Forum Topic

Government Demands Driverless Trains and More Active Travel

Story here:http://www.ealingtoday.co.uk/default.asp?section=community&link=http://neighbournet.com/server/common/ldrstrans112.htmDriverless trains are a pipe dream of course, but we can all be on board about the more active travel bit!

Paul Richard James ● 1290d17 Comments

https://www.bregroup.com/20yearscelebration/Look att the Grenfell mess over cladding.

Philippa Bond ● 1284d

Thatchers idea to enable the right of ordinary working people to own their own home was a good one, but deeply flawed. It's in the more recent documentary that she was far from happy about the way in which profiteering and the seizure of opportunity was hijacked by the wealthy developers and opportunists and the sheer greed.  The flaws ought to have been ironed out, but then, as now, other crisis break out and things get brushed under the table and others get though the back door.  Which is very convenient for controversial stuff but not good for the average person in the street.Did this ever get tackled post Thatcher and Major?  No. The opposite.Gordon Brown and Blair encouraged this further and New Labour did not act to correct something that many knew was wrong on all sides of political divisions. The Iraq episode rather handy for avoiding and deflecting debate on several issues of several domestic issues of the time and the advantages seized by PFI companies and developers.  Gove has a monster on his hands to deal with and a powerful one at that.The shift to developers and preferential deals came about during the Blair/Brown era, and barely cut a reaction at the time.

Raymond Havelock ● 1284d

Poor old Gove with his impossible mission. You would do well to remember Philippa that it was a Labour government that spent almost 11 years suppressing the Building Research Establishment report into defective cladding.The BRE first raised the problem with aluminium cladding in 1999 and bowed to the lobby groups. The coalition and subsequent Tory governments have been complicit as well.However the initial problem was in the public domain and ignored well before the current administration took office

N V Brooks ● 1284d

If you are concerned about the number of people needing to move around London you should read the London Plan.  This is something that the Mayor prepares and has to submit to the Minister of Housing etc for agreement.  This was going backwards and forwards until the Minister Robert Jenrick agreed it.  He wanted increased housing.  You should also investigate who the Tory big funders are and then wonder at the pickle Michael Gove is in trying to sort out all the defective housing the hapless new leaseholders have found themselves in and remember that Mrs Thatcher wanted there to be more home owners.  I don't think she would be impressed.

Philippa Bond ● 1284d

If you look at the terms and conditions of carriage on TFL services ( which I did a few years back & it's like a telephone directory) One has to remember that your fare is also a form of insurance.If you work and carry professional tools - even a laptop or bespoke software but more likely trade or professional equipment then it is unlikely that it is permitted in any London Transport service but particularly on services that use tunnels , so the tube underground and Elizabeth Line.Of course many who are carrying either prohibited items in their very long list do as they are out of sight and very portable.Only when something happens does this become apparent. You either have no right to claim or can be held fully liable if your item causes injury or delay. You own business PLI won't cover you because you have breached the T&Cs of carriage.If you run a vehicle, car or van or bike you have to have PLI as well as mandatory insurance, and this normally covers passengers.But while Mayor and his pals want to choke small businesses and self employed out of London and force people onto the public transport, the TfL T&Cs have remained unchanged. In fact from terrorism, much has been increased.But like the mask wearing fiasco with no proper enforcement, this is also an area where there is little enforcement if any.That is until you have something happen and you find you are not insured or covered as you were travelling in breach of the T&Cs.TfL and the Mayors office repeatedly refuse to address this or how this is supposed to accommodate those they wish to force out of vehicles.In current times this reckless approach is going to plunge hundreds of thousands below the poverty line and into unviable business.

Raymond Havelock ● 1285d

Completely agree that we should have better subsidised public transport and it is ridiculous for TfL and the Councils (with all their cuts from Central Govt) to have to pay entirely for repairs and rebuilding to major historical London bridges).

Philippa Bond ● 1286d

Yes, Khan is a puppet being played by Johnson and Gilligan, but not bright enough to not fall into their traps. Both sides are playing politics with London transport and we’re stuck in the middle.A prosperous London is essential for a prosperous Britain yet the powers that be seem determined to level it down. All for the sake of political point scoring.

Simon Hayes ● 1287d

Lord knows I’m not a supporter of Khan for all sorts of reasons there isn’t time nor space for here. But there are situations re TfL that are beyond his control & remit. The pandemic was not down to him but resulted in WFH which naturally saw a dramatic loss of punters ditto income. When Khan has approached the Government any money he has obtained has always had strings attached. One can’t blame the Government but it has meant Khan having to put into practice policies he might not agree with. I’d also point out that most capital cities in the world expect to subsidise their transport systems to a far greater extent than this country, which is why their fares are far more reasonable than ours.

Bettina Margaret Thwaite ● 1287d

Good points. London is hugely expensive to travel across. Improving public transport in terms of reliability and cost would make it more attractive. The same could be said for railways, since the cost of a train ticket is exorbitant compared to the cost of driving an equivalent route.However, Khan and the councils are determined to shoehorn yet more people into London, which will just add more stress to the transport network. Crossrail won’t solve that, as it will be full of people from outside London by the time it gets to Ealing. Have they forgotten the overcrowding issues on the tube that were prevalent pre-pandemic?

