Recent posts in my Transport Category
June 11, 2010
National Express East Anglia bullies - an update
I've made a further complaint, after getting an unsatisfactory reply from National Express East Anglia about the way their staff bullied my wife. Their customer service email used the 'data protection act' as a means of avoiding telling me whether my complaint had been upheld, or any action taken.
May 19, 2010
A thank you to London Underground staff...no thanks to abusive National Express East Anglia
My family had a dreadful 'customer' experience at the hands of abusive National Express East Anglia staff at Liverpool Street station on Sunday morning. However, a member of London Underground staff came to our rescue. In seeking to find out how to thank them, I discovered that TfL have a form to do that on their website.
October 27, 2009
How to make friends and influence people in The Guardian office this morning...
...use the nice new Oystercard wallet that The Times were giving away outside Kings Cross station last night....
August 26, 2009
Celtic fans take over Kings Cross Underground noticeboards
For a while today, Celtic fans managed to redecorate Kings Cross Underground Station with their own take on the important information they needed to know about getting to Arsenal's Emirates Stadium for their Champions League play-off tie. At first glance I thought it was an example of London Underground being extra helpful to visiting fans to London, but I soon realised that the poster had been put together by fans of the Queen's Celtic themselves (© Fivers passim) This was...
July 25, 2009
Spotted! A multi-lingual sign on the tube
One of the notable things about our travels through Eastern Europe a couple of years back was that we could pretty much make our way around with only learning a smattering of 'yes', 'no', 'please' and 'thank you' in any country we came too. Nearly all of our travel arrangements could be made in English on the web, and pretty much every travel interchange we used came with copious amounts of dual language signage including English. Visiting Macau and Hong...
June 14, 2009
The shoddy Victoria Line replacement bus service at Walthamstow Central
This is purely and simply an unmitigated moan about Arriva's woeful Railway Bus Replacement service that operates between Finsbury Park and Walthamstow Central. I understand that the Victoria Line has to be upgraded to take the improved rolling stock I first got a sneak peek at in August 2006, but why does the replacement have to be so shoddy - it seems that every time I am forced to use it there is an issue. The first problem, as demonstrated...
May 25, 2009
Kings Cross wayfinding #fail
It is probably longer ago than I think, but it doesn't seem that long in the grand scheme of things since the whole Kings Cross St Pancras Underground ticket office complex was revamped as part of the redevelopment of St Pancras into a Eurostar terminal. That also meant a whole new set of signage for the station. Judging by this handwritten annotation, it seems that at least one member of staff thinks the wayfinding to the Metropolitan, Hammersmith & City...
April 9, 2009
'No message' at Walthamstow Central
I'd love to know who was the person writing the functional spec for the London Underground matrix displays at Walthamstow Central who decided that there needed to be a special case for when there was: "NO MESSAGE" Even more, I'd like to meet the person who had to write the bit of code that must say something along the lines of: if ($message = undef) { print "NO MESSAGE"} Obviously, the code is there so that you can tell whether...
April 8, 2009
London Festival of Railway Modelling at Alexandra Palace
At the end of March I found myself at Alexandra Palace on a Saturday morning for the London Festival of Railway Modelling. Although I've never had anything more sophisticated than a Lego train set myself, it is clearly exactly the kind of geeky hobby I would have been into if ZX Spectrums and Doctor Who hadn't existed in my formative years. I found it to be a little different from the London Model Engineering Exhibition that I attended in the...
March 21, 2009
London's abandoned Underground Stations on Google Street View
Abandoned Tube Stations on Street View
Peek at the disused bits of London's Underground that you can see overground using Google Street View
January 20, 2009
London Model Engineering Exhibition at Alexandra Palace
Following my recent trips to the BBC Studios and the old Victorian Theatre, I was back at Alexandra Palace again at the weekend. This time it was for the "London Model Engineering Exhibition". It was an unashamedly niche and geeky event, but I'd invited my young nephew along, which was my excuse anyway. It was a strange mix of a trade show and an exhibition. On one stand, for example, you could by sophisticated engineering equipment that would set you...
