Canning Town

[Deleted]

A couple of questions regarding Canning Town station after the (hopefully soon!) implementation of the Stratford International route...

1. How does someone interchange between the existing DLR platforms and the new ones? Currently one goes down one level to the Jubilee Line, then down another to the Oyster gates. Is this going to be another example of touch-out-and-then-almost-immediately-back-in-again?

2. If someone arrives at Canning Town (eg by Jubilee Line) and wishes to travel towards Beckton or Woolwich Arsenal, how will they know which platform to choose?

[jswallow]

1. You'll still do that (go via downstairs), but it's all inside the paid area (i.e. no barriers are passed) so no touch-in/out needed.

2. That is the burning question. I would have thought some sort of screens would be down in the ticket hall (or I'd like to think that) but whether anything would be provided on the Jubilee platforms is another issue entirely.

[thirstquensher]

1. Exactly right - just like it was in Silverlink's day. AFAIK The same staircase will be used, which has been there all along, but with 'no entry' tape across it.

2. Ideally of course some sort of terminus-style DAISY display (or whatever the platform equivalent DMI is called) would be installed at the foot of each staircase to the existing DLR platforms, like what you find at Bank and Beckton - the difference from the usual ones being that each train entry is preceded by the platform number.

[Deleted]

This question has been put repeatedly and never answered, how people arriving at Canning Town on the Jubilee Line will know whether to go up or down from the platform. Given that visitors to the Excel Centre and City airport must give this transfer one of the highest proportions of unfamiliar users anywhere in London, it should be ripe for confusion.

It goes along with what the service provided will be. As there is no new rail corridor involved (because the new line from Canning Town to Stratford just duplicates the Jubilee Line alongside) there won't be any sudden rush of new custom, so the statements that there will be alternate services from each of the easten branches to both Stratford and Central London can, presumably, only be met by sending half the current trains to Stratford, and halving the service from each branch to the current, convenient platform at Canning Town.

I mean, can you imagine the current evening 10-minute service from Beckton, which is generally empty inbound to London after mid-evening, being doubled to every 5 minutes to serve each branch? No.

If there were to be an indicator provided on the Jubilee Line platform to help, it would surely have been installed and visible by now, even if blank for the time being, or just showing the current platform. So my guess is that whoever did the design ignored the passengers transferring from the Jubilee. My hunch is that the Stratford to Beckton and Woolwich trains will be astoundingly empty once everyone realises what a pain they are for connections at Canning Town.

Maybe it will be like the indicator installed a while ago at the foot of the steps at Royal Albert DLR station, the one put up facing the opposite way to the direction 95% of those approaching the station walk, so you have to make a dogleg to see it, or even to realise one is there. This stopped working some two weeks ago and has been blank ever since, it doubtless having been realised it's no use to anybody. So possibly one might be installed at Canning Town, high up on the roof of the station, facing upwards, for the benefit of those flying past on the approach to City Airport with very good eyesight.

Be assured, team, Auntie Diana's pen is poised for the start of the new trains. I do hope it can write positively about things.

[rincew1nd]

Jan 2, 2011 21:51:41 GMT @diana said:

Be assured, team, Auntie Diana's pen is poised for the start of the new trains. I do hope it can write positively about things.

I'm sure we all hang on every word.

[londonstuff]

Jan 2, 2011 21:59:59 GMT rincew1nd said:

Jan 2, 2011 21:51:41 GMT @diana said:

Be assured, team, Auntie Diana's pen is poised for the start of the new trains. I do hope it can write positively about things.

I'm sure we all hang on every word.

I agree with what Diana says!

Although I can't comment on the situation at Canning Town, what she's said about the Jubilee upgrade has simply highlighted the mess that passengers have had to cope with for the last three years. While I don't like the fact that Tube Lines, and therefore LU, messed up big time, it's the passengers and staff that have had to cope with the disruption. From that point of view her accounts should be used in the future of how not to do things - I really hope that the various line managers have read what she's put so that the same doesn't happen in the future.

