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Post by snoggle on Jan 16, 2017 9:08:08 GMT
Does anyone know what is happening to the Vic Line. We now seem to be getting a worsening frequency of signalling problems, track problems and rolling stock failures on the line. Coupled with unpredictable station closures affecting the north end of the line it is becoming a less trustworthy travel option.
Is there some underlying asset problem or issue with maintenance? It's not that long since the core upgrade was completed (I count 36 tph as a separate project) so declining reliability is not really what you'd expect to be seeing at this point in the line's post upgrade life cycle.
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hobbayne
RIP John Lennon and George Harrison
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Post by hobbayne on Jan 16, 2017 22:30:07 GMT
Maybe its the result of the night tube?
The Vic has always been a busy line and now there is less time for the bead and butter maintenance.
Dont know about the station closures, but there is an overtime ban at the moment with station staff.
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Post by blackhorsesteve on Jan 17, 2017 0:25:07 GMT
The Walthamstow MP Stella Creasy shared the below on Facebook following her interaction with TfL regarding the reliability and station closures:
"Walthamstow - I continue to be in regular contact with TFL about the problems with the Victoria Line. Below is an update on my discussions with them today about these issues - please share with others to keep them posted on what's happening so you can all plan your travel accordingly. Thank you!
On today's disruption (Monday 16th Jan) and Easter disruption:
TFL say they had problems at Euston which were technical i.e. with a rail which had to be fixed when it broke. They say this is very unusual as the Victoria line 'their best line' in terms of efficiency and infrastructure and don't believe today's incident is connected to any larger problem. Furthermore, I want to give residents advance notice that they have plans at Easter to increase the frequency of trains on our line to 36 per hour at peak times (and 30 trains an hour on a Saturday for longer too) To do that, they say they will need to close the line over the Easter Bank Holiday to upgrade the software the trains run on - so be aware it will be closed for four days then but you'll get a better service afterwards with more trains which run all the way to Walthamstow.
On Blackhorse Road and Sudden Station Closures:
TFL recognise the service residents in Walthamstow have had has not been good enough. They have given me the following statement about this, and Blackhorse Road station in particular, and their plans to invest in recruiting more staff to stop this happening and ensure there are enough staff to cover all the stations. This should kick in within the next few weeks and I'll be monitoring this and following up any unplanned closures too, so will be feeding back to residents via my weekly e-newsletter on this issue if there's any cause to believe these problems will not be resolved or there could be further closures.
"Regarding Blackhorse Road and nearby stations, we clearly have not offered the services that our customers expect or deserve. As you know we implemented our new station staffing model last April which is taking time to bed in. It is clear that the resourcing at Blackhorse Road and surrounding stations needs some adjustment. We have always intended to review staffing levels and have already started to recruit 200 extra staff and this is likely to increase further. The recruitment process will take some time, but I have instructed the team to prioritise the resource needs at Blackhorse Road and the surrounding stations to deliver the level of services our customer need. In the meantime, we have drawn up emergency plans to support the existing station staffing resources. Please bear with us as we continue to do all we can to keep the station open.""
