class411
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Post by class411 on Jan 27, 2022 10:00:23 GMT
A very welcome initiative has been announced to 'declutter' PA messages on trains.
Whilst I don't think LU are anyway near as bad as some NR operators there may well be room for improvement.
I know everyone is different, but when I'm on an unfamiliar metro, the only announcements I need are the train's destination and the next/currant stop. Those, together with an in-carriage diagram are all that is needed to ensure that you are on the correct line, going in the correct direction, and getting off at the correct station.
Is it really necessary to give the 'change here' information at every station where there is an interchange? Do people really get on a train with the vague idea that it will take them to an interchange and yet not know which station to use?
For normal operations, the stop to stop sequence (e.g.):
"This is a District line train to Richmond" <via if necessary> .... "The next station is Victoria" <doors inoperative message if relevant> (when stopped) "This is Victoria" ... "Victoria".
Would seem ideal, giving passengers sufficient information to ensure they are on the correct train and are approaching/have arrived at their destination without the excessive droning of the PA.
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class411
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Post by class411 on Jan 27, 2022 10:34:45 GMT
Doubtless regulars will not be at all phased when a train gets held by signals, however there is a finite time beyond which some people do start getting agitated. This AIB link www.gov.uk/government/publications/safety-digest-092019-north-pole-junction/passengers-self-evacuating-at-north-pole-junction-15-july-2019mentions several instances where passenger agitation can eventually result in some making potentially dangerous decisions - even going so far as forcing doors open and self evacuating onto tracks where the power rail may potentially be still live. The ability to issue a timely automated message can greatly reassure passengers that the driver is alert to the delay, and allow the driver to focus on communicating with signallers and getting any problem resolved swiftly. Indeed as the new tube rolling stock is being designed with at least passive provision for eventual automated operation - I suspect that reassurance messages will be of even greater value if we ever reach the point of these trains operating without a driver onboard. However by the time any Tube trains actually switch to automated operation, doubtless someone will have done some research to determine what notices are really needed(work), especially given several fully automated transit systems will by then have been operating elsewhere for many years and well placed to advise. As ChrisM stated, we have covered this before, but I know agreement was not reached. My contention that telling passengers that a train that has stopped between stations is being held at a red signal is pointless and almost facetious was met with the following counter arguments. 1) They asked passengers what they wanted and this was the result. Quite frankly, this is nonsense. I do not believe for one second that even a good minority of people, if asked if they wanted to be told that a train was stopped at a signal after 30 seconds had stopped at a signal, would reply 'yes'. It's far more likely that they were asked: 'Would you like more information when the train is stopped', to which they replied 'yes', and when that went down to the people who actually had to implement the 'improvement', they realised that they couldn't really come up with a good scheme to provide useful information, so they came up with what we have now. 2) (In response to my assertion that telling people a train stopped between stations was being held at a signal was 'stating the bleeding obvious'): Not everyone is familiar with railways or knows that the stop at signals. Again, this verges on the facetious. If someone has so little idea about railways that they don't know about signals, what on earth is the point of telling them that the train is stopped at one? 3) It reassures passengers After the last discussion on this topic, I've made a point of looking around each time a train stops between stations, and not once have I seen anyone show any signs of anxiety. Why would they? Even if they did, a more explanatory message such as "we are waiting for trains ahead of us/waiting for a platform to become available', would be far more reassuring to anyone who didn't know what a signal was. What does reassure people is when the driver makes an announcement that actually tells passengers why the train has been stopped for an unusual length of time. The 'train is held at a red signal' smacks of a 'something must be done, this is something, let's do it' mentality. |
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Post by aslefshrugged on Jan 27, 2022 11:50:11 GMT
Does anyone on here know a "visually impaired person" (VIP) whose opinion on announcements might be somewhat different to those of us with reasonable eyesight? Would reducing announcements be in line with the Equality Act 2010?
