle. This makes a hell of a difference in terms of ride quality as you basically have zero up top stability, any minor bumps go straight into the body, unlike a bogie based vehicle which can smooth this through it's secondary suspension. It makes more sense when you draw a picture but I'm on my phone.
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Dec 31, 2014 13:19
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Chocolate Teapot posted:No, the buses were retired decades ago. Oh, ok, I thought they were based on the really lovely square buses that still run one some of the lines around here, but if they're based on an even shittier bus then that's even more impressive. On a related note those Isle of Wight trains look rather nice, can we have some of those instead? I rather like traveling by rail on the rare occasion that I do it, it's quite cheap if you book a long way in advance, and also apparently if you book to a non-major destination after where you're going, and then get off earlier... Last time I went to Edinburgh I think it was significantly cheaper to book the train to Pitlochry and just get off at Edinburgh. Wish we could have those kinds of prices more readily available.
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Dec 31, 2014 13:26
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OwlFancier posted:On a related note those Isle of Wight trains look rather nice, can we have some of those instead? Sure, just go to London in the 20s, there's loads of them. (I'm assuming you mean these: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Rail_Class_483 -I wish they'd taken some of the old A-Stock trains when they were taken out of service, they're the comfiest trains on earth.)
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Dec 31, 2014 13:51
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goddamnedtwisto posted:Sure, just go to London in the 20s, there's loads of them. Yes those, seats are a bit naff but I don't think you even get that much space in first class nowadays.
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Dec 31, 2014 14:04
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Apparently Crossrail might have some problems with it's fancy signalling. Crossrail faces the prospect of signal trouble from day one quote:Crossrail, the South-East's £15bn new rail line, is on course for a humiliating signalling failure when it opens in 2018.
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Jan 11, 2015 13:06
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twoot posted:Apparently Crossrail might have some problems with it's fancy signalling. Man rail engineering just seems like a giant clusterfuck at all scales.
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Jan 11, 2015 16:24
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Meanwhile, some good news and bad news for people in the North. The good news is that all transpennine services will be 3-car from May – although it's silent on whether that's transpennine in capitals or not – but the bad news is that some Class 170s are cascading down to the Chilterns, so the Manchester–Blackpool service will be run by Class 158s: the trains that the Class 185s replaced in the first place. Presumably, the Class 185s will move from Manchester–Blackpool to Manchester–Hull now that the Selby Swing Bridge has been strengthened.
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Jan 11, 2015 16:47
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Malcolm XML posted:Man rail engineering just seems like a giant clusterfuck at all scales. lol told them this was a stupid idea 6 years ago. Will do a post about it later.
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Jan 11, 2015 17:10
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Bozza posted:lol told them this was a stupid idea 6 years ago. Will do a post about it later. 
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Jan 12, 2015 10:39
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it was a dodgy level crossing that ruined all clapham junction - willesden junction trains for a couple of days last week so i say tear them all up
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Jan 12, 2015 10:51
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Chocolate Teapot posted:No, the buses were retired decades ago. I remember catching Leyland Nationals to school a little over ten years ago, so not quite as long ago as you'd think.
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Jan 12, 2015 11:40
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Some of us have jobs and alcohol problems to deal with, come on... Anyway, the big shitstorm with Crossrail is that they decided some years ago that rather than go with a mainline signalling system within the central core, they were going to use CBTC (Communication Based Train Control, but always referred to as CBTC) which is a metro style signalling system which is currently, I believe, being used to upgrade the Central Line on LU. The reasoning was that they didn't believe that ETCS (European Train Control System) would be ready to provide both the train protection (ATP) and automated train operation (ATO, there's lots of acronyms and poo poo in rail engineering...) because they didn't deem it to be a 'mature technology' depite the fact that if they rode their own tunnels about 4 stops to Farringdon, they would find Thameslink literally using ETCS with bolt-ons as both ATP and ATO. The official line is that they didn't want to get stuck in the same development cycle but gently caress knows what really happened, probably got some scare stories and bought into CBTC as a 'proven concept' technology. Now the real fun begins, because as part of the deal with running from Paddington to Heathrow Airport, Crossrail are required, as a tunnel railway, to operate using a full ATP system (the same reason they use CBTC in the central core rather than just traditional mainline signalling). Currently on those lines for Heathrow Express the supposed "trial" ATP system fitted by British Rail back in the early 90s operates and provides the train protection for their stock, plus all 125mph capable trains between London and Bristol. The upgrade path for this technology which is quickly reaching life expiry is to ETCS, the European standard train protection system which is mandated as part of the Technical Standards for Interoperability laid down by the European Rail Authority (backed up by the EU/European Parliament), which falls neatly into the Crossrail timescales. This is problematic in itself because the existing ATP fits to the existing signalling system and does not work with all trains, only Heathrow Express/Connect and 125mph mainlines, mostly HSTs, the remaining Thames Turbos and freight operate under standard up TPWS/AWS protection. This means the purist route to upgrade cannot be applied and the ETCS has to be 'overlaid' onto the existing signalling system, something that has only just been attempted in Spain on a line which is far less congested than the last 12 miles into Pad and also is a fall back to conventional from ETCS rather than using the conventional to drive the ETCS system. So you've got a mainline with a brand new complicated signalling system, currently being trialed and due for run out, trying to interface with a totally and fundementally different signalling system (literally, underground signalling principles are miles away from main line) across an untested fringe, which has to be accomplished on the move as the train transitions from Pad (low-level) to the GWML. No bloody chance.