January 15, 2009
Police try to stop Walthamstow blogger taking pictures of a bus crash
I spotted in London Lite this evening the story of the 97 bus that crashed into McDonalds in Hoe Street in Walthamstow, and then noticed a big spike in traffic to an old currybetdotnet post about a crash near Walthamstow Central station just after it opened in September 2004. That caused the station to be closed whilst all lit up for the evening, and I sneaked in to grab some photos. I thought, as I've done with things like...
January 9, 2009
What is the collective noun for a group of atheist buses in London?
I've spent much of today trundling around London by bus, with varying degrees of success. Along the way I passed through Euston station which was chock full of number 18 buses all sporting the British Humanist Association's "There's probably no god. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life" advert. It caused me to wonder aloud on Twitter what the collective noun for a group of atheist buses might be. I got a few good suggestions back. @smagdali: a 'future' @scolvey:...
December 15, 2008
The ghost of the London, Chatham and Dover Railway Bridge across the Thames
Earlier this year I was working with a client who had offices near Blackfriars Bridge, which gave me the chance to explore that bit of Central London. I'd actually passed by that way very closely when doing a ghost walk around Haunted Clerkenwell, St. Pauls and the Barbican, but during the daylight hours it was the ghost of a bridge that intrigued me. Alongside London's Blackfriar's Bridge runs a series of supports for a bridge that looks like it was...
July 27, 2008
'Received pronunciation' for London from TfL
The BBC is famous for having an official 'pronunciation unit', that was the ultimate arbiter of how things should be said on air. With the drive towards using regional accents on television, and a move away from 'received pronunciation', the unit probably has more demand now for how to pronounce foreign names and words, than for working out whether English children were going to grow up saying 'bafth' or 'barth'. You could access a lot of the content via the...
May 19, 2008
Now and then at Green Park
Occasionally, as the London Underground gets re-fitted and re-developed, you get a glimpse back into time. On Monday night, leaving the Victoria Line at Green Park, I was suddenly transported back to 1992. The poster sites at the foot of the escalators have been peeled back to reveal adverts for, amongst other things, Pritt Stick, Monument and Bruce Springsteen. Here is one of Tower Records advertising their Easter specials. It is always good to see that regardless of whether Tower...
May 18, 2008
Walthamstow's Tramways Office building
Yesterday I was writing about the origins of the name 'currybet', which developed into a regular pub crawl around Walthamstow on F.A. Cup Final day. Part of that route was always from The Bell pub to The Dog & Duck, passing one of Walthamstow's most distinctive buildings - the Tramways Office on Chingford Road. Built in 1905, and later given codename 'WW' by London Transport, the Tramways office was a hub from trams, then trolley buses, and then motor buses....
May 15, 2008
Has Boris Johnson switched 'off' the Mayor of London 'ON' branding?
Within a day of Boris Johnson announcing his initiative to ban alcohol on London's Transport network, posters started appearing about it on the Underground. I noticed something interesting on them. Since the inception of the office of the London Mayor, publicity material that has passed through the Mayor's office has had a distinctive branding - 'MAYOR OF LONDON', with the last two letters picked out in a different colour. Generally this has been blue with the last two letters in...
March 28, 2008
Postcard from Macau #9: Information design on Macau's transport system
I recently spent three weeks visiting Macau, the former Portuguese territory on the south coast of China. As a former colony like Hong Kong, it is now a 'Special Administrative Region'. This post is one of a series looking at aspects of information design, user experience, internet use and journalism that interested me when I was there. Whilst I was staying in Macau I mostly got around by public transport. There is an excellent network of buses across the...
October 12, 2007
Unwelcome to Britain (again)
I've been zipping over Europe between London, Barcelona and Crete a lot over the last few weeks, and so I've spent quite a bit of time hanging around airports thinking about the whole user experience. I've never quite been able to put my finger on what it is exactly that makes the entry into Britain via London's airports so unwelcoming, but over the last few trips I've come to think that it is the combined effect of lots of the...
October 11, 2007
Gatwick Yotel not quite so swell
Anyone who has been following my trips on Dopplr will know that I've been stomping my carbon encrusted feet all over Europe in the last couple of months, with six flights in just over as many weeks. I've been dragging my better half around with me, but last week she headed back to Crete slightly before I did. She had an early check-in at 5:15am at Gatwick. We decided, instead of travelling through the dead of night, that we'd go...
