Dr_Paul
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A train up to Waterloo yesterday... and not one 'Sorted' announcement. Yay! And only one on the return journey. This almost made up for the foul weather.
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Are too loud and too many PRM alarms and announcements making travellers uptight.....
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lammergeier
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EMT stations are quite something. The auto announcer is prattling on for longer than there is silence, even when it's not announcing trains. The engineering work announcements are excessive and go on to long in far too much detail. The people they use for the EMT announcements are also often difficult to understand so even if you want to be told not to eat the soap you can't really make out what's being said anyway. I now always ensure my earphones are with me if I am going via an EMT station which kinda defeats the purpose of these announcements anyway.
TT-ONR-NRN
Established Member
The announcements at London Victoria by “Only woman” as she’s known, were annoying enough - but now they’ve gone and installed that awful Matt that you hear on Thameslink. He sounds so irritating I hopped on an earlier train so I didn’t have to wait and listen to it anymore!
Lol I absolutely agree and you're bang on. Someone needs to have a serious look it's so annoying. Drives me insane
Then it’s worked. It’s supposed to be an ‘earworm’ Ie something that works it’s way into your subconscious and that makes you remember it in the unlikely event that you see something suspicious.
DelW
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Saw exactly this at Guildford last Thursday evening. Departure screens were showing an up then a down train from platform 4 departing only 1 minute apart, which obviously wasn't going to work, so I was expecting a correction. Sure enough, about 5 minutes beforehand, the up train was switched to platform 3, with a (manual) announcement along the lines of "this is a platform alteration - for passengers on platform four, the xx.xx train to London Waterloo will now depart from platform three".
Initially hardly anyone on p4 moved, though over the next few minutes a number looked up at the departure board, saw it was now showing a Portsmouth train instead, then looked at the screens, saw theirs had been moved to p3 and walked across (it's the other side of the same island). There were some who only realised something had changed when the Portsmouth train arrived on p4, though fortunately the London train was still in p3 at that time so I doubt anyone missed it on this occasion.
It does show how few people listen to any announcements though.
andrewkeith5
Member
I'm afraid I haven't read the whole of the thread as it'd be too frustrating to remind myself of all the announcements... but in order of my most hated, and in full agreement that the door noises definitely do not need to be as loud as they are:
- "Please stand behind the yellow line". Usually exclusively used when there isn't actually anybody standing in front of the yellow line. This was infuriating enough at Gatwick when the platform announcers insisted on it once every train, and some silly "message from the CCTV control centre". Gatwick appears to have improved, but unfortunately it seems they just moved the problem to London Bridge - where it's now as many as eight or ten times for every single Thameslink departure. It is so incredibly frustrating at times! I almost want to scream "WE ARE!" back at them...
- "See it, say it, sorted." This is now at the stage where if I do see something untoward, I daren't tell a member of staff in case it takes them away from the very important job of constantly telling people to talk to a member of staff! Or at St Pancras, the very important job of guarding the Tensabarrier...
- The "you can use contactless" announcement at Gatwick....They never bothered to tell anyone they couldn't use it when everyone assumed they could...The particularly annoying thing about this one is that it's a recorded human voice, so when they say "can I have your attention", you're expecting something actually useful to be said...
- "Change for other National Rail services" - what's the point of that if you're not going to say which ones?
- "Delayed by approximately 17 minutes" - if you're going to quote a precise figure, don't say approximately! If you don't know what the figure is, say "currently delayed by 17 minutes", or say "approximately 20 minutes", which is an actual approximation...
trainophile
Established Member
... and "Please listen for further announcements", which rarely actually materialise.
Do Transport for Wales services still have that annoying young female telling you to "please use the bins provided, thank you!" every 5 minutes?
Well I would use the bins love, but this 2 carriage class 175 Manchester to Carmarthern service is so full with people standing along the aisles that I can't get out of my seat to get to the bin!
Well I would use the bins love, but this 2 carriage class 175 Manchester to Carmarthern service is so full with people standing along the aisles that I can't get out of my seat to get to the bin!
hooverboy
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...what about.."if you are feeling unwell, please carry a bottle of water"
would have perhaps been fitting in the middle of blazing hot summer, but it's now december,
hooverboy
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oh really???
all it takes is for someone to superimpose that announcement on top of the video of those poor cops getting kung-fu kicked by those thugs to go viral on youtube..then it very much gives the impression..."we ain't got a fecking clue how to sort it...don't call us, we're as b**gered as you are,and we ain't got the facade of dealing with it no more"
TBH they are(as are most public sector) lions led by donkeys.
I don't doubt the rank and file committment to trying to make the country safer, I doubt their superiors for having ulterior motives(like keeping themselves in gainful employment by creating problems where none existed)
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andrewkeith5
Member
If that’s on a train that’s not even a particularly useful announcement. It’s not very useful advice if you’re already on a train feeling unwell...
What’s it got to do with being unwell anyway? Everyone should really be carrying a bottle of water on all but the shortest of journeys anyway, it’s just healthy...
TfL probably have it right...they have a weather-targeted campaign telling people to carry water on every journey regardless.
hooverboy
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..aaah, but you have to make sure you drink the correct amount,for the correct temperature.Otherwise you run the risk of getting fluid retention and causing increased risk of heart failure.
for those that have been out partying and dropped an "e" or something, excessive water intake is potentially lethal..take leah betts example....so consequences can be catastrophic.
you cannot make a blanket assessment that everybody should be in a fit enough state to be :
1)carrying a bottle of water
2) distributing said content of water bottle in a safe and effective manner.
that needs a risk assessment.
trainophile
Established Member
On trains with no toilets it's not always helpful to keep swigging water!
cjmillsnun
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What people need to remember is that although annoying for you most of the announcements are useful for PRM. They can cut out the ‘see it, say it, sorted’.
