Spacious Trains
This is first (and only, so far!) time we’ve seen this new poster up around the network. A sleek S-Stock bursting out of the roundel announcing yet another way that TfL are ‘reinvesting their income to improve the services’.
We saw this on the Victoria Line, and interestingly it does mention the new ’09 trains as being part of this reinvestment, alongside the Metropolitan, Circle and H&C lines which do have the new ‘S’ Stock.
So, just the District Line to go then …
Here’s something that we’d never seen on the Tube before until recently, and now we’ve seen it happen 3 times in the space of a week. A person gets on and distributes packs of tissues with a note asking for money – they put them in places next to people sitting on the train, some who ignore, some who read, some who do give money … and the whole thing has to take place within two minutes until the train gets to the next stop.
Twice on the Bakerloo Line, and twice on the Central Line we’ve seen this, and we’re told that the practice has been quite common on the Paris Metro for several years, and now it’s here in London.
Tissues
With the last ‘C’ stock train running on the Circle line last week, the rollout of S7 trains to the Hammersmith & City and Circle Lines is now complete. There are just 8 C-Stock trains left on the network – still faithfully serving the Wimbledon to Edgware Road branch, and these will be phased out over the next couple of months.
We couldn’t help notice all the ‘All trains do not stop here!’ signs on the platforms, which were put in place when S7’s were first introduced and there was a mix of ‘C’ and ‘S’ trains. Now that all the S-Stocks are out there, surely it’s time to remove these platform signs?
Not all trains … at Aldgate Station
It also leave us (Station Master) in a tricky spot. We have all the new ‘Which door/carriage?’ information ready for the next release of the App – now that trains have 7 cars rather than 6, there have been a few subtle changes in the exit information. But we’re aware that that information is ripe for being copied and used elsewhere.
So in the same way that some cartographers (including Google Maps) introduced fake roads into their maps (known as Trap Streets), we’re considering entering a piece of false/wrong data on purpose so that we’d know if anyone ever copied us!
Ickenham Labyrinth
Time for a Labyrinth update again as we were out on the network last week, doing some bashing and picked up a few Labyrinths on the way (Ickenham is Hard, South Kensington is particularly evil).
We note though that the official Art on the Underground website, still hasn’t added a few that do exist (e.g. Russell Square), but we’re quite excited because we’ve now got up to 205 – the first time we’ve been two hundred and something, meaning that we’re on the home straight.
The distinctly non-LU stations of Heathrow 5, Richmond and Wimbledon though are still being stubborn, and I suspect will be the last stations to have their labyrinths installed.
Anyway, here’s Geoff’s list if you’re having trouble finding any, or if you think you’ve spotted any that you want to tell us about then tweet us at @stnmasterapp
Station Master Geoff has been out for Londonist again, making the eighth of series of videos that he’s doing – one for each line, this time featuring the Piccadilly Line…
Another weekend, another alternative tube map from the archives – here we’ve found the ‘Underneath London’ map which shows the Northern Line (for comparison) underneath London, alongside the sewers, underground rivers, a bit of Roman London, and the Post Office Railway – which has recently been rumoured maybe will be opened up as an attraction to visitors in the near future, rather than being mothballed away.
Underneath London
The next version of Station Master will be out later in the year (in the next couple of months, we hope), and one thing that it will have is something that we started doing over two years ago (it’s been a long project), that is, drawing every tube station as a 3D map.
We try and do at least one or two a week, and the end is now in sight – we’ve drawn 250 out of the 270 underground stations, that’s 92%. Although we’re trying to not think about the fact that we should really go and sketch out and draw up all the DLR stations after that which just aren’t as interesting.
Anyway, here’s a sneak preview of Highgate which we’ve done this week, complete with its ‘secret’ exit only escalator, and platforms that are far too long for the trains.
Highgate 3D Map
Russell Square Sign
If I were reading this blog, rather than writing it – I have to say I’d probably think “Surely you’ve just made that up and have photoshopped it now?”, but no – I kid you not. This is real.
We recently reported on the TfL department of mathematical magic where both 193 and 320 steps equates to the same as a 15 storey building. Turns out the magic maths department have sprinkled their magic on the warning sign at Russell Square too which we spotted yesterday, which has 175 steps, which is also somehow equivalent to 15 floors!
So, dear TfL we’ve done some of the hard work for you. Let’s say that the original Covent Garden sign is correct and that 193 steps is 15 storey building. That’s 12.8 steps per storey, meaning that Hampstead should be a 25 story building, and Russell Square 13 (rounded down) or 14 stories (rounded up).
Any chance of some correct labelling? Or does your sign writer just really like the number ‘15‘. ??
Strike Suspended Poster
After last week, we were all set to go again with our alternative tube map showing what services actually are running during the strike (it would have been an improvement on last week), but on Tuesday afternoon, the strikes were called off.
Londonist have an article here, or the BBC have a video as to the reasons behind it. Note that whilst the strike is ‘off’ they’re not being ruled out completely, just on hold whilst extended talks take place.
The slow rollout of platform Dot Matrix Indicators actually showing the ‘next train’ information (after years of them being installed without showing it) continues its progress as we notice they’re now working at South Ealing and here shown – At Acton Town – useful when you’re going up to Ealing Common and you’re trying to work out if the Piccadilly or District service is going to leave first.
Whether a train in ‘3 minutes‘ actually arrives in 3 minutes though is another matter, and we’ve got an idea that we’ll be blogging about soon, to check the actual timings of trains.
Acton Town DMI