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Post by t697 on Jan 27, 2022 12:04:33 GMT
RVAR applies to LUL trains. It specifies the information that has to be given in both visual and audio form so that no-one should be disadvantaged.
Other information is not regulated, so is not compulsory. There are some other bits of information that LUL Standards specify such as giving interchange information to other lines.
There's not actually a whole lot of routine journey messaging to remove from LUL trains under this 'bonfire of banalities'. However it does suggest more moderation in the frequency of other messages. Perhaps the current instructions about how soon and often the 'stopped at red signal' is given will be reviewed. And how many RTI messages are used on the Vic and SSR.
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class411
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Post by class411 on Jan 27, 2022 12:13:16 GMT
Does anyone on here know a "visually impaired person" (VIP) whose opinion on announcements might be somewhat different to those of us with reasonable eyesight? Would reducing announcements be in line with the Equality Act 2010? That's a very good point. Any changes must take account of visual and auditory impairment - although I'm sure that LU are well on top of that. I don't think that the 'change here' information would be any more useful to a visually impaired person than to a normally sighted one. In fact, making room for a very clear "This is XXXXX" would most likely be of benefit. Issuing 'change here' messages would only really seem to benefit someone who gets on a train at random, hoping it will take them where they want to go - and that would be absurd. Surely, when undertaking an underground (or any other) railway journey, the prime thing in the passenger's mind is: "I must get off at XXXX". And surely, cutting down on as much extraneous clutter so that the station announcement stands out would be the best way to help everybody. And having the station name displayed on arrival would be of great assistance to hearing impaired people who tend to be forgotten. |
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class411
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Post by class411 on Jan 27, 2022 12:22:56 GMT
RVAR applies to LUL trains. It specifies the information that has to be given in both visual and audio form so that no-one should be disadvantaged. Other information is not regulated, so is not compulsory. There are some other bits of information that LUL Standards specify such as giving interchange information to other lines. There's not actually a whole lot of routine journey messaging to remove from LUL trains under this 'bonfire of banalities'. However it does suggest more moderation in the frequency of other messages. Perhaps the current instructions about how soon and often the 'stopped at red signal' is given will be reviewed. And how many RTI messages are used on the Vic and SSR. It would be better if the 'train is stopped' message was delayed, but the real problem is the utter uselessness of the message. If the driver could select between a few messages such as: "We are waiting for the train ahead and should be moving shortly" "There is a problem ahead and there will be a short delay" "There is a major problem ahead and there may be a significant delay - we will try to get to a station as soon as possible" would actually give passengers some useful information - as I suspect that the sample questioned in the research alluded to in another thread covering this topic expected when asked if they wanted more information. |
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Post by t697 on Jan 27, 2022 12:35:17 GMT
RVAR applies to LUL trains. It specifies the information that has to be given in both visual and audio form so that no-one should be disadvantaged. Other information is not regulated, so is not compulsory. There are some other bits of information that LUL Standards specify such as giving interchange information to other lines. There's not actually a whole lot of routine journey messaging to remove from LUL trains under this 'bonfire of banalities'. However it does suggest more moderation in the frequency of other messages. Perhaps the current instructions about how soon and often the 'stopped at red signal' is given will be reviewed. And how many RTI messages are used on the Vic and SSR. It would be better if the 'train is stopped' message was delayed, but the real problem is the utter uselessness of the message. If the driver could select between a few messages such as: "We are waiting for the train ahead and should be moving shortly" "There is a problem ahead and there will be a short delay" "There is a major problem ahead and there may be a significant delay - we will try to get to a station as soon as possible" would actually give passengers some useful information - as I suspect that the sample questioned in the research alluded to in another thread covering this topic expected when asked if they wanted more information. On S stock the T/Op can vary it a bit using these and other pre-recorded messages available to them;
"Due to an incident on the line, you may experience some delay to your journey. London Underground apologises for any inconvenience caused." "This train is being held here awaiting a vacant platform at the station ahead. Please await further announcements." "This train is being held at a red signal owing to congestion ahead. Please await further announcements." as well as the ever annoying; "This train is being held at a red signal and should be moving shortly."