Simon Hayes ● 1287d

I don't object to more money being spend on promoting Active Travel but the problem is that if it is mandated from above then TfL can't develop an effective overall strategy. The priority should always be to improve public transport with Active Travel as a supplement. What is happening at the moment is spending on the network is being reduced, fares are being increased while the Active Travel budget is being protected. There simply isn't anyway that the money being given to Active Travel will meaningfully offset the number of people switching to driving because tubes, trains and buses have become less reliable and more expensive.

Christine Mulligan ● 1287d

Some good points, well made.The Jubilee upgrade was pushed through to meet the deadline of the 2012 Olympics, as well as the demands of a rapidly expanding Canary Wharf, which was rather isolated when the line didn’t function.If you recall the upgrade was handled by the Tube Lines consortium, which oversaw the project going wildly over budget and massively behind schedule. The PPP cost benefit illusion was finally shattered when Tube Lines was taken back under TfL control in 2010, simply to ensure the project finished ahead of the London Games.Former chairman Terry Morgan told me before that move that his consortium would need weeks of line closures if it was to finish on time. That was never going to happen, but it’s a scenario that would play out elsewhere on the network, as is currently happening on the Northern Line.We aren’t good at transport infrastructure in this country. If they made public transport more reliable and more affordable more people would use it. But that would upset the shareholders who want their dividends.Then they decide to cram more people into parts of London to overload an already creaking system. And the only solution they can offer is ‘active travel’.

Simon Hayes ● 1289d

Driverless tubes? Rather apt this has surfaced today with the network paralysed and I’m facing a £50 fare each way in an Uber for a hospital appointment.Bring it on!As for “ Active travel” = more LTN’s = a big F that from me.

Colin Goodman ● 1289d

The cost of a driverless train operation on the rather old underground network has been mooted several times. And tested as long ago as the 1960s on a bit of the Central Line and of course exemplified by the Victoria Line. However they were designed from the start to be automated. Very little of the rest of the network can be automated without huge risks and massive alterations and infrastructure changes.  Just look at the 'custom' built Elizabeth Line.  £millionss added because of TfL interference and a classic case of too many cooks and a generous fistful of  advisors.  To try this with a much older network will cost far, far more.Even costings for basic surface branch lines is way beyond feasible.It would be cheaper to have drivers and guards for 50 years than. ThisPlus more local based jobs lost so there will be the need for more to have to drive or travel further to make a living. It is possible but the sheer cost and upheaval would far exceed the wage bill of operating staff for decades and the infrastructure would not pay itself back before it too would need replacing or upgrading.It's typical politicians and consultants who know diddly squat about the subject other than what they see on spreadsheets and from reports tailored to suit policy.

Raymond Havelock ● 1289d

I had quite a lot of dealings with TfL when the jubilee line upgrade was progressing (slowly) a decade or so ago. There was a lot of bleating then by drivers about safety issues, although loss of well paid jobs with perks was probably the main cause of discontent.Khan has been lucky that he’s not had firebrand former RMT boss Bob Crow to deal with, otherwise the number of strike days would be far higher. Bob was very militant and seemed to have a strong support base in the union.The signalling systems on the upgraded lines will allow more frequent services with all the trains linked to eliminate human error, including going through a red signal. The main issue when upgrading is the disconnect between technologies which causes multiple shorting of signals, bringing whole lines to a halt. It was the bane of the jubilee line for years until compatibility was achieved.If you’ve ever been in a tube train cab, as I have, you will know that visibility in tunnels is virtually nil and reaction times are severely limited when travelling at speed. Better signalling and modern trains will improve safety if correctly installed. However there ought to be more station staff at all times, simply to improve the ‘customer experience’.But going back to the latest bailout. Why are cycling and walking always lumped together as active travel. Everyone walks to some extent, and you don’t need special equipment to do it. Maybe if some of the £50m was spent on improving pavements it would encourage far more people to walk further. Cycling isn’t the answer, and never has Ben.

Simon Hayes ● 1290d

There were strikes on the DLR in 2015 and 2018, shutting down the service. There is always a member of staff on every DLR train-they call them Passenger Service Agents. The first driverless trains for the underground have been ordered and are being built to replace the cars on the Piccadilly Line. They will at first have drivers but can eventually become fully automated. Other things-expensive things-will have to be done to the underground before that happens. I can recommend reading this article if anyone is *really* interested in "driverless trains": https://www.londonreconnections.com/2021/the-political-myth-of-the-driverless-tube-train/

Terry Freestone ● 1290d

Driverless trains was a condition put in place by the government, who bailed out Khan yet again putting his paw out for millions & millions of pounds every other month.I would be chuffed to bits at the collapse of TFL.I think the train drivers union need to be careful, money is dwindling for their highly lucrative jobs.If they can cut that be a massive saving.I would however want to see guards or some human points of contact in a hi vis at each station.The other day at Perivale, ticket office closed with blind down.No one in box or by open barrier.Seek assistance??????? Who to????As for being more active is fine, so long as we are not dictated to - eg cycling lobby Lycra mob.See other post PJR , you have unanswered questions you are ducking, or trying to

Peter Yale ● 1290d

Driverless trains have worked well on the DLR for over thirty years. The trains on the Jubilee and Victoria lines are fully automated and only have 'drivers' to appease the unions.Will never be truly driverless in London while successive mayors refuse to confront the dinosaurs.  The Paris Metro is currently being converted to fully driverless operation.

N V Brooks ● 1290d