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Post by londonstuff on Jan 17, 2017 0:37:02 GMT
The Walthamstow MP Stella Creasy shared the below on Facebook following her interaction with TfL regarding the reliability and station closures: "Walthamstow - I continue to be in regular contact with TFL about the problems with the Victoria Line. Below is an update on my discussions with them today about these issues - please share with others to keep them posted on what's happening so you can all plan your travel accordingly. Thank you! On today's disruption (Monday 16th Jan) and Easter disruption: TFL say they had problems at Euston which were technical i.e. with a rail which had to be fixed when it broke. They say this is very unusual as the Victoria line 'their best line' in terms of efficiency and infrastructure and don't believe today's incident is connected to any larger problem. Furthermore, I want to give residents advance notice that they have plans at Easter to increase the frequency of trains on our line to 36 per hour at peak times (and 30 trains an hour on a Saturday for longer too) To do that, they say they will need to close the line over the Easter Bank Holiday to upgrade the software the trains run on - so be aware it will be closed for four days then but you'll get a better service afterwards with more trains which run all the way to Walthamstow. On Blackhorse Road and Sudden Station Closures: TFL recognise the service residents in Walthamstow have had has not been good enough. They have given me the following statement about this, and Blackhorse Road station in particular, and their plans to invest in recruiting more staff to stop this happening and ensure there are enough staff to cover all the stations. This should kick in within the next few weeks and I'll be monitoring this and following up any unplanned closures too, so will be feeding back to residents via my weekly e-newsletter on this issue if there's any cause to believe these problems will not be resolved or there could be further closures. "Regarding Blackhorse Road and nearby stations, we clearly have not offered the services that our customers expect or deserve. As you know we implemented our new station staffing model last April which is taking time to bed in. It is clear that the resourcing at Blackhorse Road and surrounding stations needs some adjustment. We have always intended to review staffing levels and have already started to recruit 200 extra staff and this is likely to increase further. The recruitment process will take some time, but I have instructed the team to prioritise the resource needs at Blackhorse Road and the surrounding stations to deliver the level of services our customer need. In the meantime, we have drawn up emergency plans to support the existing station staffing resources. Please bear with us as we continue to do all we can to keep the station open."" Without getting into politics at all - it sounds like she's a pretty active MP. However, with the first bit that BHS has quoted, at the very least it sounds like she's poking her nose in to things not particularly to do with her - the issue at Euston - and recycling the news as something she's done. Similarly in the information about the increase in trains per hour - 'I want to give residents notice that...' - that's not her job! <eye roll emoji> |
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Post by snoggle on Jan 17, 2017 0:49:19 GMT
The Walthamstow MP Stella Creasy shared the below on Facebook following her interaction with TfL regarding the reliability and station closures: "Walthamstow - I continue to be in regular contact with TFL about the problems with the Victoria Line. Below is an update on my discussions with them today about these issues - please share with others to keep them posted on what's happening so you can all plan your travel accordingly. Thank you! On today's disruption (Monday 16th Jan) and Easter disruption: TFL say they had problems at Euston which were technical i.e. with a rail which had to be fixed when it broke. They say this is very unusual as the Victoria line 'their best line' in terms of efficiency and infrastructure and don't believe today's incident is connected to any larger problem. Furthermore, I want to give residents advance notice that they have plans at Easter to increase the frequency of trains on our line to 36 per hour at peak times (and 30 trains an hour on a Saturday for longer too) To do that, they say they will need to close the line over the Easter Bank Holiday to upgrade the software the trains run on - so be aware it will be closed for four days then but you'll get a better service afterwards with more trains which run all the way to Walthamstow. On Blackhorse Road and Sudden Station Closures: TFL recognise the service residents in Walthamstow have had has not been good enough. They have given me the following statement about this, and Blackhorse Road station in particular, and their plans to invest in recruiting more staff to stop this happening and ensure there are enough staff to cover all the stations. This should kick in within the next few weeks and I'll be monitoring this and following up any unplanned closures too, so will be feeding back to residents via my weekly e-newsletter on this issue if there's any cause to believe these problems will not be resolved or there could be further closures. "Regarding Blackhorse Road and nearby stations, we clearly have not offered the services that our customers expect or deserve. As you know we implemented our new station staffing model last April which is taking time to bed in. It is clear that the resourcing at Blackhorse Road and surrounding stations needs some adjustment. We have always intended to review staffing levels and have already started to recruit 200 extra staff and this is likely to increase further. The recruitment process will take some