Or of course make a manual PA announcement if they have better information, but of course that won't appear on the display screens as the train doesn't have speech to text conversion.
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class411
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Post by class411 on Jan 27, 2022 12:50:22 GMT
It would be better if the 'train is stopped' message was delayed, but the real problem is the utter uselessness of the message. If the driver could select between a few messages such as: "We are waiting for the train ahead and should be moving shortly" "There is a problem ahead and there will be a short delay" "There is a major problem ahead and there may be a significant delay - we will try to get to a station as soon as possible" would actually give passengers some useful information - as I suspect that the sample questioned in the research alluded to in another thread covering this topic expected when asked if they wanted more information. On S stock the T/Op can vary it a bit using these and other pre-recorded messages available to them; "Due to an incident on the line, you may experience some delay to your journey. London Underground apologises for any inconvenience caused." "This train is being held here awaiting a vacant platform at the station ahead. Please await further announcements." "This train is being held at a red signal owing to congestion ahead. Please await further announcements." as well as the ever annoying; "This train is being held at a red signal and should be moving shortly." Or of course make a manual PA announcement if they have better information, but of course that won't appear on the display screens as the train doesn't have speech to text conversion. And yet the only one of those I've ever heard - and I've heard a lot - (apart from the useless one) is the 'vacant platform' one, and that was a manual message by the driver. But to be clear, it's only the useless one that I (and those I've asked who've expressed an opinion) object to. Unlike the others it adds no information to what we already know, or can easily deduce. If LU increased the delay before the message to allow the driver to find out what the problem is, and removed the useless message, it would be a major improvement - in fact, it would be near perfect. |
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Colin
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Post by Colin on Jan 27, 2022 14:30:30 GMT
On S stock the T/Op can vary it a bit using these and other pre-recorded messages available to them; "Due to an incident on the line, you may experience some delay to your journey. London Underground apologises for any inconvenience caused." "This train is being held here awaiting a vacant platform at the station ahead. Please await further announcements." "This train is being held at a red signal owing to congestion ahead. Please await further announcements." as well as the ever annoying; "This train is being held at a red signal and should be moving shortly." Or of course make a manual PA announcement if they have better information, but of course that won't appear on the display screens as the train doesn't have speech to text conversion. Whilst they are available to us, we are actively discouraged from using them by management. The reassurance PA's (those annoying one's we do when sat at red signals) are supposed to be done manually with our own voice 'to reassure customers that everything is normal and we are in control'. Anyway, in the interests of a balanced discussion I think some context is required here. Whilst I quite agree that the idea some survey arrived at the conclusion that the travelling public want us to reassure them every single time we experience a brief delay is questionable, it should be noted that these reassurance PA's came about as a direct response to 7/7. At that time the travelling public were nervous when trains stopped in tunnels between stations and having the driver come on the PA and essentially say "no worries folks, this is quite normal" was most likely quite welcome. 17 years later, is it still relevant? The terrorism threat has changed, and indeed Covid has caused its own change. Wi Fi is everywhere and access to information is improving. The railway is arguably a different environment now. I think its certainly right to pass on relevant information when the driver has it. Sometimes we are as literally in the dark as our passengers and so I suppose the simple rule of 'if you've got nothing interesting to say, don't bother saying anything' might be a good benchmark. But then again, if you leave it to driver discretion you will get a complete mix of standards. At least with the current system there is a basic standard. Bottom line though is that there are many different types of customer using the railway and they all have very different needs. It's impossible to find a one-size-fits-all solution! |
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Post by dm1 on Jan 27, 2022 15:20:44 GMT
I don't think that the "Change here for..." announcements are necessarily superfluous. They allow unfamiliar passengers to build an intuitive mental map of the network while they are travelling on it, that they can then use on future journeys. With a network as complex as the Underground, at least in my experience, it's quite helpful.