October 9, 2007
Let's hope The Westway doesn't collapse on a weekend
I was wandering around White City the other week between various bits of the outer-lying BBC empire, when I spotted this sign on one of the bridges that makes up the intersection between "The Westway" and the local rat-runs of W12. Let's hope it never develops a major structural problem that only becomes apparent out of office hours, eh?...
September 14, 2007
Heraklion airport doesn't quite live up to the BA online check-in promise
I'm back in the UK for work for the majority of September and October, with a trip to Barcelona for the Euro IA summit and a brief sojourn back to Crete for a last summer "Hurrah!" sandwiched in the middle. As a result, I shall certainly be racking up my carbon emissions with a variety of airlines. The first flight was with British Airways lask week, on a route I've not flown before - Heraklion to London Gatwick. Heraklion is...
July 16, 2007
One Prince = c.100 People
Well Carol, as you say, there was an incident at 11,500 feet above Newbury in Berkshire, on the morning of Wednesday the 24th of March, and these details have been reported in the briefest of detail on the CAA website. It says, and I quote, "an aircraft proximity report has been filed". Now, this is a report I understand where safety was or could have been compromised. And this is an aircraft proximity report between a military aircraft and an...
May 21, 2007
Last Rounds project featuring some of my photographs of Tube stations
I'm always pleased to see my public Flickr photos being re-used to help new websites, and a little while ago I was approached about using some of my pictures on the "Last Rounds" site. It is a website that concerns itself with public transport and the pursuit of beer. Seeing as that wraps up three of my chief areas of interest, how could I refuse? The Last Rounds project began in response to the new later licensing laws in England....
January 24, 2007
Check-in credit card trauma with British Airways at Heathrow
Staying on a travel theme this week, since I am over in the UK for a few days, I noted James Cridland's post about the problems he had trying to make travel arrangements with a card that was due to expire in a little while. I had a similar problem last week when trying to travel. Having got to the UK, the first leg of my mad dash around the country involved flying from London Heathrow to Edinburgh with British...
August 23, 2006
There's just no messin' with the kids
When I was around Euston to look at the exhibition of new Victoria Line rolling stock, I also noticed a big promotional display for No Messin'! No Messin'! is, in their own words: Network Rail's youth safety brand created to reach an audience that is cynical of authority, media savvy and hard to influence. No Messin'! rejects the traditional 'just say no' approach and gives kids positive alternatives to hanging out on the railway Trespassing on the railway is a...
August 10, 2006
New Victoria Line trains on display at Euston
Yesterday I visited the temporary exhibition outside Euston station of the new Victoria Line Underground rolling stock which is due to make a debut on the line in late 2009. The display was in a marquee at the front of Euston, and featured a prototype of half of one of the new style carriages. What is it about the marketing material for these kind of events that forces people to use puns all the time? We're on track to introduce...
November 1, 2005
"Excessive Door Noise" on the Central Line
I wrote back in August about the scratchings on the doors of a couple of Central Line trains - NOISY DOORS ARE UNACCEPTABLE and DOORS CAUSE DEAFNESS. At the time I said I thought there was a third example out there, but only today on the way to work did I finally capture it on camera - "EXCESSIVE DOOR NOISE"...
October 20, 2005
Oxford Circus Underground Timewarp
There is currently some refurbishment work going on at Oxford Circus Underground station, and as you descend towards the Northbound Bakerloo and Victoria line platforms you suddenly drift back in time over 15 years. The work has exposed two panels of adverts that must date from back in 1989, since one of them is advertising a New Year's Day Andy Sheppard gig from 1990....
October 5, 2005
London Transport Fare Rises
Yesterday marked one of my annual blog rituals, when the Evening Standard spins the announcement of fare rises on London's transport system into a story of economic doom'n'gloom that even the pessimistic Daily Express would be envious of. (I'd apologise for repeating myself, but due to the great currybetdotnet server disaster of 2005 none of the earlier posts are currently online.) Today the Standard screamed: KEN'S HUGE FARE RISE Usually the trick on these occasions is to use the percentage...