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Jan 12, 2015 19:30
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Blacknose posted:I remember catching Leyland Nationals to school a little over ten years ago, so not quite as long ago as you'd think. They were running in London well into the 00s - they were the only buses that could run through the Rotherhithe Tunnel for the replacement service during the East London Line conversion to Overground, which was also the only non wheelchair-accessible bus route left in TfL control (presumably because the line they were replacing was similarly non-accessible).
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Jan 13, 2015 12:55
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Any of you lot (particularly Bozza I guess) have thoughts on the Improving Connectivity document? Allegedly the work of a bunch of signallers in their own time, so may feature such rarities as 'sensible solutions to longstanding problems' and whatnot.
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Jan 13, 2015 15:14
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Vando posted:Any of you lot (particularly Bozza I guess) have thoughts on the Improving Connectivity document? Allegedly the work of a bunch of signallers in their own time, so may feature such rarities as 'sensible solutions to longstanding problems' and whatnot. I just gave this a read, and I note they specifically mention having studied this system on the swiss rail network. It's simple, and extremely effective. When I first came here I was wondering why trains were never direct to where I wanted to go, with at least one change of train per journey for what were quite busy routes. After a few weeks I realised that almost every change of train was cross platform, the train timetable was such that the trains always lined up beautifully, and when the leading train was late, the interchange train was always waiting for you. The carriages on the trains have displays that tell you exactly what platform your next train was leaving from and when, displayed as it begins to pull into the station, so you know exactly where you're going before you even step onto the platform. This is intermodal, too- it'll tell you when the next trams and busses are departing, as well as the regional trains, intercities and the like. It makes travel effortless, but it also makes you think 'holy gently caress, whoever designed this actually cares that you make it to your destination', which is not a feeling you get travelling in the UK and is probably why the swiss rail network gets a big public karma boost.
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Jan 13, 2015 15:32
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The issue of holding trains to make connections absolutely cannot be resolved in the UK until the concept of delay minutes is abolished, until this is done, no chance.
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Jan 13, 2015 16:13
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by 'delay minutes' do you mean a penalty incurred on the operators for running late? I guess that's the problem- the swiss operators aren't fully public, but the federal railway is huge, so they can do whatever they want without incurring a penalty on other operators.
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Jan 13, 2015 16:42
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StarkingBarfish posted:by 'delay minutes' do you mean a penalty incurred on the operators for running late? I guess that's the problem- the swiss operators aren't fully public, but the federal railway is huge, so they can do whatever they want without incurring a penalty on other operators. Yeah, Schedule 8 delay minutes which are either NR -> TOC cos of infrastructure failure or TOC -> TOC cos of rolling stock / dispatch issues. Basically you pay a fine per minute per train based on the delay minute rates. A track circuit failure between Reading and Paddington can rack up 8,000 minutes delay within an hour or so easily, costing Network Rail about a million quid in fines, as an example.
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Jan 13, 2015 17:58
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Does the fine per minute vary in different places? I've seen estimations for costs of delays but I'm not sure where they get their numbers from
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Jan 13, 2015 18:06
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Devils advocate question: why should passengers already on that second train and waiting for it to leave have to wait? What if they are then late for appointments etc?
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Jan 13, 2015 18:17
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thehustler posted:Devils advocate question: why should passengers already on that second train and waiting for it to leave have to wait? What if they are then late for appointments etc? People are talking about small delays of a coupe of minutes to allow connections to be made. Nothing significant like half an hour.
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Jan 13, 2015 19:07
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thehustler posted:Devils advocate question: why should passengers already on that second train and waiting for it to leave have to wait? What if they are then late for appointments etc? These are delays of <3 minutes I think, which are pretty easy to make up. From the 2013 statistics for SBB on wikipedia: -Customer Punctuality: 87.5% of all passengers reached their destination - measured from departure station including any necessary changes - with less than 3 minutes of delay (either 2 or 1 minute delay, or on time) -Connections made: 97.3% So the punctuality figures are probably lower than those published for the UK network, but the 'connections made' figure I'm guessing is heaps higher. Funnily enough, I've been delayed less on swiss trains than I have in the UK, and I've used both loads.
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Jan 13, 2015 19:12
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Essentially, delay minutes ensures the train runs on time, but not trying to ensure connections ensures that people don't run on time. An empty train that departs and arrives on time is less of a failure than a full train running five minutes late. Apparently.
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Jan 14, 2015 01:10
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