On LU I think a bigger problem is the dot matrix displays on the trains. The displays are quite small, but the announcements quite verbose, so it might be worth trying things like "Next Station: X", "Destination: Y", "Change for: A, B, C", where the bit before the colon is static and the bit after scrolling if necessary, and static if the station name is short enough to fit. That way the useful bit of the information would be on the display for much longer, rather than having to wait for "The next station is" to scroll past every time. In the audio announcements that phrase serves mainly to attract attention instead of using a chime, but on the visual displays it takes up space. As mentioned on another thread, the displays on the S-Stock going blank on approach to each station is also rather unhelpful.
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Post by sd826e on Jan 27, 2022 15:45:07 GMT
Does anyone on here know a "visually impaired person" (VIP) whose opinion on announcements might be somewhat different to those of us with reasonable eyesight? Would reducing announcements be in line with the Equality Act 2010? There's still the issue of waiting 30 seconds on some lines to find out where a train is going + 20% of the time this isn't possible until train departure. |
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Post by t697 on Jan 27, 2022 16:25:13 GMT
I don't think that the "Change here for..." announcements are necessarily superfluous. They allow unfamiliar passengers to build an intuitive mental map of the network while they are travelling on it, that they can then use on future journeys. With a network as complex as the Underground, at least in my experience, it's quite helpful. On LU I think a bigger problem is the dot matrix displays on the trains. The displays are quite small, but the announcements quite verbose, so it might be worth trying things like "Next Station: X", "Destination: Y", "Change for: A, B, C", where the bit before the colon is static and the bit after scrolling if necessary, and static if the station name is short enough to fit. That way the useful bit of the information would be on the display for much longer, rather than having to wait for "The next station is" to scroll past every time. In the audio announcements that phrase serves mainly to attract attention instead of using a chime, but on the visual displays it takes up space. As mentioned on another thread, the displays on the S-Stock going blank on approach to each station is also rather unhelpful. In my experience the worst LUL fleet for visual displays is the Northern line. The scroll speed is extremely slow and the messages too verbose. On the in town sections with multiple interchange messages and short inter station runs the messages often get behind the actuality and one is still being shown information about the station one has just left! It is wishful thinking to think this slow scroll speed is compatible with telling you about interchanges at 'this' station. By the time it's scrolled through, it's possibly too late to get off anyway. Reading about interchanges on the between stations display should be sufficient.
Similarly the Northern also tells you what the next station is whilst at a station (good) but also says 'Change here for xxx line.'. If you must display that at the previous station, at least put 'Change there for xxx line.'. It is too easy to glance up, read 'Change here for xxx' and dive off the train only to find you are on the platform a stop before the one you wanted.
Another point, a lot of comments have been posted about S stock screens blanking after the station approach message. I'd just note that the Northern line ones blank after the between stations message finishes next time after the station approach message which is audio only. Because the time to finish the scroll is random from the approach trigger, the blank time is variable but does mostly happen.
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Post by t697 on Jan 28, 2022 8:37:06 GMT
Whilst they [various driver triggerable pre-recorded announcements] are available to us, we are actively discouraged from using them by management. The reassurance PA's (those annoying one's we do when sat at red signals) are supposed to be done manually with our own voice 'to reassure customers that everything is normal and we are in control'. Bottom line though is that there are many different types of customer using the railway and they all have very different needs. It's impossible to find a one-size-fits-all solution! Big organisations are wonderful aren't they; Left hand: 'Engineers, you are required to provide this set of pre-recorded messages for T/Op selection on the trains.' Right hand: 'T/Ops, you are required not to use most of them.'
Fashions change. Under the current instructions it seems that the human touch of PA from the actual T/Op is seen as better than providing an admittedly slightly vague message in both audio and visual forms. Presumably the needs of hearing impaired passengers are less, or their numbers low enough as to be ignored?
Perhaps using both would be better? Or do we need to be thinking about speech to text?