time, but I have instructed the team to prioritise the resource needs at Blackhorse Road and the surrounding stations to deliver the level of services our customer need. In the meantime, we have drawn up emergency plans to support the existing station staffing resources. Please bear with us as we continue to do all we can to keep the station open."" Thanks for sharing that as I'm not on Facebook and don't follow Ms Creasey on Twitter / via the web. Shame that she's been misinformed about the Easter closure. The Planned Closures list shows the line closed for 2 days not 4. I can't believe that TfL would shut the Vic for 4 days over Easter. Even 2 is going to be a bit of a stretch with people returning on the Monday evening from weekends away. I see it was a broken rail. I thought it had to be given a partial line suspension for 5.5 hours. Only something that catastrophic, in failure terms, would necessitate that scale of intervention. It's a bit ridiculous that I have to get this info via my MP via social media and a transport forum. I know LU put out an apology but why don't they say what actually failed? Might help people understand the seriousness of the problem. I am not sure I believe it is a "one off". There have been repeated problems for weeks with signals, points and rolling stock failures. A broken rail is just a more serious failing in a litany of problems. I asked the Line Manager when she was last on Twitter if there was a "trend". She said not but I'm very sceptical that you can get so many one off or random problems but with an increasing regularity. The odd one weeks apart then OK but that's not what is happening. Something is amiss somewhere - we're just in the denial stage at the moment and then eventually the engineers will go "erm, actually yes we changed this, that and the other thing and erm we've got worsening trends now". Seen it before on more than one line. So, essentially, it's a great big cock up on staffing at the North End of the line and we just have to put up with up and hope for the best in the meantime. Marvellous. I expect any permanent resolution is linked into solving the "ticket office" dispute so we could be either days or months away from a resolution depending on who digs their heels in the most. Thank goodness I am not commuting any more and can be more selective as to when I use the line. Pity the poor souls who have no option. |
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Post by snoggle on Jan 17, 2017 1:03:15 GMT
Without getting into politics at all - it sounds like she's a pretty active MP. However, with the first bit that BHS has quoted, at the very least it sounds like she's poking her nose in to things not particularly to do with her - the issue at Euston - and recycling the news as something she's done. Similarly in the information about the increase in trains per hour - 'I want to give residents notice that...' - that's not her job! <eye roll emoji> She is active to be fair. She has established contacts with TfL. I suspect she got a shedload of social media feedback and complaint about the service from constituents. There are plenty of social media grumbles about the station closures issue and I'd not be astonished if she hasn't been inconvenienced directly by those issues. It's entirely legitimate that *someone* puts TfL on the spot about the shambolic service and unpredictable impact for people. We've had a game of "swapsie" going on between BH Road and Tott Hale recently. They close one to keep the other open and then halfway through a shift it swaps round. If I was an Essex or Herts resident who regularly went through T Hale to connect with the main line I'd be livid never mind us poor souls who use these stations to get a bus / walk home. The screams would have been even worse if the GOBLIN was open and we need to recognise that once it does reopen in a few weeks the inconvenience factor from a station closure will rocket. There is also the small issue of the local staff needing to be familiarised on the new lift(s) to the GOBLIN platforms - assuming they are finished in time for end Feb. People will not be amused if they fail and no one is around to assist. While I sort of accept your point about whether she should be doing TfL's job I would point out that the volume of promotional "fluff" or even helpful info from TfL has plummeted in recent weeks. I suspect this is deliberate and reflects the change in Mayoralty but also cutbacks in Head Office staff. I doubt many people know that TfL even has a planned closures list or where to find it. TfL / LU have not said very much at all about the 36 tph initiative publicly and there have been no Project / Investment reports to the TfL Board for almost a year. Therefore even those of us in "tfl geekery" mode have no source of official information to refer to for major project progress. I don't see that as a step forward nor in keeping with statements made during the Mayoral campaign and subsequently. If TfL won't / can't tell people what they are doing then I don't object to my MP telling her constituents. |
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Post by 35b on Jan 17, 2017 7:59:26 GMT