September 13, 2005
Panic On The Streets Of London
As I got home this evening panic buying of petrol in Walthamstow had begun. As a non-driver myself I can't tell you whether it was the threat of the £1 litre, upcoming blockades that are not apparently happening, the fear that American oil consumption would leap following Hurricane Katrina, or that fact that two of our national newspapers today said "Please don't panic buy" that started it off. I do know two things for certain though: 1) Not one...
August 20, 2005
The Bike Shed at Walthamstow Central
So I think I've given up on my ambition to be cycling to work by the start of September - it is 22km each way, and apart from the physical issue of whether I can do it or not, I can't work out when I would either get to write currybetdotnet or drink beer. Plus there is the issue of whether I would actually have the energy left to do any work after a 22k cycle first thing in the...
August 11, 2005
Unusual Stuff On The Central Line
I'm glad someone else has noticed this. Going Underground has posted today about some odd graffiti appearing on the door of a Central Line train - "NOISY DOORS ARE UNACCEPTABLE" It is one of a series - back in early July I posted to Flickr another example - "DOORS CAUSE DEAFNESS" I haven't managed to capture it on camera yet, but I believe there is a third one out there. I did, however, manage to capture on camera - however...
July 14, 2005
London's Transport, and Passengers Back To Normal in Walthamstow
I knew things were back to normal yesterday morning when the quietly simmering rage of the average commuter broke through once again in Walthamstow. All the goodwill towards London's brave and long-suffering transport staff evaporated as a bus driver on the Arriva franchise 275 route refused to stop outside Walthamstow Central Train station, instead turning straight into the bus station. Before he even managed to turn right there was a cacophony of shouting, pleading and bell ringing. He shouted back...
June 9, 2005
Open Weekend at the London Transport Museum Depot in Acton Town
At the weekend I spent a couple of very happy hours (albeit in almost exclusively middle-aged male nerdy company) visiting the London Transport Museum Depot at Acton Town, which was having one of their twice yearly open weekends. It is a place where all the exhibits that cannot be displayed in Covent Garden are stored, including restored rolling stock and buses, and some are on display. Of the trains the two that most interested me were a Metropolitan...
May 12, 2005
A day on the District Line
Yesterday I took a day trip exploring the branches at the Western end of the District Line. Bits of the District Line form some of the oldest parts of the London Underground system, with steam-hauled services between South Kensington and Westminster starting as far back as December 1868. The first branch I headed down was the Wimbledon branch. This allowed me to have a look at the South London Tram system, which I've not seen before, and then gradually make...
April 27, 2005
A gallery, a monument, a museum and a spot of shopping - Day-tripping in London
With a month off on my hands I'm working through a lengthy list of things that I've always wanted to do around London, but have never found the time for. Today I ticked three things off the list. I started at the Estorick Collection at Canonbury Square in Islington, which until June 5th has a exhibition on Avant-Garde Graphics from 1918 to 1934. The gallery itself is quite small, consisting of six rooms, five of which are taken up with...
March 12, 2005
When Oyster Card fails think "Thanks for the uptime"
In Friday's Evening Standard there was a small article by Local Government Correspondent Ross Lydall about the Oyster card: "Oyster card users have been overcharged about £1 million because of delays in limiting fares, it was claimed today. The revelation came as pressure grew for an inquiry after a computer crash caused the £50 million smartcard system to collapse. Card readers across the 270 Tube stations and on 8,000 buses failed yesterday morning - taking five hours to repair and...
March 7, 2005
Could Arsenal station be retro-renamed?
A while ago Arsenal announced that thanks to the quick bung of £100m in their direction, their new stadium is to be known as Emirates Stadium. It made me wonder what might happen to the name of Arsenal station on the Piccadilly Line. It was renamed 'Arsenal' on the 31st October 1932 to reflect that it was just around the corner from the club's Highbury ground. The re-naming is very noticeable, since over 70 years later the tile-work on the...
