Train walk round unnecessary waste of time ?

[Taunton]

It would actually serve the railway community better if its supporters gave reasoned and sensible comments to such items, sensibly worded, rather than hysterical political invective, which just proves to those who wrote what started this thread off what they have always believed.

 

[MissPWay]

It would actually serve the railway community better if its supporters gave reasoned and sensible comments to such items, sensibly worded, rather than hysterical political invective, which just proves to those who wrote what started this thread off what they have always believed.

What’s the point? What they say is political not rooted in any technological or safety case. They’re not going to change their mind if they get a run down of checking for brake isolations and scotches on a rake of Mk3’s are they?

 

[Geeves]

I've heard of a few stories of trains in the sidings with not to be moved boards on the far end of a 8 coach train, and there is no computer currently that can flag a warning on the cab for those type of events, to me it seems like a good idea to check, not to mention its not unheard of for wires and pipes to be left attached to said trains.

 

[dctraindriver]

It would actually serve the railway community better if its supporters gave reasoned and sensible comments to such items, sensibly worded, rather than hysterical political invective, which just proves to those who wrote what started this thread off what they have always believed.

Probably because we’ve seen and heard it before or experienced it in other sectors. Not all of us have been on the railway man and boy and have read stuff like this before and experienced the consequences some time later....

 

[ComUtoR]

It would actually serve the railway community better if its supporters gave reasoned and sensible comments to such items, sensibly worded, rather than hysterical political invective, which just proves to those who wrote what started this thread off what they have always believed.

Sensible answers have already been posted. Pretty much everything else is going to repeat what was blindingly obvious to everyone.

 

[Darandio]

So, the train is stabled at a remote location, no security etc. Local vandals decide to open a few panels. Driver jumps in, off they go. First platform rips said panels off or slices someone. Sounds risky to me....

Well indeed, the suggestion of not doing a walk round is absurd.

 

[coppercapped]

If you told any aircraft pilot, even those of the smallest ones, that the walk round every trip was unnecessary, they would tell you that you are an idiot. If you are going for a flight test, even for a basic private plane licence, the examiner will always covertly snag an item for the walkaround to see if you spot it.

Notably this didn't evolve from any union job-preservation approach or requirement, as airline pilots are paid by the flight hour, which all the necessary preliminaries make no impact on.

Just to add to your post. I was told by a pilot that another important part of the walk-round was that it helps prepare you psychologically for flight. Those bits you are looking at being all that stand between you and oblivion...

Obviously this ritual is more significant for General Aviation where the pilot may be the only person looking at the aircraft rather than commercial flying where many people will be looking and where it is not necessarily the captain who walks round.

Although I am all for labour saving procedures if the technology is up to it, there is still an awful lot the Mk 1 eyeball can pick up that automation can't - yet. And as trains can travel very quickly and are very heavy I'm all for the Mark 1 eyeball.

 

[LAX54]

Might as well do away with it for planes as well. They tell you when something goes wrong as well, right?

I would have thought it makes sense to walk round your car too ! if you don't you may well end up with a fine and points due to a light out, faulty tyres, don't think there is a brake fluid level indication ?
Trains: Hand Brake, Faulty Wagon, pipe hanging, coupling hanging, tail light out/missing.........

 

[ComUtoR]

don't think there is a brake fluid level indication ?

My car is a 2016 model and it still has the old school level indicators on the fluid tanks.

 

[Domh245]

I would have thought it makes sense to walk round your car too ! if you don't you may well end up with a fine and points due to a light out, faulty tyres, don't think there is a brake fluid level indication ?

There was a quite prominent advertising campaign on radio a few years ago to the effect of "you wouldn't trust a plane that wasn't checked before departure, so why not your car"

 

[MissPWay]

At the end of the day this is just a right wing bloggers speculative idea about efficiency savings. I look forward to reading about Katie Hopkins’ thoughts on Axle counters vs track circuits.

 

[Ashley Hill]

To help this thread along could somebody in the industry comment on whether anybody else besides the driver ever 'walks round the train'.

At my depot guards still carry out a full prep on a class 255 (including a walk around and through) for a set that's outstabled. Then we have to sign the prep slip to say we've done it. You seldom find anything wrong but you never know!

 

[87015]

Prep activity is already been taken off drivers and carried out by the maintainer with some modern stock I believe, so this isn’t a new invention.

 

[DustyBin]

Bus and HGV drivers are required to carry out a similar check. I walk around my car at least once a week to check for damage (unlikely to be safety critical but I’d like to have an idea of when/where it occurred). Having said that I could of course spot a damaged tire for example which would be safety critical. I also check the oil level etc. manually as I’d like to know if it needs topping up before it gets to the point where the car warns me. All in all a nonsense article!

 

[Hairy Bear]

On two occasions walking around our Meridians I have found access panels open ( they stick out at 90° to the body), and another occasion an 8ft tall set of steps leaning against the bodyside.
And that's why I always walk around them.

 

[DarloRich]

They also know if they use the words “highly paid,” and “Union,” they can dog whistle the usual suspects into a frothing rage about nothing.

and that, dear reader, is the whole point of this article. Don't fall for their tricks.

 

[Philip Phlopp]

I steeled myself to read this Conservative Home article. Actually there are some good points in it, especially the last one - "the greatest inefficiency within the rail system is the Time Delay Attribution mechanism. This merry-go-round of cash and blame achieves little and certainly doesn't help the passengers or taxpayers."

The merry-go-around of cash is an annoyance, but the underlying Time Delay Attribution mechanism dates from British Rail and their attempts to understand underlying causes of delays and failures.

The process now is insane with fights on the size of birds or types of animals so money can be sent or received, but the underlying data generated is invaluable to the railway. It's the sort of data which highlights where trespass might be occurring more often than normal and where resources might best be deployed to improve fencing, where there's some issues with signalling which might well indicate a drainage or cable theft problem and so on.