The Walthamstow MP Stella Creasy shared the below on Facebook following her interaction with TfL regarding the reliability and station closures: "Walthamstow - I continue to be in regular contact with TFL about the problems with the Victoria Line. Below is an update on my discussions with them today about these issues - please share with others to keep them posted on what's happening so you can all plan your travel accordingly. Thank you! On today's disruption (Monday 16th Jan) and Easter disruption: TFL say they had problems at Euston which were technical i.e. with a rail which had to be fixed when it broke. They say this is very unusual as the Victoria line 'their best line' in terms of efficiency and infrastructure and don't believe today's incident is connected to any larger problem. Furthermore, I want to give residents advance notice that they have plans at Easter to increase the frequency of trains on our line to 36 per hour at peak times (and 30 trains an hour on a Saturday for longer too) To do that, they say they will need to close the line over the Easter Bank Holiday to upgrade the software the trains run on - so be aware it will be closed for four days then but you'll get a better service afterwards with more trains which run all the way to Walthamstow. On Blackhorse Road and Sudden Station Closures: TFL recognise the service residents in Walthamstow have had has not been good enough. They have given me the following statement about this, and Blackhorse Road station in particular, and their plans to invest in recruiting more staff to stop this happening and ensure there are enough staff to cover all the stations. This should kick in within the next few weeks and I'll be monitoring this and following up any unplanned closures too, so will be feeding back to residents via my weekly e-newsletter on this issue if there's any cause to believe these problems will not be resolved or there could be further closures. "Regarding Blackhorse Road and nearby stations, we clearly have not offered the services that our customers expect or deserve. As you know we implemented our new station staffing model last April which is taking time to bed in. It is clear that the resourcing at Blackhorse Road and surrounding stations needs some adjustment. We have always intended to review staffing levels and have already started to recruit 200 extra staff and this is likely to increase further. The recruitment process will take some time, but I have instructed the team to prioritise the resource needs at Blackhorse Road and the surrounding stations to deliver the level of services our customer need. In the meantime, we have drawn up emergency plans to support the existing station staffing resources. Please bear with us as we continue to do all we can to keep the station open."" Without getting into politics at all - it sounds like she's a pretty active MP. However, with the first bit that BHS has quoted, at the very least it sounds like she's poking her nose in to things not particularly to do with her - the issue at Euston - and recycling the news as something she's done. Similarly in the information about the increase in trains per hour - 'I want to give residents notice that...' - that's not her job! <eye roll emoji> Absolutely reasonable for her to - her constituents use the line to get to work. If she gets PR out of it, good for her. Various MPs for Putney have done similar about the crossover at Earls Court, over the last 25 years As for the information, I hadmthe misfortune to need the Victoria Line at 8:20 yesterday. Information was completely lacking and, by the time I'd taken the Northern via London Bridge, I knew thanks to last week's strike that I could have walked to Waterloo faster. |
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North End
Beneath Newington Causeway
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Post by North End on Jan 17, 2017 17:30:51 GMT
As you know we implemented our new station staffing model last April which is taking time to bed in. It is clear that the resourcing at Blackhorse Road and surrounding stations needs some adjustment." Absolute garbage from TFL. TFL got things wrong with the design and implementation of its new staffing model, hence why we are now seeing station closures on a regular basis. Having stations open at the published times is one of TFL's core functions, like running the timetable, so it's simply unacceptable for station closures to be the result of an operational change conceived, designed and implemented by TFL, wholly within their control and remit. Have any senior staff associated with this new station staffing model been held accountable for their failure? |
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Jan 17, 2017 20:22:20 GMT
No the mayor still in power
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Post by superteacher on Jan 17, 2017 21:52:28 GMT
No the mayor still in power Was this really down to him though? |
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Post by snoggle on Jan 17, 2017 22:23:35 GMT
No the mayor still in power Eh? The previous Mayor supported the policy which closed ticket offices and reduced staffing. He was lucky enough to escape from office before an overtime ban was imposed which exposed some of the flaws of the policy he endorsed. I understand there are a load of other issues that have affected staff and morale but these haven't hit the headlines / obviously impacted lots of passengers. To be fair the new Mayor asked for a review, got it done, accepted the recommendations and also accepted staffing levels needed to rise. He didn't have to do this and I'd venture to suggest if a different candidate had won there'd have been no review and no desire to increase staffing levels. Looking in from the outside it seems to me that the assumptions underlying the new model were too aggressive and this has resulted in a fragile staffing situation that can't cope if overtime is not worked at high levels. I've not been directly affected by a station closure *but* I have decided not to travel at all in order to avoid them. I have that flexibility but oodles of people don't and are having their journeys mucked up. The one issue where I would criticise the current Mayor is that he's not handled the strike at all well, had set himself up for a fall during the campaign and has given all the wrong signals to the unions that LU are likely to concede in order to avoid more grief for him as Mayor. That's just a daft place to get to when dealing with the tube unions - they can smell weakness at a 1,000 paces. Managing to get embroiled in the aftermath of your predecessor's failed policy is not a good place for Mr Khan but showing weakness sets up problems for the next 4 years over pay, terms and conditions and the deliver of any more efficiencies that LU have decided they need to make that affect staff. |
