Piccadilly at Turnham Green
Last year, living on the Piccadilly Line as we do, we saw the publicity asking people for their views and thoughts on it. In particular, it seems, whether trains should stop more often, or even on a regular, basis at Turnham Green.
This Station Master made the point that they’d like to see more off-peak trains stop there during the day time – e.g. after 10am, and before 4pm, which I suspect wasn’t a popular choice.
Anyway, TfL have now published their results, which they sent to everyone in an email. They don’t specifically say “We’re not going to stop more trains at Turnham Green”, instead they just say:
“Although we recognise that stopping more Piccadilly line trains at Turnham Green would benefit customers using that station, we do not currently do so because it would mean decreasing the service to other parts of the Piccadilly line, longer journey times for customers passing through Turnham Green station and a potentially less reliable service for all passengers on the line”
That is, until then we spotted a small link at the bottom which DOES take you to the full report, which is here. (Note, it’s a 38-page PDF but the summary is the same : No additional Piccadilly Line trains to Turnham Green).
… but the summary is the same : No additional Piccadilly Line trains to Turnham Green).
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Hang on … that is of course, until you find the one small paragraph on page 24, which then DOES go onto tell you that ‘TfL plans to stop Piccadilly Line trains at Turnham Green station all day once the line is modernised’ – i.e. once there is a new signalling system in place with new rolling stock.
This is what annoys us about such lengthy reports – in the initial email you get, the message is one of “Trains will not stop at Turnham Green”, but only if you read the full lengthy report, do you find that new trains will stop there – but not until 2018. And we suspect that date will slip to 2020 in reality.
Reading the rest of the report too it does reference the fact the initial survey was to ask about people’s thoughts on the whole of the Piccadilly Line, but they do seem to have focused on the Turnham Green issue and not much else. There’s no mention of the Piccadilly Line going to Ealing Broadway for example, or whether the District Line will go to Rayners Lane instead once the new S-Stock are rolled out on that line.