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New ticket gates in North of England

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Spartacus

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I think the only way they could do it on the Leeds platform is by extending the current platform railing so that it extends around the lift, and put the gates within that cordon at the bottom of the stairs.
 
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pemma

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A quick glance at the latest estimate of station usage figures from the ORR, I would say Sheffield was the largest for passenger numbers without any barriers

If there's so many large passengers perhaps ticket gates are unworkable. ;)
 

johntea

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Quite rare to see a manual ticket check at Sheffield, suppose even that is quite hard to coordinate.

It is quite funny though how you could travel hundreds of miles and dodge a fare but try jumping on a Supertram and dodging a fare for a journey not even 1 mile ;) The staff on those are like hawks!
 

BMIFlyer

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Probably just to keep the ticket hall entrance and keep gates shut elsewhere.

From asking a few questions it seems that Birchwood now has the station security gates permanently locked - this in effect makes the old footbridge a right of way from one side of the station to the other.

Access to the station platforms is currently via the ticket hall then you can cross the new footbridge to acces trains towards Liverpool.
 

yorksrob

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On the subject of "newish" ticket gates in the North, the ones in Leeds seem to be increasingly decrepit. Every day at least three have paper signs crudely sellotaped over them saying "tickets only" and yesterday I saw one with brown tape over the ticket slot.
 

rg177

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On the subject of "newish" ticket gates in the North, the ones in Leeds seem to be increasingly decrepit. Every day at least three have paper signs crudely sellotaped over them saying "tickets only" and yesterday I saw one with brown tape over the ticket slot.
They're horrifically programmed anyway. 9 times out of 10 I'd have my ticket rejected. Usually "not valid at this location" on a Leeds to Newcastle single.

Not to mention the multiple times they've swallowed a ticket then not opened.
 

johntea

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Wakefield Westgate earlier and surprisingly the barriers are in operation!

I try in vain to get the installed barcode readers to scan my ticket QR code before eventually a member of staff goes ‘yeah those don’t work at all’ and manually lets me through!

Unbelievable...
 

Geeves

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Rochdale is the latest station to get on the barrier bandwagon. Gates are currently being installed in the subway, there will still be a clear run for people to pass through the tunnel, how ever its not good news for the booking office which is now on the paid side of the barriers... 4 new TVMs currently going in downstairs.
 

daodao

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Rochdale is the latest station to get on the barrier bandwagon. Gates are currently being installed in the subway, there will still be a clear run for people to pass through the tunnel, how ever its not good news for the booking office which is now on the paid side of the barriers... 4 new TVMs currently going in downstairs.

Seems daft! How do you get to the ticket office to buy a ticket if you haven't got one already?
 

MidnightFlyer

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If they move it downstairs, which I guess they'll have to, that's a personal safety and passenger information loss.

I can't remember what the platform building's like, but was there no scope to put them in there somehow?

It has been a good while since I have been in Rochdale so cannot recall the exact detail of the subway, but I can imagine moving a booking office (with all the necessary gubbins and security) any distance let alone to a different level, perhaps with no suitable existing provision at the new site, is a bit of a headache to say the least. From what I can gather the position of the booking office nowadays at Blackburn is something which has precluded barriers there, so perhaps Rochdale may give some indication of solutions!
 

Kite159

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Rochdale is the latest station to get on the barrier bandwagon. Gates are currently being installed in the subway, there will still be a clear run for people to pass through the tunnel, how ever its not good news for the booking office which is now on the paid side of the barriers... 4 new TVMs currently going in downstairs.

Would make sense at Rochdale to have two sets of barriers either side of the ticket office, so passengers can still go up the stairs to access the ticket office before going onto the platform via either set of barriers
 

Geeves

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Yes it would have made sense but it was deemed to much of a safety risk penning people at the top of a set of stairs (and it does get very busy) so the barriers are going at the bottom of the stairs instead. Moving the booking office is no big deal, there is a perfect booking office shaped hole in the day light section of the subway where you could lower in one of those Network rail style modular offices into. You could then have the full upstairs for a waiting room and shop, plus a better office for the platform staff who can then be on full view.

Unfortuntaly I cant see logic actually happening so it will be a case of the TVMs taking all the slack and people being let through to use the office if they need to which kind of defeats the object the barriers. While day to day ticket sales get lower in the AM peak the office will be busier at night as people will need a ticket to get out if they don't have one already. Certainly the late shift at Salford Central has seen a huge uptake in ticket sales where as the morning is now much quieter.
 