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Post by will on Jan 18, 2017 16:35:02 GMT
Unreliable today as yet again there is a major issue on the line a signal failure first reported at 1:30 and it's now been going on for 3 hours. Surprised they haven't called it "emergency engineering works". It also doesn't help that the Piccadilly has its own delays due to a customer incident.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Jan 18, 2017 20:35:22 GMT
All track circuits are remotely monitored on the Vic and flag up warnings when they are about to fail
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Post by Deleted on Jan 18, 2017 20:35:55 GMT
No the mayor still in power Eh? The previous Mayor supported the policy which closed ticket offices and reduced staffing. He was lucky enough to escape from office before an overtime ban was imposed which exposed some of the flaws of the policy he endorsed. I understand there are a load of other issues that have affected staff and morale but these haven't hit the headlines / obviously impacted lots of passengers. To be fair the new Mayor asked for a review, got it done, accepted the recommendations and also accepted staffing levels needed to rise. He didn't have to do this and I'd venture to suggest if a different candidate had won there'd have been no review and no desire to increase staffing levels. Looking in from the outside it seems to me that the assumptions underlying the new model were too aggressive and this has resulted in a fragile staffing situation that can't cope if overtime is not worked at high levels. I've not been directly affected by a station closure *but* I have decided not to travel at all in order to avoid them. I have that flexibility but oodles of people don't and are having their journeys mucked up. The one issue where I would criticise the current Mayor is that he's not handled the strike at all well, had set himself up for a fall during the campaign and has given all the wrong signals to the unions that LU are likely to concede in order to avoid more grief for him as Mayor. That's just a daft place to get to when dealing with the tube unions - they can smell weakness at a 1,000 paces. Managing to get embroiled in the aftermath of your predecessor's failed policy is not a good place for Mr Khan but showing weakness sets up problems for the next 4 years over pay, terms and conditions and the deliver of any more efficiencies that LU have decided they need to make that affect staff. maybe a wrong comment to make  |
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Post by metrider on Jan 18, 2017 21:32:37 GMT
Unreliable today as yet again there is a major issue on the line a signal failure first reported at 1:30 and it's now been going on for 3 hours. Surprised they haven't called it "emergency engineering works"..... I avoided the Vic on my journey home tonight, and instead ended my journey via the District at Sloane Square and walked from there.. As the District train passed through Victoria (c. 18:10?), an announcement that there were no southbound Vics gave the reason as a "broken rail". |
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Post by superteacher on Jan 18, 2017 21:34:50 GMT
Let's hope they can sort the issues out before the 36tph upgrade!
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Post by will on Jan 18, 2017 22:18:14 GMT
Let's hope they can sort the issues out before the 36tph upgrade! It will be carnage if they don't as it's bad enough now when delays are still severe hours sometimes after the issue has been resolved. For them to introduce 36tph running how man extra trains will be needed for service and how many run now isn't it 39 in the peaks? |
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Post by superteacher on Jan 18, 2017 22:22:56 GMT
Let's hope they can sort the issues out before the 36tph upgrade! It will be carnage if they don't as it's bad enough now when delays are still severe hours sometimes after the issue has been resolved. For them to introduce 36tph running how man extra trains will be needed for service and how many run now isn't it 39 in the peaks? I believe it'll be 43 trains for peak service. |
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rincew1nd
Administrator
Junior Under-wizzard of quiz
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Post by rincew1nd on Jan 18, 2017 23:06:20 GMT
Let's hope they can sort the issues out before the 36tph upgrade! It will be carnage if they don't as it's bad enough now when delays are still severe hours sometimes after the issue has been resolved. For them to introduce 36tph running how man extra trains will be needed for service and how many run now isn't it 39 in the peaks? I wonder if the delays in recovering the service are mainly due to Train Op's being out of position and/or needing relieving. |
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Post by snoggle on Jan 19, 2017 1:54:19 GMT
Let's hope they can sort the issues out before the 36tph upgrade! Let's hope they can acknowledge they *have* issues before the 36 tph upgrade. Even looking in at a distance I can see there are too many things going wrong on an increasing frequency. I wonder if someone hasn't spotted that the sheer service intensity is creating problems with asset wear and stress that the inspection regime isn't identifying fast enough. Two broken rails in under a week - that's not good even if it was at network level. On one line and not very far apart is pretty unusual. Thankfully I've not see the Vic Line peak for a long time but the off peak is noticeably busier as the high frequency daily service has really pulled in the punters. The scale of disruption from any delay of more than 10 minutes or so must be enormous now regardless of time of day / day of the week (barring the night tube). |
