The Vic

I really wasn't in the mood for two rounds of Hindi when I got up this morning, but I did eventually get out of bed. I gave up any hope of making the 08:54 train, though, and put some washing away instead. Having learned my lesson from Monday, however, I started getting my things together comfortably before 09:05. In spite of this, my watch decided it was 09:13 by the time I was approaching ROV (in horrible drizzle which never really cleared up, too)! Why it did that, I don't know :P Ah well, although I took longer than I'd expected, I was still just about on time. The WOO train was in the platform when I turned up, but I've also learnt my lesson from the time I nearly slipped on my way to High Street Kensington and I was nice and careful (without dawdling, obviously). No problem.

In reality, though, I could have dawdled all I liked, and there was no need for me to stare aghast at my watch either :P Before I'd even set off today, we had a platforms and hold call for a faulty train at MIE (Mile End) (where else? :P).

Speaking of MIE, I have a bit more information about yesterday's calamity, courtesy of Aslefshrugged. Apparently, in addition to the signalling problems, 38 electrical pickup shoes managed to find their way trackside. No word yet on what it was that enticed them away from the train they should have been attached to, but it made for quite a mess :P

Anyway since it was terribly wet and cold and nasty the T/Op did something I have never seen before - he enabled passenger door operation on the 1992 stock. I didn't even realise that was still possible!

Passenger door operation is, of course, very much in use on London Overground and the DLR. Now, over on these railways, the door open buttons will illuminate when the doors can be opened. The doors can't be opened when the buttons aren't illuminated, but that won't stop people trying :P

I don't really know much about the operation of either of these railways; but I do know that London Overground has now gone (or perhaps is in the latter stages of going?) DOO (Driver Only Operation). I don't know if LO has CSDE, but I presume the doors can't be opened until man or machine has checked the train is correctly berthed. I would guess that enabling of the door open buttons is done by the driver but I don't know. Either way, when the buttons are illuminated and the doors can be opened, passengers must press the button to open any door they wish to use, otherwise they remain closed. (Well, I say "must", in my experience this has been the case, but I'm not a frequent user. I think it's quite likely that the driver can open all doors themselves, especially at rush hour). I can't recall whether doors can be closed manually by the passengers or not, but I believe they will eventually shut after a while to keep the cold out or whatever. Until the buttons are disabled and no longer illuminated, the doors can still be opened again by newcomers. The driver is responsible for closing the doors. When the train is ready to depart, s/he will do the necessary and any doors that are open will close and the door open buttons are disabled. This used to be the job of the guard on the lines which still had them. When all doors are proved closed, the train can go.

A similar state of affairs exists on the DLR. Once the train is correctly berthed, the buttons illuminate and passengers must operate the buttons if they wish to leave/board. (Again, I say "must". After finishing, it was suggested to me that I may be wrong and I had a quick look at youtube and I think that suggestion could be correct. I'm sure the train captain can probably operate all doors if necessary. I think off-peak it's quite common to leave it to the pax, though). I don't know if this (checking the train is berthed and enabling the door open buttons) is done automatically, but I presume it is. Again, however, the closing of any and all doors before departure is the job of the train captain (officially: Passenger Service Agent (PSA)) I believe.

Regular readers may recall that a similar situation (which I can be a bit more sure about) exists on London Underground with the S stock. This is largely because of the air-con (to avoid wasting energy by having the doors wide open at termini and during long dwell times) and the long dwell times more likely on the extremities of the Met. The S stock does have a new form of CSDE equipment and I understand that when the train is correctly berthed, the T/Op him/herself opens all doors. Passengers can't open the doors before the T/Op, but still I constantly see S stocks pulling up and pax hammering away at the buttons which has no effect at all :P Still, at first you don't succeed, push, push and push again :P Once the doors have been opened by the T/Op, they can be set up to close automatically after a certain period of time. (I'm not sure if this is a feature which has to be enabled or whether it's a feature which can be disabled). The buttons will remain illuminated and so will lights by the doors inside the carriage, indicating that passengers may operate the doors if they desire. As on the DLR and LO, when the train is ready to go, the T/Op closes any and all doors which are open (as per the usual procedure I think) and the lights go off and the train can go (assuming, of course, all doors are proved closed and some wally hasn't made a mess of the task of using some doors).