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Post by cudsn15 on Jan 28, 2022 9:05:58 GMT
There is also a lot of inconsistency across the lines - no doubt because of the different systems in use due to age. Obviously the newer lines attempt reading the phone book at you between stations whilst the oldest give the absolute bare minimum. So already there is "discrimination" for want of a better word between passengers who use these different lines.
As a Victoria line user the amount of verbal diarrhoea - especially at weekends covering all the suspensions on the network - becomes incredibly tedious. Even then there are inconsistencies - sometimes giving accurate suspension information other times just saying a line is part suspended including the ubiquitous "London Overground is Part Suspended". The Victoria line interchanges with 5 different Overground lines!
And the repeating "x station has no step free access " at every stop it just creates aural fatigue and you end up not actually noting the messages but filtering them as background noise.
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Post by t697 on Jan 28, 2022 9:35:50 GMT
I agree. I don't know how limited the RTI library is on the Vic but on S stock one could trigger a more useful message such as 'London Overground is suspended between xxx and yyy.'. All stops served by any TfL rail borne services are in the library including trams.
And yes, these are generally added too liberally on the Vic at weekends. During a 4LM closure we were told about it at length on the Vic at every station across central London!
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class411
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Post by class411 on Jan 28, 2022 9:58:59 GMT
Whilst they [various driver triggerable pre-recorded announcements] are available to us, we are actively discouraged from using them by management. The reassurance PA's (those annoying one's we do when sat at red signals) are supposed to be done manually with our own voice 'to reassure customers that everything is normal and we are in control'. Bottom line though is that there are many different types of customer using the railway and they all have very different needs. It's impossible to find a one-size-fits-all solution! Big organisations are wonderful aren't they; Left hand: 'Engineers, you are required to provide this set of pre-recorded messages for T/Op selection on the trains.' Right hand: 'T/Ops, you are required not to use most of them.' Fashions change. Under the current instructions it seems that the human touch of PA from the actual T/Op is seen as better than providing an admittedly slightly vague message in both audio and visual forms. Presumably the needs of hearing impaired passengers are less, or their numbers low enough as to be ignored? [This mainly relates to S Stock] What has emerged from this thread is that the claim, in response to complaints about the 'held at a red signal message', of 'they did a survey; that's what passengers wanted' is completely spurious. It's fairly clear that passengers said that they wanted to be better informed, and the engineers provided what appears to be an excellent solution. However, the useful part of the solution is being ignored and, normally, only the completely unhelpful message is ever heard. It does seem, though, that on the S-Stock, there's little need for technical changes to handle 'delayed' messages. Just better direction as to how to use the extant system. I don't think speech to text would work. Some drivers speak so well they could be BBC news readers, but some mumble dreadfully, and at very high speed. It would be an embarrassment to LU if garble messages started appearing. Gold for comedians, though. |
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Post by brigham on Jan 28, 2022 10:09:55 GMT
Passengers ARE uneasy where unscheduled stops are concerned.
Driverless trains at the Gateshead Garden Festival, long before the London terror outrage, carried a prominent sign thus:
"Trains may stop between stations for good reason".
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Post by dm1 on Jan 28, 2022 11:47:36 GMT
You don't actually need text to speech. You just need the driver to be able to trigger the relevant announcement visually without the recorded audio announcement being played, allowing the driver to announce it manually.