March 6, 2005
Adopt-a-Station with 'one'
Earlier this year whilst at Tottenham Hale waiting for the Stansted Express I picked up a copy of the 'one' rail franchise's newsletter. One article grabbed my attention - "Adopt A Station extended". The company was announcing that: 'one' railway stations on the Crouch Valley line - Althorne, Fambridge, Woodham Ferrers and Burnham - will soon receive makeovers thanks to the 'one' Adopt-a-Station initiative. The scheme is aimed at improving lines of communication between the train operator and railway station...
November 15, 2004
What will the C-Charge extension mean to Londoners?
LBC are running an advert to coincide with Nick Ferrari's Congestion Charge Campaign, asking what the proposed expansion of the Congestion Charge will mean to Londoners. They've redrawn the map of the zone into the shape of a pound symbol. Well I'm a sucker for their slogan "gets London talking", so I thought I'd reiterate what the Congestion Charge means for me. 1: If I emerge from Holborn tube and I am running late for a meeting at Bush House...
The worst train stations in London
Tonight the Evening Standard published a feature on the worst train stations in London, naming North Sheen, Hanwell, Clapham High Street and Maryland. They are asking readers to contact them about the dangers of their local stations by emailing stations@standard.co.uk. They didn't forget to mention Wood Street Station in the text - after all like Walthamstow Central it is practically unmanned in the evening, and the CCTV isn't guaranteed to work if you become a victim of a crime there...
September 21, 2004
London Bus fares rise by 42%. Or become free. (Depending on how you do the sums. Or how old you are)
Not a great day in the media for London's Transport as the annual ritual of the fare increase announcement enjoyed its latest instalment. Punitive rises all round it seems this time round. Well, until you have a careful look at the small print, which has some better news: Free travel on buses for all under-16s from September 2005 (probably not such happy news for bus drivers though!) Free travel on buses for all under-18s in full time education from the...
Open House at Loughton Station
This weekend was Open House in London, and I booked to go on a tour of Loughton Station on Sunday morning. The present station at Loughton is the third to serve the area, and was built in the late 1930s at a time when the Underground was taking over what had been an overground suburban railway - so it is unique in mixing the architectural and functional styles of the two. The tour was well-run, and we were lucky...
September 16, 2004
Accident at Walthamstow Bus Station
If you are looking for information about the recent 97 bus crash into the McDonalds on Hoe Street, you can find that here. There was a serious road accident at Walthamstow Central on Monday evening - and it caused Selbourne Road to be closed. It meant all the bus routes had to be diverted away from Walthamstow Bus Station. It left the brand new building lit up for use yet completely abandandoned and empty, still chirping out the automated reassurance...
September 12, 2004
Cause and effect?
I was travelling home tonight exactly a week after the murder that took place at Wood Street station on September 5th. There has been quite a palpable sense of shock and anger in the community. Still nobody was feeling worried or uneasy tonight at Walthamstow Central, as it was full of police officers seeking anyone who may have witnessed the attack which took place just one stop further down the line. There was something ironic about the fact that they...
August 30, 2004
Operation Londinium at Stratford
One of the highlights of my day out to see the National Maritime Museum's The Adventures of Tintin at Sea exhibition, was a rare chance to travel on the futuristic Docklands Light Railway. It caused one of my friends to remark "This is how the future was sold to me as a kid - travelling through tunnels in a robot-driven train.". On the way home we got caught up in another vision of the future, although this time it was...
August 11, 2004
Congestion Charge expansion in West London
The Mayor of London has today published a revision to his Transport Strategy - one which allows for the expansion of the Congestion Charge into West London. The public consultation on this involved over 100,000 people responding to TfL. Predictably you-know-who was not amused, despite the fact that implementation is still two years away, and subject to further consultation....
June 30, 2004
It's just like the not-so-good old days
One positive offshoot of the apparent chaos currently enveloping London during the RMT strike, is it gives us a chance to remember what travelling across central London at surface level was like before the Congestion Charge was introduced. Bloody awful. It's wall-to-wall cars, and the bus journey from Liverpool Street to The Strand has just taken the best part of 35 minutes (usual post congestion charge time: 15-ish minutes)...