Now, anyway, where was I? Yes. Though new to the sub-surface lines, passenger door operation is generally out of fashion. The 1992 stock was built with the capability, but I've  never seen it used. I've heard it was stopped on the District line after numerous incidents of passengers shutting doors on other passengers. Also, passenger door operation is not really - in general - a good thing on rapid transit systems. Unlike railways such as LO, dwell times are very short and what you want is: train turns up, all doors open at the same time, all doors close together, train leaves. Nice and fast and sharp. With so many people trying to get on and off, you don't really want (nor have any need for (e.g. for reasons to do with the temperature)) people having to mess around with door controls. Indeed, in the recent revamp of the Northern line's 1995 stock, the buttons have actually been removed. So for these reasons the feature is almost never enabled on the 1992 stock and you certainly can't open the doors yourself before the T/Op - there's no point pressing the buttons immediately after the train stops, before the doors open, it won't do anything :P

Today, however, the T/Op said that 'cause of the weather (and, also, ROV is a very lightly used station, so few people would be likely to want to board or alight), he was gonna close the doors, but if we wanted to get off, we could press the open buttons. The doors then closed and then (whether this is how they're designed to work I don't know) one set of double doors re-opened automatically. I could scarcely believe my ears (or my eyes) :P I didn't really want to be seen to be messing about, but then curiosity overcame embarrassment and I walked over and pressed the close button and the doors closed. Now, satisfied, I wasn't gonna fiddle anymore. But then I decided to fiddle some more and opened a door, walked to another (better, actually, for changing at LIS (Liverpool Street)) carriage and was able to open the doors from the outside. Quite the exciting novelty for me :P After all this time tutting (also see above) at people attempting to open the doors of tube trains when a train pulls up, thinking myself all knowledgeable about tube train doors tehe :P, I have learnt something new.

So anyway, back to the main story. Before too long, we were cleared to move up one station to WOO, which is where we were terminating anyway. By the time the next westbound (EAB (Ealing Broadway) I think) arrived, the problem seemed to have been resolved and we reached LIS without much more to-do. Here I changed for a semi-fast Met train to Harrow-on-the-Hill and was back out in the nasty, nasty weather in no time. I arrived 10 (well, much closer to 15, but 10 sounds better :P) minutes late, all told. Not really a good week for punctuality :P

After round 1 of Hindi - having enjoyed myself so much with the Edgware Roads - I decided to take a trip on the Vic. This also had the advantage of obviating the need to walk from King's X to Russell Sq. The Victoria line is pretty nippy and it's actually quite a fun ride. I find the seats surprisingly comfortable, the interior of the new trains is all rather pleasant, the exterior of the new trains is even more so and I enjoyed seeing the Vic again after a while - particularly the little motifs on every platform (each station has a unique picture). The trains do make rather a lot of noise in the process of getting around, mind you :P

So yes, it was up to Walthamstow Central from King's X, all the way to Brixton and then back to Green Park. At Walthamstow Central I also found myself on the national rail platform (Greater Anglia (Chingford - LIS)), which was a fairly nice surprise. Took in a rather colourful bridge outside Brixton station as well. At Green Park, I changed for the Picc up to Russell Sq, where I again had pretty good luck with the lifts :P Also, the T/Op on my Picc train was silky smooth, there was almost no jolt at all when we stopped. This was in marked contrast to the very hard stop of the 2009 stock and its ATO. It used to be that the heuristic criteria for assessing whether a T/Op was really smooth was whether you could do your crossword without making a mess. They don't seem to've bothered aiming for that with the 2009 stock's ATO system (DTG-R (Distance to go - Radio)).

After Hindi round 2 I boarded a Circle line train at Euston Sq and changed for the EPP (Epping) at LIS. Only a 2 minute wait for the HAI at WOO, which was especially nice given the weather.