LO stations are staffed all day long with barriers on all exits in contrast to SE metro so on-board checks less important.
It doesn't stop the determined but it does stop the casual fare evader.
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SouthEastern franchise direct award through to 1 April 2020 (& franchise competition terminated)
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LO stations are staffed all day long with barriers on all exits in contrast to SE metro so on-board checks less important.
It doesn't stop the determined but it does stop the casual fare evader.
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RailUK Forums
The title has been changed many times over the years...
One of SE's biggest issues is not collecting revenue but then DfT didn't really specify doing that in the previous franchise agreement (2009), SE had to pick up the extra cost of gating etc. and DfT would have got all the revenue.
There is no space for that. You would create dangerous overcrowding at the platform, especially in the afternoon peak when everyone tries to get to already narrow and confined staircase.
Oh, and there are two sets of platforms at Kent House so you need two gatelines, and two members of staff, at least if you wan to keep the gates closed.
At West Dulwich or Brixton situation is even worse as the current entrances would need serious rebuild.
I honestly don't see easy way of gating many of the SE stations.
Let's assume we try to avoid major engineering whenever we can. Many stations would need 5-6 members of staff instead of current 2 (doing shifts) or even 1 (many have less staff than they should due to franchise uncertainty). I don't see anyone willing to pay for that...
Don't take me wrong. I wish that would happen as at least it would be incentive to do something with the stations which, as I have already written, are falling apart as we speak. I just don't think anyone will do anything any time soon...
That would require some seriously rewritten and long term franchise or taking over by the TfL. And subsidy to bring the metro stations up to standard...
Mikey C
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Not all the Overground stations are gated anyway, especially on the North London line and Goblin. West Hampstead for example only gained ticket barriers recently when a new station building was built
There is a lot of truth in the above. Many stations are pretty much ungateable. Looking at the Orpington - Victoria route for example you have...
Orpington - already gated, but often left open.
Pets Wood - footbridge is public right of way. Ungateable.
Bickley - could easily gate this one.
Bromley South - already gated.
Shortlands - gateable in the booking hall. This station has been very popular with fare evaders ever since Bromley was gated.
Beckenham Junction - gateable on the up side, think the down side would be tight.
Kent House - not a hope.
Penge East - bridge is a public right of way making the down side ungateable at least.
Sydenham Hill - forget it.
West Dulwich - two separate street entrances. Not happening.
Herne Hill - is that subway a public right of way? If so, not happening.
Brixton - no way.
Victoria - gated.
With the above in mind it would make sense to have regular revenue patrols on the trains on that route. They don't bother though, so it remains a free ride for anyone who wants one.
Orpington - already gated, but often left open.
Pets Wood - footbridge is public right of way. Ungateable.
Bickley - could easily gate this one.
Bromley South - already gated.
Shortlands - gateable in the booking hall. This station has been very popular with fare evaders ever since Bromley was gated.
Beckenham Junction - gateable on the up side, think the down side would be tight.
Kent House - not a hope.
Penge East - bridge is a public right of way making the down side ungateable at least.
Sydenham Hill - forget it.
West Dulwich - two separate street entrances. Not happening.
Herne Hill - is that subway a public right of way? If so, not happening.
Brixton - no way.
Victoria - gated.
With the above in mind it would make sense to have regular revenue patrols on the trains on that route. They don't bother though, so it remains a free ride for anyone who wants one.
Gate what you can. If the problem is multiple entrances then still gate them all.
If you can’t man them all then move the manning around randomly. It must also be easier and less disruptive to do revenue blocks if they can just man the barriers and pick up the scraps.
The more you gate the fewer ungated journeys there are, and the easier it is to do mobile revenue protection
Petts Wood and Kent House and others need bumping up the list to be rebuilt to be accessible, and gated at the same time.
If you can’t man them all then move the manning around randomly. It must also be easier and less disruptive to do revenue blocks if they can just man the barriers and pick up the scraps.
The more you gate the fewer ungated journeys there are, and the easier it is to do mobile revenue protection
Petts Wood and Kent House and others need bumping up the list to be rebuilt to be accessible, and gated at the same time.