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Chris M
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Post by Chris M on Jan 28, 2022 13:00:44 GMT
What has emerged from this thread is that the claim, in response to complaints about the 'held at a red signal message', of 'they did a survey; that's what passengers wanted' is completely spurious. You must be reading a different thread to me as I see nothing like that at all. It's fairly clear that passengers said that they wanted to be better informed, This bit you have correct. and the engineers provided what appears to be an excellent solution. However, the useful part of the solution is being ignored and, normally, only the completely unhelpful message is ever heard. But this bit is a mixture of half right, completely wrong and a matter of personal opinion. I don't think speech to text would work. Some drivers speak so well they could be BBC news readers, but some mumble dreadfully, and at very high speed. It would be an embarrassment to LU if garble messages started appearing. Gold for comedians, though. Your first two sentences I agree with, after that it starts getting a bit embarrassing. |
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class411
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Post by class411 on Jan 28, 2022 13:36:08 GMT
What has emerged from this thread is that the claim, in response to complaints about the 'held at a red signal message', of 'they did a survey; that's what passengers wanted' is completely spurious. You must be reading a different thread to me as I see nothing like that at all. Yes, as you say, you must be reading a different thread. That doesn't mean it wasn't said. Yes, a forum is the place for personal opinions, as well as facts and logic. Perhaps you could specify what, in your opinion, is wrong. Before I get banned by someone completely misinterpreting what I wrote, I meant that if the text to speech got it wrong (and current text to speech does that no matter how well people speak), it could provide something that comedians or cartoonist could use. I presume you interpreted 'would be gold for comedians', as implying that they could take the micky out of people who didn't speak clearly. It honestly never occurred to me that anyone could think that.  |
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Tom
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Post by Tom on Jan 28, 2022 14:01:47 GMT
OK, you've both made your points.
Now, time to step back, and remember that a big 6 painted in the middle of a road will look like a 9 to someone coming from the opposite direction.
Please can we try to stop this thread becoming a line by line analysis of what someone else has written, all the time going further and further away from the original discussion point.
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Post by philthetube on Jan 28, 2022 14:28:36 GMT
Does anyone on here know a "visually impaired person" (VIP) whose opinion on announcements might be somewhat different to those of us with reasonable eyesight? Would reducing announcements be in line with the Equality Act 2010? I know a visually impaired person who finds bus announcements invaluable, he doesn't travel on the tube so I cannot help there. What is important about announcements when the train is stopped is that they are made, what is said is far less important, it just reassures passengers that the driver is alive and there is nothing dangerous to worry about. |
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class411
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Post by class411 on Jan 28, 2022 17:11:55 GMT
Does anyone on here know a "visually impaired person" (VIP) whose opinion on announcements might be somewhat different to those of us with reasonable eyesight? Would reducing announcements be in line with the Equality Act 2010? I know a visually impaired person who finds bus announcements invaluable, he doesn't travel on the tube so I cannot help there. Bus announcements are a godsend for anyone who is unfamiliar with a route, particularly if the stop you want is one that is frequently bypassed. And the key point implied there, surely, is that the announcement be made by the driver. We're all used to transportation devices such as lifts that can gabble away quite happily with nerry a human in sight. Hearing a clearly automated announcement is unlikely to reassure. Even the unhelpful 'stopped at a red signal' means something when it is made by a human being - i.e. that the driver is aware of and monitoring the situation and that he is carrying human beings, and not just delivering a set of articulated carriages. |
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Post by brigham on Jan 28, 2022 18:58:24 GMT
However will we get people used to driverless trains?
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class411
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Post by class411 on Jan 28, 2022 19:24:28 GMT
However will we get people used to driverless trains? Where/when we have driverless trains, the system will know exactly what the delay is and will be able to select/generate a useful message to inform passengers. ETA: If TPTB think it necessary. |
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Post by Chris L on Jan 28, 2022 19:38:31 GMT
Travelling into Charing Cross from Woolwich Arsenal today reminded me that a lot of sound could be removed by deleting London in front of stations in Central London. There isn't London London Bridge and it doesn't appear on the signs at the stations.
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Post by AndrewS on Jan 28, 2022 22:52:22 GMT
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Post by dm1 on Jan 28, 2022 23:39:33 GMT
I suspect in that case the problem wasn't just the contents of the announcement but also its intelligibility.
A muffled, mumbled announcement from poor quality speakers transmitted with a poor quality microphone, where one of the few intelligible words is "emergency" is going to cause unfamiliar passengers problems. That suggests that focussing on making sure announcements are always intelligible and clear is very important.
