Station Master App

Santa Cycles

The Mayor of London, Transport for London and Santander today announced a seven-year partnership to grow and develop London’s Cycle Hire scheme.

Named ‘Boris Bikes’ as the ‘Barclays Cycle Hire’ slogan never caught on.

The new name – Santander Cycles – and the new red-and-white livery (although the base dark blue colour seems to be staying) of the 11,500 bikes, 748 docking stations and 32 service vehicles will become familiar sights to Londoners from April onwards. Staff uniforms and membership keys will also be rebranded.

Rumour has it that Santander outbid Coca Cola for sponsorship of the scheme.

So with them now being ‘Santander Cycles’, that’s got to be abbreviated to ‘Santa Cycles’ right?

Cycle Hire — — 27 Feb 15

When not passing through Zone 1 …

Pink Oyster Pad

The highly amusing TLF Travel Alerts posted this on Twitter, and made us laugh … overtones of course, of a classic Monty Python sketch.

There seems to be confusion around how to travel on the Overground if you’re not passing through Zone 1. It really is quite simple. Behold:

“If you are travelling on the Overground but NOT going through Zone 1 but ARE considering going through Zone 2 but NOT even thinking about a bus but you WILL be taking the Tube but for ONLY two stops and you WILL be taking a different route home but WON’T pass through any station with escalators DESPITE your need for excitement and you will ALSO skirt the borders of Zone 4 but NOT Zone 3 and you will ONLY travel in a CLOCKWISE direction then remember to touch your Oyster card on the pink reader, then the red one, then the green, the blue, the yellow the pink one again TWICE, then the purple one, recite the Sixth Incantation while turning on the spot, and then breathe. Just breathe.”

“Once your breathing has been monitored and deemed to be within acceptable limits, you will be asked 37 general knowledge questions and will then be required to compose a poem on a subject of your choice using a meter as defined by station staff. This will be judged.”

Following these simple steps will ensure you pay the correct fare. It’s really not that hard. Enjoy your journeys. We do.

Fun / Oyster — — 24 Feb 15

New Tube Map 2015

Station Master Geoff has written and produced an article and video for Londonist speculating on what might happen in May of this year, when new Overground lines are added to London’s transport network …

Map / Video — — 19 Feb 15

TfL Takeover

Do you ever get the feeling that sometimes (with new Overground lines coming later this year), TfL are slowly but surely – like a Bond super villain – trying to take over the world? It appears they already have a logo for their global domination strategy …

Globe Roundel

Fun — — 16 Feb 15

50 Shades of tube

50 Shades of Grey, with all the rude words replaced by Underground Stations. It’s probably even ruder than the original. Courtesy of Absolute Radio.

listen to ‘50 Shades of Tubes: Going Underground’ on audioBoom

Fifty shades

Fun — — 13 Feb 15

Every Tube Station song … the map version

Someone’s taken Jay Foreman’s Every Tube Station song, and produced a ‘map’ version of instead. Wow… this probably took longer to put together than the original video…

Video — — 11 Feb 15

From the cab

… because sometimes, the best place to take a picture of an abandoned Tube station (here – Osterley Park & Spring Grove) is from the cab of a train – taken with permission!

This is going into our ‘Abandoned Stations’ App which we’re currently working on, and will be released later this year …

Osterley Park & Spring Grove

Disused Stations — — 09 Feb 15

Part suspended bench

We recommend not trying to sit on this bench on the eastbound platform on the Central Line at Notting Hill Gate. Who broke this?! We have visions of a very, um .. large person sitting down on one end, and it giving way under their weight!

Notting Hill bench

Fun — — 08 Feb 15

Five car Overground

Out of the fleet of 25 trains required to service the East London Line part of the Overground, the halfway point for the extended trains has been reached, as 13 units are now five cars in length.

Whitechapel, Wapping – and here at Rotherhithe though – are three stations on that line where the fifth carriage doesn’t fit, (you can just make it out in this picture here). The fifth car sits in the darkness of the tunnel, and Selective Door Opening makes sure that the doors in the last carriage don’t open into the tunnel.

Five car Overground train

Overground / Upgrades — — 06 Feb 15

D Derailment

A small hiccup in Ealing Common depot occurred earlier this week, when a 3-car unit (half a normal train) being moved about had a small issue and became derailed. It meant that no unit that would normally enter the depot from Ealing Common station could do so, and had to do so via Acton Town instead.

This Station Master was caught in that delay which is how we knew about it!

D-Stock Derailment

Broken Tube — — 05 Feb 15

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