Station Master App

Last of the Labyrinths

5th June 2014

It’s been a while coming, but finally, after almost exactly 16 months since the first one appeared at St. James’s Park, the last of the Labyrinths was installed this week at Perivale.

We needed to get Acton Town, North Ealing, West Acton too – which is handy as they were all on the way, and we soon had them in hand. A full list of where they all are is over on Geoff’s website here.

Art on the Underground also tweeted the ones that had previously been up, then removed whilst work took place at those stations, that have now all been put back up again – so for the first time since it started, all 270 are in place, simultaneously!

West Acton Labyrinth

This post categorised under: Art on the Underground / Labyrinths
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Last Wimbleware ‘C’ Stock

3rd June 2014

C Stock Poster

It’s your last chance ever to catch a ‘C’ stock train in public service as the last one runs today with its scheduled last run being the 1.09pm from Wimbledon to Edgware Road where it will be taken out of service.

Tickets though, have now gone on sale at the LTM website for the C-Stock tour, later in the month.

Update: In the end, the last C Stock train departed Wimbledon at 09.05, and was then unceremoniously taken out of service at Edgware Road, due to it meeting its ‘mileage restriction limit’.

A power failure over the weekend it seems put some C-Stock trains out of place which led to this mis-calcuation, and so it was taken out of service earlier than planned so that the same unit can run as the final tour-train at the end of the month.

TfL’s press release is here.

VirginWiFi now VodafoneWiFi

1st June 2014

Vodafone WiFi

We noticed the other day on a Vodafone device that at stations that have VirginMedia WiFi, you now also get the choice to connect to Vodafone WiFi.

In fact, we didn’t even have to manually choose to connect to it – our iPhone just connected automatically to the network and WiFi started working just as if we had connected to Virgin Media!

A little technical digging later, and it turns out that Vodafone identify and authenticate you using the IMSI number (your unique SIM card number) and are able to tell if you’re a Vodafone customer who has the right package, and will allow you to connect.

Using the Vodafone connection instead of the Virgin one gives you a level of encryption too (whatever the value of secure WiFi is today!) but better than the “none” on the Virgin Media network (where your connection could easily be eavesdropped by a malicious third party). It also means you don’t see the “captive” WiFi portal that you see when you first connect to the VirginMedia WiFi, although Vodafone have published some help that states that you might see a captive portal every 45 minutes if you open your browser.

This is a great way of getting more people on-line on the Tube with zero-configuration and we hope to see the other operators adopt the same EAP-SIM and iOS carrier bundle settings system that Vodafone have in the future.

This post categorised under: Tube / Wi-Fi
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Piccadilly Closures

30th May 2014

We spotted this on some publicity the other day concerning Gloucester Road – sure Piccadilly trains aren’t stopping there whilst the lifts are replaced, but what’s this below? NO TRAINS at all for a few weeks at the end of July and beginning of August? Surely that’s just at weekends, right?

Piccadilly Closures

Err, no. We checked out the TfL Planned Works calendar – and there must be some major work taking place as there really are no Piccadilly services beyond Rayners Lane for 20 days, and the Metropolitan is affected too, with trains only going as far as Rusilip. This means there will be NO TUBE TRAINS at all beyond Ruislup and Uxbridge between July 19th and August the 10th. Replacement buses will of course operate

No trains to Uxbridge!

This post categorised under: Engineering / Tube
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Planet of the Apps

28th May 2014

Station Master Geoff appears on GINX-TV’s ‘Planet of the Apps‘ last week as they asked us on to talk about the App, and we were very happy to oblige! It’s taken us a few days to capture it, but have done so now – here’s how it came out.

This post categorised under: Media Mention / Video
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Priority Lift Boarding

27th May 2014

With major work taking place on the escalators at Cutty Sark DLR station at the bottom, there is only step and lift access when entering the station – there is only an escalator out at the moment.

So there’s a big sign up saying that the lift is for wheelchairs and prams only – as a temporary poster – but this is up next to a permanent sign suggesting that it is always the case at this station, and is the first time we’ve seen a permanent sign suggesting that this is the case at a station.

Priority Boarding

This post categorised under: Accessibility / DLR / Escalators
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Now You C Me

26th May 2014

Station Master Geoff’s video of the final A-Stock trains, is finally coming out on DVD next month (via the London Transport Museum) along with a brand new video … the last days of the C Stock, the trailer of which is now online:

The tickets haven’t gone live on the LTMuseums website yet, but they soon will for the Last C-Stock Tour on Sunday June 29th. On the day there’ll be a ‘pop up’ shop/stall at Barking station, where the DVD will be on sale for the first time, and after that – through the LT Museum shop as per normal.

The trailer for the A-Stock video (A to S) is still online here too.

Both videos are 30 minutes in length, one hour in total for the whole DVD.

This post categorised under: London Transport Museum / Video
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Labyrinth Update … Part 3

24th May 2014

North Harrow Labyrinth

They’re still out there – and we’re still tracking them down! We love the Labyrinths.

Yesterday we ventured to the middle-to-dark end of the Bakerloo Line and picked up Queens Park, Kensal Rise and the brand new one that had been installed at Willesden Junction at last.

Coupled with Wimbledon and Richmond (two tricky NR stations) that have recently been added, by our calculations there are just seven stations left now that don’t yet have their Labyrinths installed, namely:

Acton Town, West Acton, North Ealing, Perivale, Brent Cross, East Finchley and Loughton.

Why these particular stations are last or problematic in getting a labyrinth installed (perhaps the Grade II listed status for some of them?) we don’t know, but the end is now in sight.

We also spoke to Art on the Underground yesterday who told us that the ones that had been put up at Cannon Street and Whitechapel (and then removed for maintenance work), are being re-installed next week.

This post categorised under: Art on the Underground / Labyrinths
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Red Wine (And ten other colours)

23rd May 2014

I see what you did there, London Wine Week in having the eleven colours of the tube lines …

Eleven Bottles of Wine

This post categorised under: Posters
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Central Stickers

22nd May 2014

There are now some nice big bright stickers on Central Line carriages, in bold red pointing out the fact that trains aren’t currently stopping at Bond Street, by removing its connection blob.

No connection

What we can’t work out though is why they felt the sticker needed to cover up Notting Hill Gate, Queensway, Lancaster Gate and Marble Arch as well when absolutely nothing map-wise has changed about these stations.

With connection

This post categorised under: Map / Posters / Signage / Tube
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Recent Posts

Archives

Last of the Labyrinths

Last Wimbleware ‘C’ Stock

VirginWiFi now VodafoneWiFi

Piccadilly Closures

Planet of the Apps

Priority Lift Boarding

Now You C Me

Labyrinth Update … Part 3

Red Wine (And ten other colours)

Central Stickers