Thank goodness there looks like there's light at the end of the tunnel.

</thread hijack - sorry>

[alex92ts]

It probably will be confusing at Canning Town having the two seperate areas for the DLR, but i'm not sure TfL can do anything to make it easier.

I know this is rather off-topic, but at Canning Town, i've noticed an abandoned pathway (looks like its from the 80s or 90s) by the riverside of the River Lea. Does anyone know what it was for and why it was closed? I'm doing alot of research on the regeneration of the Docklands, and I wanted to know what it was for. Thanks.

[Chris M]

There is an exit to this riverside path from Canning Town station, but it's been closed every time I've seen it. Curiously though it appeared the lift the other side of the closed doors looked like it was switched on the other day.

I know there are (or at least were) plans to redevelop the peninsula opposite the station, including a bridge over the river to the station that would link to this path. Given the scale of the plans, I wouldn't be surprised if they've been shelved due to the recession.

[Deleted]

Jan 2, 2011 22:26:42 GMT londonstuff said:

I agree with what Diana says!

Now what a pleasant gentleman Mr Londonstuff is !

alex92ts said:

I know this is rather off-topic, but at Canning Town, i've noticed an abandoned pathway (looks like its from the 80s or 90s) by the riverside of the River Lea.

This is where Mr Diana (another pleasant gentleman!) comes into the picture, as he is into this sort of historical industrial stuff (would be better concentrating on those weeds in our garden, but never mind), and when we were first here in Beckton, having spied this path from the DLR, he led one sunny Sunday an expedition of two (him in the lead, your intrepid reporter following) down to this path, which at the time looked like it had been very recently reworked, and had lighting, seats, etc. In fact there were notices up describing it as some sort of community scheme. You got to it from north of the A13. Haven't been down there since but it does indeed look like gates have been installed and you can't get there any more so the money spent seems wasted.

Chris said:

I know there are (or at least were) plans to redevelop the peninsula opposite the station

Now I can help you a bit here too, from our financial eyrie over in Canary Wharf, where colleagues were distantly involved with this one, and passing it daily (in fact we can readily see it from the east side of the staff restaurant) I was interested as well. The site of the old margarine factory there (my VERY FIRST moment stepping up onto the DLR platform at Canning Town, I sniffed the air and said to [the future, then] Mr Diana "uh-oh, margarine factory") was demolished and cleared away a few years ago, and a housebuilder started work on some substantially high apartment blocks (20-plus floors, several buildings), in fact they had to take into account the planes heading into the City Airport. Compared to say what has gone up alongside East India DLR station it looked a pleasant project. The project ("Leamouth Peninsula") used to be on the web, but seems to have disappeared. They have planning permission so it may well come back. They got a contractor in who started on the groundworks (I recall my colleagues told me this is the technical expression) but then work stopped, although there are some items left behind.

- Edited because I've just found an architect's image of the development, including the footbridge across to Canning Town station www.worldarchitecturenews.com/index.php?fuseaction=wanappln.projectview&upload_id=1097

Now I've got away from the original topic a bit as well, haven't I?

[Deleted]

Jan 2, 2011 21:51:41 GMT @diana said:

This question has been put repeatedly and never answered.

Yes it has.
DLR have stated that there will be new signage, screens with real time information and staff on hand to direct passengers to the right platform.

Be assured, team, Auntie Diana's pen is poised for the start of the new trains. I do hope it can write positively about things.

Well, on the positive side DLR are considering introducing 3 car trains on the Beckton branch from May.

All information from Newham Public Transport Liaison Group (agenda item 3)
mgov.newham.gov.uk/ieListDocuments.aspx?CId=781&MId=7761&Ver=4

[Chris M]

Aren't the Beckton-Blackwall trains going to be the ones diverted to Stratford International?