ATO gets a step nearer

[towerman]

044-043,048-079 were both lurking at the northern extremities of the Jubilee overnight.

[towerman]

Was looking at the Jubilee Line upgrade "blurb" on the intranet tonight,when the TBTC system is commissioned,it will be 30tph peak service,24tph at all other times.BTW,it also said the line will operate on ATP before the TBTC is fully commissioned.

[Deleted]

towerman said:

when the TBTC system is commissioned,it will be 30tph peak service,24tph at all other times

30tph is somewhat less than the 36tph figure envisaged whilst the JLE was being planned! I've read LU and TfL themselves claiming 33tph post upgrade recently.

24tph is quite an impressive off-peak frequency though.

[Deleted]

Considering the shambles that has accompanied service upgrades of this type on LU in the past, maybe the management are being conservative and introducing a 30tph service to make sure that the line can actually run that.

Once the service has been running for a while and the signalling is less likely to break down, then maybe they'll ramp it up to 33tph.

[Deleted]

It might have something to do with the availability of trains as well?

[Deleted]

sweek said:

It might have something to do with the availability of trains as well?

Not anymore - Alstom has at least 63 trains to choose from now, and IIRC they only need about 45-50 to run the current peak service of 24tph. towerman will probably pop up and tell us what the fleet diagrams are, and what they may be with a peak service of 30tph.

[towerman]

They need 51 trains for a full peak service at the moment.

[Deleted]

sweek said:

It might have something to do with the availability of trains as well?

There should be enough trains once ATO is in full operation. The faster run times under the new signalling mean that the tph can be increased with the same number of trains. Plus as mentioned above there are plenty of spare trains at the moment.

What can make a difference though, is if more trains are timetabled to run end to end, instead of turning short, then lines can see their capacity limited by train availablity. This seems to have happened on the Central Line, where Liverpool St reversers are a now thing of the past for various reasons.

[sm]

kind of curious, but why are the liv street reversers a thing of the past now?

[Deleted]

Because you lower line capacity by performing a reversal-in-sidings maneuver on the core trunk of a busy line like the Central, mainly due to LU's inability to perform a rapid tipping-out and the slow approach speeds into most of the sidings on the network.

When stephenk shows up he will probably explain far better than I can.

[c5]

theonekea said:

Because you lower line capacity by performing a reversal-in-sidings maneuver on the core trunk of a busy line like the Central, mainly due to LU's inability to perform a rapid tipping-out and the slow approach speeds into most of the sidings on the network.

When stephenk shows up he will probably explain far better than I can.

That sounds about right.

On LU, for safety reasons, each car has to checked visually by a member of staff before being closed up, this slows the whole process down especially if it is only the Train Operator doing it. At places where tip-outs are timetabled, extra station staff are usually rostered to assist the process.

[Deleted]

As ZEDex and OneKEA have mentioned, LUs tipping out procedure is a tad slow, usually taking over 1 minute even with 2-3 staff. This would cause blocking back on a 30tph service. Trains have to be checked when tipping out due to HSE/HMRI (or whatever the railway inspectorate is called this week) rules. This is after a death at Liverpool Street, when someone fell between the cars whilst walking between carriages as train went into the sidings at Liverpool Street. The railway inspectorate though forgot that people can fall between cars whilst the train is on normal running lines as well - so why don't they ban passengers on normal running lines too?

The other reason for not timetabling Liverpool Street reversers is that the section of line to Stratford is one of the busiest parts of the underground, and thus now needs all the trains it can get!

Interestingly, on the NYC subway where there are similar tipping out rules (i.e at sidings, but not for non-passenger loops), they now play a recorded announcement before and whilst a train negociates a non-passenger loop to tell anyone left onboard that the next stop is the departure platform, and that they must stay seated and not walk between cars.

[suncloud]

Just missed a Liverpool street reverser this week, and did notice a bit of a delay pulling in to Liverpool Street, but not too bad. I know too well the heavy loading East of Liverpool Street... I remember hearing or reading somewhere that between Bank and Mile End was meant to have the highest loadings on the network, but I could be making that up.

