Forum Topic

District Line shambolic and cruel on Tuesday

I was very fortunate in that travelling back to Turnham Green with a house guest laden with luggage from Central London that when we got as far as Hammersmith and discovered that the District Lane was 'off", the Piccadilly Line train we were on went on to stop at Turnham Green.  But nobody was being allowed into the station and I was told that most Piccadilly Line trains wouldn't stop there. So people had to struggle on to crowded buses in the pouring rain and standstill traffic in rush hour. Or taxis.In such circumstances, most rational organisations would have allowed the Piccadilly Line trains to stop at Turnham Green from both directions or at least some regular trains. People have paid for tickets and season tickets and are entitled to travel. Why are Tfl so determined not to stop Piccadilly Line trains at Turnham Green (and SB and RP) even when the District Line service has failed without warning.  They have the trains, they have the ability to do it , it is senseless and cruel in the circumstances to make people suffer.  

Jackie Elton ● 1581d25 Comments

The general issue of Picadilly Lines and TG is sadly unlikely to be solved in our lifetime. But as for issues like yesterday I agree. Its fully in the remit of the line controller to get trains to stop at some or even all District line stations, they can divert some onto the District line track on occasion. It has happened on plenty occasions in the past.I have no idea why they refused to do so yesterday, too often providing a service for customers seems low down their priorities. I ended up getting off at Acton town, even though the train I was on crawled for half of the journey after Chiswick Park and I could see no trains were ahead of it.

Bill George ● 1580d

Stopping at TG during busy times would cause disruption to the Piccadilly line.  The current signalling is designed for through trains at 45mph. Trains travelling more slowly will take longer to clear the signalling blocks, leading to red signals, and the train behind getting held up by a red signal, and the train behind that getting help up and so on down the line.  It would lead to cancelled trains.Given the limitations of the signalling, the decision not to cause additional disruption on a second line is understandable.  You can't really blame current management for a bad signalling design decisions made decades ago when they were still in school, or possibly not even born.

Al Webber ● 1580d

Bill, with the resignalling of the District line, diverting trains onto the the District isnt' really possible any more.  I know that at least one set of points between the District and Piccadilly at Hammersmith has been removed.

Al Webber ● 1580d

Al you may be right from a technical perspective but that is not the point here. But the stopping at certain District line stations when the Distric line is suspended is a long standing process that happened on numerous occasions that I experienced pre COVID. When an entire service is suspened to the west of Earls court as it was yesterday for a couple of hours, then providing some form of service should be the priority. It was the case before and should be again.

Bill George ● 1580d

The problem now is that the District line has a modern signalling system where the trains essentially drive themselves. When it was the older style system with manually driven trains, diverting a manually driven Piccacilly line train onto the District was not a problem.  It is a problem now.Like I said in the post I made about ten minutes ago, they have recently removed at least one set of points near Hammersmith.

Al Webber ● 1580d

Given how often in the past they have needed to stop the Piccadilly trains when the District was unavailable, removing the points and making the signalling incompatible seems very short-sighted.

Richard Greenhough ● 1580d

Al, I am not talking about diverting Pic lines onto District line, I am talking about line controller asking Pic Lines to stop at certain stations, typically TG. It happened a lot just that I personally experienced. It is quite possible and nothing to do with signalling systems. From talking to station staff in the past, it seems someone needs to make the request from along the route. Its about trying to provide a minimum service level.

Bill George ● 1580d

It's about capacity.  You have the choice of staying on an old signalling system that can handle approximately 24 trains per hour, or moving to one that can handle somewhere around 36 trains per hour.Keeping the District line compatible with the current Piccadilly line system would mean staying on the old system and would severely limit capacity.  We won't see 30 plus trains per hour here, but the signalling system being able to cope with that in the centre of town does mean that we will be able to get a few more trains out West.

Al Webber ● 1580d

OK, but presumably the Piccadilly signalling system ought still to make it possible to stop trains at TG when the District is out of action - a slight delay to Piccadilly passengers as opposed to major inconvenience for District passengers.

Richard Greenhough ● 1580d

It would be more than a slight delay.  It's not just a minute or so for the extra stop.  You would back trains up along the line.Trains would take too long to clear the area around TG.  The trains behind would then get red signals.  It's not just the time they are held at the red signal.  They take time to get up to speed again, so they take significantly longer to clear the section of track they are in.  That causes the train behind to get stuck at a red signal, and so on down the line.

Al Webber ● 1580d

Al, I understand your point. But in the past Pic lines regularly stopped at TG and other stations during periods when the District line was suspended. It could be done before and it could be done now.No amount of repeating the same thing changes that, the issues of signallign etc have not changed, perhaps just the desire to help passengers. With traffic for some reason currently terrible around W4 in the evenings, when the district line is out of service then some form of alternative needs to be provided

Bill George ● 1580d

For all that Al is trying to explain technically why trains could not stop at TG, the answer is really much simpler.  Passengers get in the way of running an efficient train/tube system and customer service is not a concept that TfL recognises

Justin Stephenson ● 1580d

I was at Turnham Green Tube station one day towards the end of April hoping to get a District Line train to Sloane Sq but there had been some incident and there was a long delay. Anyway there was announcement that Piccadilly Line trains would be stopping and I managed to get on one, so it does still happen occasionally.