One of the posts in that thread suggested that the phraseology used in the announcement may not have been standard either, particularly the use of the phrase "emergency braking".
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londoner
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Post by londoner on Jan 28, 2022 23:45:08 GMT
Does anyone on here know a "visually impaired person" (VIP) whose opinion on announcements might be somewhat different to those of us with reasonable eyesight? Would reducing announcements be in line with the Equality Act 2010? I have lost central vision and periphery vision in one eye and some periphery vision in the other eye. I have also lost a small amount of colour vision in one eye too. I remain an outpatient of Moorfields eye hospital. Usually after a visit to the hospital, I have dilated pupils which make my eyes extremely sensitive to natural light. It is particularly difficult even crossing the road and I have to just look at the ground whilst squinting my eyes. The green painted strip on the pavement which runs from the hospital to Old Street tube station entrance is therefore very helpful for me although the paint is starting to dry out. Fortunately I do not have any difficulties using the tube (when it is underground) with dilated pupils. However it is difficult for me to look outside the window with dilated pupils in broad daylight when the tube travels above ground. Announcements as to what is the next station can therefore be helpful in this case. I struggle to read the new platform DMI's as the text can be too small unless I happen to be particularly close to the DMI. Platform posters are still fine and very helpful. I think TfL should be commended for the useful "line posters" (whatever they are called) which shows the next stations along the line in one direction. Whilst the platform posters in my view are good (particularly those placed on the tube tunnel walls), some of the text for the in-car line diagrams is too small e.g. the text for Turnham Green on the Piccadilly line. Again, announcements are very helpful in this case, particularly regarding any specific station details. It takes me 3-4 times longer to read using just my "bad eye". If I was to close my "good eye", the best way to describe trying to read is that I have to offset the focus of my eye very slightly away from the word to then see it clearly before progress to the next word. By the time the sentence is finished, I need to have remembered all the words. This is simple if you can make out the words easily (as with "normal" sight) but when you need an extra second or two to make out each word you would be surprised at the increase in difficultly when reading even simple sentences. In my case (if the "good eye" were closed) what helps is to have white text on a black background. It really makes a significant difference for me in comparison to having light grey text on a white background. I am able to see more clearly the region of lost vision in the central part and for whatever reason, this allows my brain to better adjust and be able to read the text more efficiently. For this reason, I also made the comments some time ago that the grey colour of the zones on previous iterations of the tube map is simply not clear. In fact, I found some almost impossible to discern. As far as I am aware, TFL do not offer alternative coloured maps, except a black and white version. I can imagine reading can therefore become a "chore" for people with worse visual impairments and even the knowledge of knowing there will be regular announcements is probably highly beneficial. As an aside I also have ASD. I do not like having to approach strangers for advice. I would only do so if absolutely necessary. Having announcements and maps means that I can have less social interaction with strangers which makes my journey more comfortable. An example would be at Acton Town. During a period when there have been delays, a member of staff gives announcements about the next train to Heathrow or Uxbridge as well as details of the approaching train. This means that I do not have to stand in an area of the platform which makes me feel uncomfortable just to read the DMI (yes, this is a thing) when the platforms happen to be particularly busy or even during regular times where I know people typically tend to accumulate (e.g. near entrances or the DMI). |
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Post by dm1 on Jan 29, 2022 0:40:24 GMT
DMI placement and specification are also a real problem on LU in my experience of using it, probably a much bigger problem than audio annoucements.
Why dot matrix displays with line sizes that are clearly too small even by TfL's own standards are still being installed is beyond me. Particularly where they have been used to replace older DMIs that were much larger and much more legible. High quality, well-designed, large LCD/TFT/OLED displays should be the standard these days, but I suspect the Elizabeth Line will be one of the few places to have something resembling this when it opens.
I would say the the issues on LU with announcements and passenger information are somewhat different to those on NR, just because TfL's information is generally better already, and the nature of the lines mostly having consistent stopping patterns.
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