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Post by 35b on Jan 19, 2017 7:13:10 GMT
Let's hope they can sort the issues out before the 36tph upgrade! Let's hope they can acknowledge they *have* issues before the 36 tph upgrade. Even looking in at a distance I can see there are too many things going wrong on an increasing frequency. I wonder if someone hasn't spotted that the sheer service intensity is creating problems with asset wear and stress that the inspection regime isn't identifying fast enough. Two broken rails in under a week - that's not good even if it was at network level. On one line and not very far apart is pretty unusual. Thankfully I've not see the Vic Line peak for a long time but the off peak is noticeably busier as the high frequency daily service has really pulled in the punters. The scale of disruption from any delay of more than 10 minutes or so must be enormous now regardless of time of day / day of the week (barring the night tube). On Monday morning, as the incident was developing, I had to wait for the fourth Northern Line train before I could board. |
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Post by philthetube on Jan 19, 2017 8:08:59 GMT
It will be carnage if they don't as it's bad enough now when delays are still severe hours sometimes after the issue has been resolved. For them to introduce 36tph running how man extra trains will be needed for service and how many run now isn't it 39 in the peaks? I wonder if the delays in recovering the service are mainly due to Train Op's being out of position and/or needing relieving. once the service is running on the vic, it should, with renumbering be possible to recover quickly, even more than most lines as nearly all trains end up at the same place at the close of traffic. Issues with train ops bieng out of position would still be the same even if they were not train ops, thee is no chance of the Vic running unstaffed. A possible solution, though it may be expensive, would be to dispense with the timetable, send a train out, when it gets back send it again, either with the same driver or a replacement as needed. The major problem with this is close of traffic, getting the right staff on the right trains without paying large numbers who have nothing to do. |
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Post by aslefshrugged on Jan 19, 2017 10:25:47 GMT
A Victoria Line driver told me that both Monday and yesterday the issue was a broken rail with the one at Brixton requiring several attempts to fix it.
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Post by alpinejohn on Jan 19, 2017 15:05:12 GMT
It will be carnage if they don't as it's bad enough now when delays are still severe hours sometimes after the issue has been resolved. For them to introduce 36tph running how man extra trains will be needed for service and how many run now isn't it 39 in the peaks? I believe it'll be 43 trains for peak service. I think the order from Bombardier was for 47 new Victoria line trains, so if they need 43 available to run the planned peak service will 4 (8.5%) spare trains provide adequate margin for maintenance, training and any other predictable demands? I guess with relatively new trains, the Victoria line would make a good test bed to determine just how many spare trains are actually needed to deliver a reliable peak service. Which poses the question of whether that ratio can then be used when it comes to re-equipping other lines with the new deep tube stock. I rather doubt there would however be scope to reduce the overall number of trains required even if totally identical trains are going to be operating on several lines, without some sort of policy to consolidate maintenance depots. |
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Post by 100andthirty on Jan 19, 2017 19:37:23 GMT
I don't know for sure how many trains are needed for 36TPH, but I reckon that it'll be about 41. Given that the original estimate which led to the 47 train order was that 43 trains would be needed for a 33TPH service, delivering 36TPH at all is pretty good.
When LU specified the JTC for VLU, it kept a performance margin for itself. Metronet in turn kept a small margin for itself as did Bombardier and Westinghouse (Invensys). All these margins were provided in case something went wrong with the design as the financial penalties for failure to deliver the performance were significant.
So, it might be reasonable to consider when more could be done with a couple of extra trains. I'm confident that good use can be found for them.....38TPH anyone?
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Post by will on Jan 19, 2017 20:40:37 GMT
I don't know for sure how many trains are needed for 36TPH, but I reckon that it'll be about 41. Given that the original estimate which led to the 47 train order was that 43 trains would be needed for a 33TPH service, delivering 36TPH at all is pretty good. When LU specified the JTC for VLU, it kept a performance margin for itself. Metronet in turn kept a small margin for itself as did Bombardier and Westinghouse (Invensys). All these margins were provided in case something went wrong with the design as the financial penalties for failure to deliver the performance were significant. So, it might be reasonable to consider when more could be done with a couple of extra trains. I'm confident that good use can be found for them.....38TPH anyone? Wasn't it 43 trains that used to run the original Victoria Line service, based on that an extra 4 trains to run 8/9 trains an hour extra certainly isn't bad. Did they plan for the upgrade to run 36tph all along or was this just a desire due to the availability of extra trains?
