JLE barriers at Stratford

[Chris M]

I've just received the following in an email from TfL

I am writing to make you aware of some changes at Stratford station. The Jubilee line ticket barriers are now open and the Oyster yellow card readers will no longer work.

Oyster pay as you go customers using National Rail for any part of their journey will therefore need to touch their Oyster card on the new yellow card readers at either end of the Jubilee line ticket barrier at Stratford station, to ensure they continue to be charged the
correct fare.

Asside from the fact that this is probably how it always should have been, I'm wondering why the (apparently) sudden change? Is the gateline going to be removed?

[mrfs42]

This might be a red herring; but does this mean that there are going to be pink Oyster readers installed on the gateline?

[suncloud]

Surely yellow only, as they'll be only required for people changing from paper NR tickets to Oyster PAYG... Pink ones i think affect only the NLL services...

[Deleted]

At last! that means I can now travel to Central London from Canning Town via Stratford instead of the Jub line without getting told by TFL that I should go the way they devine a route!

I was charged £4.00 a few months back because I traveled to S Bush (Central Line Station Via Stratford) when they said I should have gone Canning Town - Jub line to Bond Street then Central)

[Deleted]

Sept 8, 2009 16:52:56 GMT @dannyeastlondon said:

At last! that means I can now travel to Central London from Canning Town via Stratford instead of the Jub line without getting told by TFL that I should go the way they devine a route!

I was charged £4.00 a few months back because I traveled to S Bush (Central Line Station Via Stratford) when they said I should have gone Canning Town - Jub line to Bond Street then Central)

I had a similar problem doing West Hampstead to Covent GArden once. The reader decided I should have changed at Green Park, when this was in fact quite impossible due to Green Park being closed because of a fire alert!

[andypurk]

Sept 8, 2009 12:17:48 GMT suncloud said:

Surely yellow only, as they'll be only required for people changing from paper NR tickets to Oyster PAYG... Pink ones i think affect only the NLL services...

Well, they'll need some of each then Pink if coming from Central line, NLL, DLR or Tottenham Hale on the NXEA services. Yellow if coming from east of Stratford on NXEA.

[Tubeboy]

Whilst saving people money, doesnt these pink readers now just make Oyster even harder to understand for the punters, especially the ones who dont travel by tube that often.

[version3point1]

The western gateline at Stratford was originally installed for passengers who were starting/ending their Underground/Jubilee Line journeys from National Rail, instead of having to walk over the bridge to the main/eastern gateline. We did have PVLs (those standing readers) on the BR/Central platforms, but these stopped working/were de-comissioned at some point for whatever reason about 2 years ago.

Mainly for PAYG passengers, the western gateline has never been programmed to deduct to take money if you were interchanging, as your fare is calculated at the end of your journey. It only charged:
- if you were ending your Jubilee Line journey and hadn't touched in at your station of origin, thus incurring the penalty fare or
- if you were ending your Jubilee Line journey, changing onto National Rail, and had a valid entry, thus incurring the correct charge for your journey.

Those who interchanged at Stratford (and thus the gates were colloquially known on the group as 'interchange gates') to enter the Jubilee Line were shown their balance (minus the £4.00 charged at the start of the journey), but not the charge for the fare (which is always shown in brackets), thus causing many customers to panic and think they'd been charged the penalty fare. What a lot of people still don't seem to understand is that you are initially charged £4.00 at your station of origin as a sort of deposit, so if you don't touch out, then that's your penalty fare.

The amount of grief that gateline caused on a daily basis was immeasurable – I mean – try explaining all of this to some people... I'm glad that gateline is getting ripped out. Unfortunately, the usual morons have gotten so used to touching in/out there that now the gateline has been powered down and had red 'NOT IN USE' stickers placed on all the readers, they're complaining that the gates don't work now! After moaning all that time about the gates being there!

With regards to the current situation of touching in/touching out at Stratford west (as per instructions) – the only people who are required to use the PVLs are customers changing from NR to LU and vice versa.

It's still no excuse to buy a ticket without Zone 3 and think you can just breeze through Stratford without paying for it just because you're interchanging/it's convenient – revenue are not taking this as an excuse, as you couldn't use it as an excuse at another interchange station you don't have the correct zone fare for, and we do have regular revenue operations there.

[Deleted]

Why is there a barrier line to the Jubilee anyway, there's no barriers to the Central line?
Surely the barriers should be at the station entrance?

[Chris M]

There are barriers at the station entrance.

I presume that the only reason there are no barriers to the Central Line is because the cross-platform interchange with NR on platforms that aren't really wide enough at peak times means that they are completely impractical.

[Deleted]

Sept 15, 2009 16:52:17 GMT Chris M said:

There are barriers at the station entrance.

I presume that the only reason there are no barriers to the Central Line is because the cross-platform interchange with NR on platforms that aren't really wide enough at peak times means that they are completely impractical.

I really used the Central line as a comparison . My point really was why have barriers to one line when passengers without tickets can simply use the other, I've never seen any other interchange with barriers separating the lines.

[Deleted]

There used to be a set of barriers seperating the tube lines from the sub surface at Kings Cross.

I've always thought Stratford to have been an odd fish. Enter the station from say the shopping centre direction, pass through one set of barriers, up the escy, over the [former] NLL line, then either;

go straight on for the DLR or
go down the escy and turn right for the national rail or
go down and straight across [and through the barriers] for the Jubbly.

I once met a friend here, who'd come off the Main Line from Liverpool Street as the Central was up the spout. So, he'd already been docked £4 for the barriers at Liv. St. Touching in again on the jub barriers, he was docked another £4 [incurring a neggy balance] but upon him touching out and exiting at my local station, the system had corrected it all.

[Deleted]

Sept 15, 2009 18:24:37 GMT @jim said:

Sept 15, 2009 16:52:17 GMT Chris M said:

There are barriers at the station entrance.

I presume that the only reason there are no barriers to the Central Line is because the cross-platform interchange with NR on platforms that aren't really wide enough at peak times means that they are completely impractical.

I really used the Central line as a comparison . My point really was why have barriers to one line when passengers without tickets can simply use the other, I've never seen any other interchange with barriers separating the lines.

I agree with you, actually - it's never made sense to me either why they're at the Jubilee Line at Stratford.

Kings Cross (Hammersmith & City, Circle, Met) also had this setup for a while when changing between those lines and the rest of the system. Although I think there might not have been a main gateline then between the entirety of the LU station and the outside/NR station.
Edited to add: I note Artery Train Op has just beat me to it regarding Kings Cross.

[Deleted]

Pink readers, Yellow Readers.

I'm confused!