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johntea

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They’ve installed a couple of barriers now for the Platform 3 exit by Harrogate, and it looks like there is one of these new large screen ticketing machines by the entrance too
 

scrapy

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Gates now partially installed at Manchester Airport all wide gates. Also a separate gateline of 2 downstairs between the tram and train platforms.
 

Starmill

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There are 9 wide gates and 4 normal gates at Manchester Airport.
 

xotGD

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I did a cross-Bradford transfer earlier this week. No problem exiting at Interchange but my ticket was then rejected by the barriers at FS.
 

Trackman

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Work now at Manchester Piccadilly now to install TPE ticket gates (1-3?). Sounds like more fun to come.
 

BMIFlyer

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Gates now partially installed at Manchester Airport all wide gates. Also a separate gateline of 2 downstairs between the tram and train platforms.
Nearly ready to be switched on as well. The good news is that the barriers will be almost always "closed", especially on the platform level, mainly to combat antisocial behaviour at night.

Work now at Manchester Piccadilly now to install TPE ticket gates (1-3?). Sounds like more fun to come.

About time. The sooner the remainder of the station is completed the better.
 

BMIFlyer

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Work is progressing rather quickly on the new gates at Dewsbury.

There is a possibility that Stalybridge could be gated as well, sometime in 2018. It would by far be the easiest station on the TPE network to install barriers at.
 

johntea

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How do the barriers cope with advance tickets, do they not particularly care / not capable of reading times of tickets? Quite an interesting setup otherwise with the prospect of delayed flights etc.
 

BMIFlyer

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There will still be staff on hand for those. The protocol is that if you are delayed less than 3 hours you can still travel on the original ticket. Any more than that and you would need a brand new one.

Ideally the gates could be programmed to allow people through say 10 mins prior to the advance ticket departure time. But alas this is not a priority at the moment and would be software dependent.
 

Starmill

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About time. The sooner the remainder of the station is completed the better.
Is there something specific that makes you say that? There were long delays on the current arrangement, it doesn't seem to be causing that many problems?
 

BMIFlyer

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Is there something specific that makes you say that? There were long delays on the current arrangement, it doesn't seem to be causing that many problems?
Because from my experience the people manning platforms 8-12 will wave you through with anything remotely ticket looking.
 

BurtonM

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There is a possibility that Stalybridge could be gated as well, sometime in 2018. It would by far be the easiest station on the TPE network to install barriers at.

Regular user of Stalybridge here - do not agree. I have fairly serious doubts gates would work. The gates probably have to be on the flat, so they'd have to be just behind the ticket office windows. To do this you'd have to relocate the TVM (and there isn't really anywhere else to put it), and permanently lock the manual side door, forcing everyone through the gates. Realistically I think you'd have to remodel the ticket office to an extent to fit them in. The ticket office is also pretty crowded at busy times so the barriers would probably be obstructed fairly often, on both sides.
You can't put them at the bottom of the ramp to 4-5 or in the tunnel to P1-3 as there'd only be space for one gate each way (assume you'd need a wide gate), and even if there were two each way you're creating a serious choke point in the rush hour - and in any case I'm suspicious that no matter how many gates there are (I can't imagine more than about 4/5), people will get off trains on P4-5 and end up backing up the ramp. I don't think that's safe at all. Disabled access to the P4-5 lift would need to be accounted for as well.
Also there's the matter that the famous buffet bar is on P4 , and gates would possibly cause access issues for that - I expect the proprietors would have a problem with that, as would people wanting to access the pub.
There is also a wooden gate on P4 (right at the top of P5 in fact) that takes you to the top of a side road leading to the station car park (potential loophole to skip the barrier there with very easy access to services stabled in P5 - good for free rides to Ashton) and some benches belonging to the buffet bar where drinkers are sometimes found outside - alcohol is not permitted on the platforms so I imagine this area also acts as the pub smoking area sometimes. There is a double door into the pub's wooden conservatory that isn't on the platform but I'm not sure if it gets used, if not then the gate would have to stay open. A lot of people use that gate and the side road as an exit to the station.

I don't think you can easily fit barriers to Stalybridge safely, effectively and at a reasonable cost.
 
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