Part of the project is rearrangement of the main depot at Beckton, which has led to weekend (including Fridays) restrictions of services. Today this was exacerbated by a train breakdown, actually a rare DLR event, somewhere on the Woolwich branch in the morning peak.
Unfortunately a bit of "headless chickens mode" developed. At Canning Town a train which entered running Wrong Line had three separate destinations showing, one on the platform describer, another on the train cars, and a third being bawled out on the train PA. I didn't know the automated signalling was actually capable of that, and in fact the scrolling message at the bottom of the platform describer was giving a fourth, different again, version of events.
Considerable chaos on the platform particularly by those headed to, and indeed from, City Airport. Lift overwhelmed. One of the part-time platform "Event staff", who only come when something significant is on at Excel, was actually doing a very good job of understanding it all and giving directions to incessant questions. Notably more so than another, who by their seniority title on their hi-viz, should surely have been in a position to Take Charge. But they stayed silent.
Notwithstanding the restricted output from the Beckton depot, there were six cars idle at the Poplar depot throat from before all this started, which would have been quite useful in overcoming the restricted service plan. One got the feeling it was all rather the B Team on duty on the ops side.