When they introduce 36tph running and when it eventually settles down as long as the station platforms are able to clear there isn't any reason why they couldn't run a more frequent service. They could utilise the extra trains and squeeze 37tph or run even 38tph even if it was just for an hour in the peak of the peaks. The infrastructure can support it as the signals can cope with a train every 90 seconds and 36tph is a train every 100. The only issue would be weather Walthamstow and Brixton can support it.
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Post by snoggle on Jan 19, 2017 23:11:38 GMT
I don't know for sure how many trains are needed for 36TPH, but I reckon that it'll be about 41. Given that the original estimate which led to the 47 train order was that 43 trains would be needed for a 33TPH service, delivering 36TPH at all is pretty good. When LU specified the JTC for VLU, it kept a performance margin for itself. Metronet in turn kept a small margin for itself as did Bombardier and Westinghouse (Invensys). All these margins were provided in case something went wrong with the design as the financial penalties for failure to deliver the performance were significant. So, it might be reasonable to consider when more could be done with a couple of extra trains. I'm confident that good use can be found for them.....38TPH anyone? Wasn't it 43 trains that used to run the original Victoria Line service, based on that an extra 4 trains to run 8/9 trains an hour extra certainly isn't bad. Did they plan for the upgrade to run 36tph all along or was this just a desire due to the availability of extra trains?
When they introduce 36tph running and when it eventually settles down as long as the station platforms are able to clear there isn't any reason why they couldn't run a more frequent service. They could utilise the extra trains and squeeze 37tph or run even 38tph even if it was just for an hour in the peak of the peaks. The infrastructure can support it as the signals can cope with a train every 90 seconds and 36tph is a train every 100. The only issue would be weather Walthamstow and Brixton can support it.
Stretching my memory back I don't think there was ever an intention to run 36 tph. Upgrade requirements were expressed as a journey time capability target which could be met by a combination of factors with differing weights applied to different elements within the overall measure. The overall JTC though was composed in a way that stopped extremes being adopted - such as rolling stock that used enormous amounts of power to support very high acceleration / very rapid braking which would probably be very uncomfortable for standees or those a little wobbly on their feet. As 100&30 has said there were margins adopted by each party to the contract as risk allowances. Post PPP the JTC measure was not formally used as a "headline" for the upgrade project to achieve and "tph" re-emerged as the favoured headline to achieve. Being cynical this was probably because Directors couldn't understand JTC.  By utilising the "margins" previously reserved by other parties and with the benefit of a broadly successful implementation I expect LU considered that more could be done with the infrastructure subject to spending the requisite money to ease constraints like crossover speeds etc. I also think there was a general reassessment as to what was needed from each upgrade to meet forecast demand levels. I think this is where the more general approach of pushing to 30tph and beyond emerged from - happy to be corrected by those who know for certain. I'll be honest and say that I think pushing beyond 36tph is a bit risky. This is purely on the basis that you need everything to run like clockwork and extremely strict dwell time management. There must be a trade-off at some point between sheer throughput and the resilience of the service and also the ability to recover it when things go wrong. We also need to remember past incidents with stalled trains in tunnels and sub optimal decisions re evacuation from such trains. The Vic Line has had a lot of money spent on tunnel ventilation and other things to try to get tunnel temperatures down thus reducing the risk of extreme conditions in stalled trains. Nonetheless there is a need to balance things. As I have bemoaned before there is no long term strategy for the tube network nor for tube station capacity. Forever pushing massive numbers of trains through platforms has an impact on the ability for stations to cope - as witnessed this past week when the Vic Line service fell over. We need to see a more coherent vision for the tube because what do you do when a 36 tph service is full and bursting. There are always more Crossrails but they are massively costly, take decades to develop and build (assuming no delays) and most likely only provide short term relief to the tube network that they parallel. We will know for certain come 2020/21 after a year or so of Crossrail operation how things are beginning to pan out - provided we haven't had World War 3 by then.  |
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Post by will on Jan 26, 2017 20:20:32 GMT
South of Victoria the line is now suspended due to a track fault at Vauxhall......
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By utilising the "margins" previously reserved by other parties and with the benefit of a broadly successful implementation I expect LU considered that more could be done with the infrastructure subject to spending the requisite money to ease constraints like crossover speeds etc. I also think there was a general reassessment as to what was needed from each upgrade to meet forecast demand levels. I think this is where the more general approach of pushing to 30tph and beyond emerged from - happy to be corrected by those who know for certain.