 

[FordFocus]

Poorly researched and nothing more than an opinion piece. Lovely comment section open in the right wing echo chamber about pay and unions!

A lot of TOCs now have fitters or depot drivers prepping trains, that's a cost saving on salary grades. I haven't prepped a train in years. Automation and sensors can't detect many items of TW1 of the rule book (feel free to Google 'TW1 RSSB'). Lifeguard damage, smashed windows.. Then you get to checking Not to Move and fuelling hoses aren't attached to the train.

HGV Drivers have Daily Checks of 10 minutes. As previously mentioned about pilots, they wouldn't take off without a walk around and pre flight check.

 

[Wagonshop]

I used to be a examiner in the late 60's
One of my jobs was check trains out stabled at night all over kent DMU and EMU"s.
I can only remenber one thing that was unsafe a shoe beam hanging off a emu
Most things would be carded.
Do remember that DMU's some seen had brake blocks allmost worn away.
Freight trains used to find faults on most trains some clearly unsafe and would be stopped.
You do need a trained eye to check.
Now rolling is so much safer. I do remember finding things wrong on new PO vehicles.

I

 

[ABB125]

Why does the inspection need to be undertaken by a driver? Surely it would be better for someone whose job it is to maintain the trains to inspect?

 

[SynthD]

Could there be more status lights in the cab? Put them behind the driver so it’s not a distraction. A simple red yellow green status light on oil, does that need checking more than once a shift?

When I take a hire bike I briefly test it out before even unlocking it. Sometimes the same tests with my own bike, stored in my own garage. There’s no need for complacency.

 

[MotCO]

Wasn't there a recent incident where a train had been left in "good order" overnight, but someone had "meddled" overnight (some training as I recall) which left things in different order on departure?

Yes there was - I think it was this one. https://www.gov.uk/government/publi...ofton-west-junction-west-yorkshire-7-may-2020

The train was prepped the night before, and a brake test was not required if it had been checked within the last 10 hours. However, some trainees were being instructed on it, and some brakes were isolated, and were not changed back, leading to inefficient braking capacity and a SPAD.

 

[David57]

I have had a lifetime in the HGV/PCV industry, if I was 'first user' of any vehicle, and signed a 'no defect' card, I would always have a good look round, as (certainly in the bus industry) any unreported defect later in the day may come back to be blamed on you.

 

[Re 4/4]

When you regularly use hire or company pool cars, a walkaround quickly becomes second nature - not least because if there's a scratch and you don't report it before driving off, you get to pay for it!

I've never had problems with the oil so far, but I have turned up to the car I'm supposed to be using before now to find someone's knocked a mirror off.

 

[Domh245]

Could there be more status lights in the cab? Put them behind the driver so it’s not a distraction. A simple red yellow green status light on oil, does that need checking more than once a shift?

You could, but with modern trains it's far easier to put it on the TMS screen (which is what they do). That way you could even have it tell you which engine is low on oil (for example) and the severity of each fault that's noted. Also worth noting that a status light is something that should be avoided - even if it were behind the driver a bank of green lights saying "everything is fine" will become quite a distraction at night. I also don't think that checking the oil is the sort of thing that drivers would be doing on these checks though

Putting status lights in the cab (or a faults page on the TMS) doesn't address the issues around sensor reliability, nor how or what to put a sensor on. For example, the examples mentioned around equipment doors being left open, or a ladder left against the train, how do you put sensors to detect that? You could put a proximity sensor on every single equipment door, but that's going to quickly start becoming very expensive for very little benefit. Something like a ladder would be to all intents and purposes undetectable (on cost and technical grounds). Not to mention that with each sensor you put on something, that's another thing that can fail - there a few things more irritating than a faulty sensor grinding things to a halt when everything else is fine

 

[JB_B]

What on earth do politicians know about trains .... ?

Probably not a great deal : see e.g : https://www.independent.co.uk/voice...-taking-a-more-rational-approach-5362620.html

 

[iphone76]

At my TOC we only prep the older stock. The new trains are prepped by the fitters. We should stop prepping in May next year when the old stock is finally phased out. Personally I would rather do it.

 

[the sniper]

When you regularly use hire or company pool cars, a walkaround quickly becomes second nature - not least because if there's a scratch and you don't report it before driving off, you get to pay for it!

I've never had problems with the oil so far, but I have turned up to the car I'm supposed to be using before now to find someone's knocked a mirror off.

If you're rich enough you'd consider that a waste of your valuable time, far more sensible to just pay for any damage the hire car company sticks on you regardless of who caused it or have your insurance take care of it.

I agree with the Tories on this one. Should be like that on the railway. Driver just takes what he finds, regardless of open panels, damaged equipment, attached pipes/machinery, human or animal life laying foul of the train. Tories pay for any fallout via the DfT and the Drivers are absolved of any responsibility/blame.

 

[Surreytraveller]

It would be interesting to know how often the walk around finds something amiss that otherwise would not have been detected.

The obvious point also being that trains do a darn sight more mileage every day than a typical car.

So the next time a signal fails, no point cautioning the next train, and there's hardly ever anything amiss

 

[baz962]

If you're rich enough you'd consider that a waste of your valuable time, far more sensible to just pay for any damage the hire car company sticks on you regardless of who caused it or have your insurance take care of it.

I agree with the Tories on this one. Should be like that on the railway. Driver just takes what he finds, regardless of open panels, damaged equipment, attached pipes/machinery, human or animal life laying foul of the train. Tories pay for any fallout via the DfT and the Drivers are absolved of any responsibility/blame.

I do hope this is tongue in cheek. Absolved of blame or not , I wouldn't want anything on my conscience.