Michael David Rowe ● 1580d

Cruel in what way?

Keith Iddon ● 1580d

People use to  joke that the ultimate aim of British Rail was to run the entire network without picking up any passengers. More recently the Department for Transport’s logo was said to be ‘the slower you go, the quicker you get there’. What witticism works for TFL?

David Turner ● 1580d

Chiswick problems..Pain in the arse yes but cruel...Read  the room.

Greg Gold ● 1580d

People in Chiswick can experience cruelty. They aren’t immune. Cruelty involves inflicting suffering or inaction towards another's suffering when a clear remedy is readily availableIt can indeed be cruel in a situation when people are struggling with heavy luggage, when they are vulnerable, in pain, or needing to pick up children or dependents, get to and from hospital. For them a three minute element of a journey turns into at least 30 mins in the rain fraught with stress and uncertainty.All this when it would have been possible to stop a few Piccadilly line trains, not all, to sort out the issue and alleviate the situation. Staff involved could have shown some concern,  humanity and common sense.  I witnessed the opposite of that on Tuesday. And let’s not forget that bus journeys have got slower and far more uncertain between Hammersmith and Chiswick because of road changes undertaken by TfL.  When there was more road space for buses, those journeys were faster and more predictable.  Now it is anybody’s guess.

Jackie Elton ● 1580d

Given the stairs at Turnham Green station, it seems a bit cruel to inflict that station on anyone struggling with heavy luggage.

Richard Greenhough ● 1580d

Jackie, I'm sure it's nothing personal by TFL.That would be cruel if it were.They quite often dissapoint and let us down one way or another, but in fairness get things right most of the time.

Keith Iddon ● 1579d

My bugbear is when drivers of westbound Piccadilly and District line trains stopping more or less at the same time at Barons Court and/or Hammersmith ignore the needs of passengers wishing to change from one to the other.  Given that both services have, shall we say, loose adherence to the timetables it surely wouldn’t hurt for them to pause sufficient time for changing passengers to cross the platform.  Typically, as happened to me the other day en route to Acton Town,  my District line train stopped at Barons Court just after a Piccadilly line train had stopped.  Just as the doors of our train were opening those of the ‘dilly train were closing.  Being an optimist I thought that it would wait for us at Hammersmith but oh no.  Our train took forever to start and by the time we reached Hammersmith the other train had long gone.Many years ago - 20, 30? - there used to be an official notice for drivers posted on Hammersmith station instructing them to allow time for passengers wishing to change …’in accordance with the regulations’.  Someone (not me) had scrawled underneath in black felt pen ‘They never do’.  True then and still true now it seems.  If there’s a good logistical reason for this I’d be happy to hear it but I suspect it’s just drivers’ bloody mindedness.

Alastair Banton ● 1579d

Quite unlike the government.

Stewart Jones ● 1579d

"My bugbear is when drivers of westbound Piccadilly and District line trains stopping more or less at the same time at Barons Court and/or Hammersmith ignore the needs of passengers wishing to change from one to the other" Or at earls court when your sitting on a DL train going east but not going anywhere and another DL train comes in on the other platform and leaves before you. And in one case a second came in and left before us,going against the drivers update to moving. HA

Julian Pavey ● 1579d

Anyone would think tfl are running a service! I get the District home from Blackfriars and there are virtually no trains to Ealing.I usually end up getting off at Barons Court and getting the Piccadilly line. Don't get me started on the lack of Central lines on Friday night and Saturday either while the unions p&*s about over the Night Tube.

Peter King ● 1579d

Yes Julian, we’ve all been there, Earls Court etc I mean.  What can be especially galling is if you decide to change trains to beat the ‘system’ and still get left behind.  This sort of thing never happens in Japan where the entire network moves with the precision of a Swiss watch.

Alastair Banton ● 1579d

I agree absolutely about District Line protocols.  Earl's Court and Barons Court procedures ignore the passengers swopping trains.  The Westbound Earl's Court District especially guilty when the occasional [or Tennis foreign fan] traveller, ignorant of the scenario, have no idea that a Platform 3 train is usually for Richmond/ E.B., and a Platform 4 usually for Wimbledon.  Sometimes they switch them over - before the unprepared user has twigged...Incidentally for Lizzie Line aficionados, we had little trouble last Tuesday as a 440 bus and a easy connection E3 Bus reached TGT easily from Acton Mainline....Take the Chiswick E3 northbound and change at Acton High St. for A.M.L station.

Peter Crowther ● 1578d