June 28, 2004
Walthamstow Central Bus Station - accessibility and security
Nearly a year in the making the new Walthamstow Central Bus Station opened just over a week ago - with a celebratory concert that managed to feature Chas'n'Dave. There is still a lot of snagging going on, but, as the third station I've known standing on the site it is without a doubt the best - it is more spacious, better lit, and actually has capacity for the number of buses that park there It is also one that I...
June 15, 2004
Complaint about the 212 bus route in Walthamstow
Below is a complaint I have made today to First Group, who operate the franchise for the 212 bus route in Chingford and Walthamstow. I would like to complain about an incident that took place involving one of your drivers on the 212 route this morning, Tuesday June 15th. The incident happened at the bus stop at the foot of Church Hill in Walthamstow, just after the bus turns right into Church Hill from Shernhall Street. Your driver pulled...
April 16, 2004
Congestion Charging Expansion consultation
Until the 23rd of April 2004 TFL are running a consultation exercise about the proposed expansion of the Congestion Charge into West London. Until then you can read the proposal, and offer your comments. I'd love to think we could have a sensible public debate about transport in London, but we appear to be dealing with one motor lobby powered voice as the dominant press outlet. If I could just point out what TFL has been forced to issue...
March 9, 2004
Unwelcome To Britain
I flew back into Britain today, and what a sorry experience it was, full of the kind of British mean spirit that gets me down. Before we'd even fully boarded, an overweight over-sunburnt British couple had managed to barge and shove their way down the aisles looking for any nook and cranny to stash their copious duty free fags'n'booze - in the process treating a couple of fragile lovely old Indian ladies who must have been in their sixties...
February 25, 2004
How to confuse WAGN ticket inspectors with your Oystercard
One of the great things about Oystercard is that it is an electronic cashless London-wide method of paying for multiple forms of public transport. One of the terrible things about Oystercard is that it is an electronic cashless London-wide method of paying for multiple forms of public transport. I couldn't begin to imagine how complicated their roll-out project planning has been, but there are inevitably strange and difficult leaks at the edge of the system. One is my local...
What is a ticket? And how does it apply to over-booked flights?
Maybe I should have watched more airport reality shows and been prepared for this, but I was astonished late last year to turn up at Heathrow and find I couldn't get onto the flight I had tickets for, because it was over-booked. I am fairly sure major airlines have better legal advice than me, and that I had in fact only puchased some sort of "permission to try to fly you if we have space" voucher. However I naivly...
February 18, 2004
Congestion Charging one year on: "The sky did not fall on London's head"
Yesterday it was the first anniversary of the Congestion Charge arriving in London. The Evening Standard published a news piece that quoted the Mayor's research that the first 11 months Congestion Charging have: Cut delays by 30 per cent Reduced the number of cars entering the zone by 30 per cent Slashed [the Evening Standard's word not mine] delays by 60 per cent on buses serving the zone Seen 110,000 a day pay the charge Resulted in only "some...
January 13, 2004
'New Fines War On Bus Lane Drivers' cries Evening Standard
Before the death of Harold Shipman knocked it off the front page for later editions, today's Evening Standard was leading with the headline "New Fines War On Bus Lane Drivers". The article, dubbed an exclusive, by the paper's Local Government Correspondent Ross Lydall, revealed that: Fine for drivers caught in London bus lanes have soared by almost 50 per cent in 12 months By which, judging from the figures quoted, I believe he means that the volume of fines...
October 16, 2003
Oystercard - the problem is when the man meets the machine
I had my first practical unsatisfactory Oystercard experience today. I tried to get the 212 bus (franchise holder First) to Walthamstow Central this morning, and the card would not swipe on the bus driver's ticket machine. As I walked away there was a tap on the plastic grill that separates the driver from the public. I told him that the card didn't expire until next week. I tried the card another couple of times. It didn't read. He wasn't...
October 13, 2003
Leaf-fall timetable starts today
Today my cattle WAGN journey into work started 3 minutes earlier than usual - due to the autumn 'leaf-fall' timetable being put into effect. This gives trains extra time to slow-down going into stations when there are wet leaves on the line. The SRA or WAGN haven't found a way of fixing the problem - they've now just built British inability to cope with our own climate into the timetable. But what really brightened my journey up today was...