However PRM need the announcement of all calling points (it is a reminder of how many station calls there are before they need to alight) they need the ‘the next station is ....’ as the train approaches a station along with ‘change here for.....’
one thing that would be useful is to standardise door opening and hustle alarms (there are different alarm sounds for the same thing) and bring the volume of the announcements down slightly.
However PRM need the announcement of all calling points (it is a reminder of how many station calls there are before they need to alight) they need the ‘the next station is ....’ as the train approaches a station along with ‘change here for.....’
one thing that would be useful is to standardise door opening and hustle alarms (there are different alarm sounds for the same thing) and bring the volume of the announcements down slightly.
trainophile
Established Member
I think we are all agreed about useful announcements i.e. calling points and the next station (especially when it's dark outside!). Also the timings and platforms of connecting trains as you approach an interchange is often welcome, particularly if it's a large station. I quite appreciate being informed that a ticket check is underway as it gives me time to dig them out. It's the announcements that are unrelated to the actual journey that intrude into what should be peaceful travel, like the "delicious" offerings in the shop or on the trolley.
Dr_Paul
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Not really, such announcements make no more likely or unlikely to report anything, I just find them -- and especially 'Sorted' -- infuriating, like a repeated inane jingle on the wireless.
I do find it vaguely amusing that 'Sorted' implores us to report anything 'unusual' rather than 'suspicious'. A few weeks back I saw a pair of 450s going through Hampton Wick on a diverted Reading to Waterloo service... now that's 'unusual' but hardly 'suspicious'.
Volvo buses tend to make that noise when the handbrake is released.
Very often such an announcement is made and there is no subsequent ticket check or, at least, not in every coach .... and the danger then is that someone might get their ticket out and put it on the table and then forget it when they get off - I have seen that nearly happen a few times.
Then you get "a FULL ticket check is about to commence" followed by the guard coming through asking for "tickets from xxx" or "any unchecked tickets".
Another one is "have your tickets ready as you will need them to use the automatic ticket gates at this station" - the station concerned being one where the gates are always open at that time of day.
Strat-tastic
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fairysdad
Member
I must admit, in the past two years of commuting in London, I've started to tune out the announcements, although unless I'm expecting to hear one that I might need to hear (ie, in case of disruption). One recent annoying one and one recent pointless one stand out though.
First the annoying - it was a little while ago, and there was disruption at Waterloo (no surprise there in recent times...) and there was this overly cheerful "Hello! Hi there! Are you having a nice day? Going anywhere nice?" recorded announcement. At least one fellow passenger said what I, and no doubt others, were thinking: "No, I'm trying to get home after a long day at work and your bl***y trains aren't working properly again." Heard that one a couple of times, never did hear what they were trying to flog us.
And on the subject of trying to sell stuff to passengers, the pointless announcement, this time on a guard working a Waterloo to Epsom service trying to sell us their smartcard. Even the guard didn't seem to want to do it: "I've been told by management to tell you that you can get the smartcard..." ... which of course isn't available to any stations down to and including Epsom! (if it was one that went to Guildford I could perhaps understand it.)
First the annoying - it was a little while ago, and there was disruption at Waterloo (no surprise there in recent times...) and there was this overly cheerful "Hello! Hi there! Are you having a nice day? Going anywhere nice?" recorded announcement. At least one fellow passenger said what I, and no doubt others, were thinking: "No, I'm trying to get home after a long day at work and your bl***y trains aren't working properly again." Heard that one a couple of times, never did hear what they were trying to flog us.
And on the subject of trying to sell stuff to passengers, the pointless announcement, this time on a guard working a Waterloo to Epsom service trying to sell us their smartcard. Even the guard didn't seem to want to do it: "I've been told by management to tell you that you can get the smartcard..." ... which of course isn't available to any stations down to and including Epsom! (if it was one that went to Guildford I could perhaps understand it.)
underbank
Established Member
How on Earth did we all manage before announcements became standard?
andrewkeith5
Member
With way more difficulty than is necessary. It's a pain in the neck, especially on a stopping service, to try and keep track of stops with literally no information available as to what they are or what order they come in.
Presumably stopping patterns were much more standardised than they are now - but unfortunately that doesn't really work when you're trying to cram in as many services as possible. The stops on Thameslink services for example are remarkably cleverly aligned to make two interleaved stopping services run as close together as feasibly possible by effectively stopping at alternate stations.
CaptainHaddock
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If only there were published timetables available showing what time trains were scheduled to arrive at each station......
And your evidence for this fairly ludicrous statement is? You're wrong by the way....
There's no 'not really' about it. It was designed specifically to be an earworm, something that gets under your skin. The very fact you complain about it shows it's worked.
There's a lot of work that goes into the psychology of anti-terror campaigns, it isn't just dreamt up in ten seconds by a bored marketing executive and as I've previously said the public have reported suspicious behaviour and items before that have resulted in arrests and convictions for terror related offences. They do work and that's why this particular announcement exists in the form it does.
IceAgeComing
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That one is actually an anti-suicide one (it was a temporary thing with the Samaritans basically saying that if someone looked distressed or whatever then perhaps go and have a chat with them since apparently that reduces suicide) so not actually trying to sell you anything.
Its a funny old forum this at times with posters in other threads saying about other users of the railway who may need the assistance or some such and the railway should provide it then in this thread when the railway is doing something to help those who those who have been just mentioned they get blasted for it - you all need to make up your mind as to what you want because you simply can not have it all.
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