As I understand (from previous discussions somewhere here), the tipping out procedures are also about protecting staff from customers that may wish to do them harm.

[Chris M]

Several times now when heading out to Debden it has been South Woodford before I've got a seat.

[Deleted]

suncloud said:

As I understand (from previous discussions somewhere here), the tipping out procedures are also about protecting staff from customers that may wish to do them harm.

The tipping out procedures are primarily due to a HSE/HMRI ruling after the Liverpool St incident. It is possible to get exemptions from the ruling for special cases, as Crossrail has. I don't know if either LU or the unions have any policies to do with tipping out trains to protect the staff? Can any LU staff shed light on this?

On the NYC subway, the tipping out rules were introduced by the unions to protect the staff.

[sm]

thanks for the answers!

although, as stephenk mentioned, how does banning passengers from being on board within a siding help anything?

the person killed in the liverpool st accident could have done the exact same thing in passenger service?

[c5]

It was being worked into the siding, the lights were probably out.

Maybe the person was alseep, maybe a bit tipsy and woke up and panic - don't know.
I do know that the current method employed is much much safer.
Train Operators, once empty should make 3 PAs saying that the train is out of service and if anyone is on board they should activate the Passenger Alarm.

Also, the routes to and from most sidings are signalled using "Shunt Signals" and passengers cannot be carried over thses points as the route is not as "secure". The likes of a TO will be able to explain this better!

[Chris M]

The reasons why passengers can't be carried past shunt signals was explained after a question I asked a long time ago. I can't find it immediately, but it might have been in a thread related to Rayners Lane. I'll have another quick look, but if I can't find it Colin will probably work his magic.

[Deleted]

c5 said:

I do know that the current method employed is much much safer.
Train Operators, once empty should make 3 PAs saying that the train is out of service and if anyone is on board they should activate the Passenger Alarm.

Not three! Just one - we don't have all day.

[Chris M]

The thread in question is: districtdave.proboards39.com/index.cgi?board=Signals&action=display&thread=1126342234 from September 2005!
I'm not certain, but I think the "thread on the Piccadilly board" referred to in that thread might be districtdave.proboards39.com/index.cgi?board=picc&action=display&thread=1123366277

[Deleted]

Thanks for bringing up the shunt signal issue again, which I forgot to mention. It should be mentioned that the DLR doesn't have shunt signals for reversing sidings, but trains are still required to be tipped out when reversing in sidings at Bank and Crossharbour. Yet, passengers can be carried around the non-shunt signallled Kennington loop. So there are some discrepancies in the rules!

[sm]

cheers for the info guys!

[towerman]

Methinks there is a case of left hand not knowing what the right is doing at the moment,there is supposed to be three test trains out tomorrow night two from SMD one from Stanmore,unfortunately there are only two trains signed off and Alstom has stopped one of them for 12 monthly exam which takes four days,and they're supposed to be out all day Sunday,that's why the Jubilee is shut between Stanmore and Wembley this Sunday.

[towerman]

As of Monday Tubelines contractors have taken possession of 9 to 11 roads in the yard to construct a temporary shed for the installation of TBTC equipment on the 96TS as it was taking up too much room in the maintenance shed and Alstom said they couldn't get their work done.Wonder who's paying for it as it also involves moving the deicing filling tanks and pumps from 10 & 11 roads to 15 & 16 roads,bet it wont be cheap.

[Chris M]

Is there a reason they've chosen those roads then? If it involves moving deicing equipment wouldn't it have been quicker and cheaper to use other roads without this?

[towerman]

There's only 3 roads on this current section so it doesn't give capacity problems stabling the service.

[towerman]

070-069 are now off the pit road,stabled in the yard,will probably go on the DCA next week.

[towerman]

028-027 now stopped for ATO mods.

[towerman]

070-069 now off DCA,112-111 due to go on DCA Wednesday or Thursday.

[towerman]

070-069 now signed off and in passenger service,112's-111's trip to the DCA has been delayed due to 112's mishap last Monday.