If it’s not possible to gate everywhere then at least man the barriers at the London end permanently. This will make sure that the chavs tap in/out once on each leg of a journey and they will soon get the message when they get charged a maximum fare for every journey.
Journeys to intermediate stations are still a potential issue but the fares between them are lower so less revenue loss. It can be mitigated with regular revenue blockades.
Journeys to intermediate stations are still a potential issue but the fares between them are lower so less revenue loss. It can be mitigated with regular revenue blockades.
Kite159
Veteran Member
I could swear West Hampstead had barriers in the old station building, although more often they were thrown open during peak time due to overcrowding
And make the oyster readers harder to reach from the train to reduce the "jump out of train, tap in, jump back on same train" folk. For example moving the readers to the bottom of the stairs
Class 170101
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Certain station layouts will prevent gates being built on Health and Safety grounds and consequently it will never be a closed system. Therefore a leakage of revenue is inevitable.
Insofar as the Direct Award is concerned its basically another standstill farnchise that frankly needs a lot of work doing to it and investment that isn't going to happen whilst waiting for next 'proper' franchise competition.
Investment is happening, but nothing on the scale it needs. Every time there is a direct award, money is given to be invested. The problem is, it's nothing more than patchwork. The company is fractured and there are projects continually being kicked into touch because there is no long term investment or future planning. There is going to be at least 2yrs of continual stagnation and then a further 5 (at a guess) before new stock is procured. Chuck in the Williams review and your looking at another year minimum before anything changes. Any new service provision will only come when the franchise changes and will then be locked in because the franchise system is dumb as !£$££$$%$%^%^&^&
What we need to hope for is that GoVia lose the franchise in April and the Operator of Last resort takes over.
What we need to hope for is that GoVia lose the franchise in April and the Operator of Last resort takes over.
Brixton is often mentioned on this thread as being very difficult and you've said no way - yet a huge redevelopment project is planned directly next to the station (is NR involved?) and Atlantic Road next to the station is under consideration for pedestrianisation allowing possible building at street level and the staircase rebuilt with lift. The arcade below is also being rebuilt.
That is if NR/SE/DfT are on the ball and link the station into the project. The uncertainty of the franchise cannot be helping planning. The same could be said for other stations which are apparently too difficult.
EDIT: Found details of the project
https://www.fromthemurkydepths.co.uk/2019/05/27/new-homes-for-brixton-but-what-of-a-new-station/
https://love.lambeth.gov.uk/atlanticroad/
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brad465
Established Member
When visiting Shortlands 3 weeks ago there were RPIs, on a day they were regular on trains in that area too. Given I only visit x2 a year for the Dentist though, I can't vouch for frequency.
From memory of Albany Park station this I believe is an example of the bridge being iron-bar fenced in half, so it's a public right of way on one side but gated to access the platforms. Don't know how easy this is to replicate though around the area.
The problem at Brixton is that the bottom of the up side stairs are on the street so the platform is the only railway property they can realistically put them on. I imagine half way up the stairs is a safety risk.
I think the way forward for Brixton is a lot of investment and a new interchange station built linking the Overground, SE and Victoria line. Its been talked about for years but nothing has come of it.
As an aside, it always amazes me how many people get off SE trains from Victoria at Brixton. Surely it's far easier to get the tube if Brixton is your end destination.
Back in the 90s and early 2000s the Brixton mainline station area was an open air drug market and rife with robberies and hustlers. While it's far from perfect it is NOWHERE NEAR as unpleasant a station as it used to be.
And the tube station was just a covered version of the NR one in terms of activities...
Shortlands does get a number of RPOs on a semi-regular basis.
The above points about the whole line-of-route from Orpington - Victoria are very true; there's a lot of public right-of-way across these stations that just cannot be gated. Also if the Victoria metro service ever wants >8 cars, forget about it until some serious engineering work is done to extend platforms (or SDO stock is used). Some such as West Dulwich and Beckenham Junction might even be cost-prohibitive.
Not if you don't want to pay... although Victoria is usually gated pretty late and pretty consistently.
Joe Paxton
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Whilst a station/platforms at Brixton on the Overground line (the Atlantic lines) would be fantastic and well patronised, the problem is it would also be a very expensive (and disruptive) undertaking - building platforms next to a line on a high viaduct floating above the existing NR station, and providing all the necessary access to said platforms. Which is exactly why nothing has come of it.
I half think that a rebuilt East Brixton station might be a vaguely more realistic proposal. Though of course it wouldn't provide any (direct) interchange opportunities.
Alternatively a new Brixton station with level(ish) platforms on the Chatham and Atlantic lines the other side of Brixton Road would probably make more sense than trying to build and integrate new platforms on the Atlantic lines overbridge directly above the existing station. Subway access from there to the tube station. I'll put my crayons away now.
4-SUB 4732
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Whilst we are going off-topic with the whole "Brixton" thing, it is very clear that platforms on the Chatham, Atlantic and Catford lines as well as platforms at Brockley on the Lewisham lines will be very much appreciated by many.
I'm not sure the 'Public Right of Way' thing is much of an impingement to Gating.
See Derby station arrangements for how public access is managed (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Derby_railway_station) on the overbridge to Pride Park and there must be other cases too.
Also my local station has three public entrances, all gated but only two are staffed, with the third managed remotely and seems to work fine. In fact remote controlled double height gates may be the safest option for staff as it would remove a point of conflict.
See Derby station arrangements for how public access is managed (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Derby_railway_station) on the overbridge to Pride Park and there must be other cases too.
Also my local station has three public entrances, all gated but only two are staffed, with the third managed remotely and seems to work fine. In fact remote controlled double height gates may be the safest option for staff as it would remove a point of conflict.
NorthKent1989
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I’m not sure what could be done with Brixton in terms of a rebuild.
It’s in a awkwardly tight location, in order to create the desired interchange between South Eastern, South London LO line and the Victoria line, they’d have to make it a big scale project which will cause disruption for several years.
SE trains would probably be diverted to Blackfriars.
Personally if it creates better journeys and improves Brixton then it’d be worth in the long run
It’s in a awkwardly tight location, in order to create the desired interchange between South Eastern, South London LO line and the Victoria line, they’d have to make it a big scale project which will cause disruption for several years.
SE trains would probably be diverted to Blackfriars.
Personally if it creates better journeys and improves Brixton then it’d be worth in the long run
Not enough room to do that or capacity on a lot of the tracks needing to take higher traffic levels to do that either.
4-SUB 4732
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I don't think it would be necessary to do quite that. The reality is you will need to do some work but it could be done outside of the operation of the railway.
I strongly suspect the only operator most likely to be affected would be London Overground as the SE services towards Catford and Lewisham (and the Coast) could be re-routed over either the Atlantic or Catford lines.
Indeed, the easiest bit would be begin by dismantling buildings in the area and then building the Catford platforms (as well as doing some work on the Chatham lines); before then looking to have a weekend closure to put a crossover in near Cambria from Atlantics to Chathams (which would be useful for service perturbation anyway) to let London Overground stuff go in and out of Clapham Junction whilst they take down and build the Brixton Atlantic platforms.
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BluePenguin
On Moderation
Coincidentally some revenue staff made an appearance on my train today.
I created a thread here: https://www.railforums.co.uk/threads/southeastern-revenue-staff-making-an-appearance.192011/
Looks as though Southeastern have given up on South London routes and decided to focus on targeting fare evaders in Kent instead
I created a thread here: https://www.railforums.co.uk/threads/southeastern-revenue-staff-making-an-appearance.192011/
Looks as though Southeastern have given up on South London routes and decided to focus on targeting fare evaders in Kent instead
Maybe I've only just noticed it but today rather a few Metro carriages didn't have Southeastern logos/lettering on the side. Possibly the lettering just fell off or they didn't renew it as they expected stock to be replaced which of course will not happen now anytime soon.
urpert
Member
It’s almost certainly just fallen off. Same deal with the coach numbers on 376s
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