Euston overcrowding

[Bletchleyite]

I'm at Paddington this evening, they have announced several times that "staff monitor boarding, there is no need to run", which I haven't heard before. Could it be that NR are paying attention to the media?

Are NR even fit for purpose? Do they think announcements and shouty men are the solution to every problem, rather than designing for passive safety (e.g. appropriate capacity)?

 

[jfollows]

Are NR even fit for purpose? Do they think announcements and shouty men are the solution to every problem, rather than designing for passive safety (e.g. appropriate capacity)?

Plenty of shouty ladies on Piccadilly platform 14 …..
And, no, they don’t seem to accomplish much either.

 

[Wtloild]

It's in today's Times paper as well. It's been getting decent coverage this week in the mainstream media.

I think all the Westminster press heading up to the Labour & Tory conferences in Liverpool/Brum has spotlighted it a bit more this last couple of weeks.

 

[artemic]

Do they think announcements and shouty men are the solution to every problem [...]?

No word on NR, but there were certainly some shouty men in blue vests (edit: Not LU staff, to the best of my knowledge) in the Tube ticket 'hall' this afternoon, directing exiting passengers via the ramp to the Overground to the audible dismay of some.
Apparently it was a one-way system. No word on the morning, when it was actually busy!! I thought it might be to do with an escalator being out of order, but that's been broken all week and I've never experienced it before.
I am curious what exactly putting more people into the station unnecessarily is supposed to achieve?

 

[Starmill]

I wonder if our friend the Rail Minister, that's the Rail Minister who is facing credible allegations of corruption which he has not chosen to deny, has any comment on London Travelwatch's assertion that London Euston is unsafe. No...?

 

[Bletchleyite]

No word on NR, but there were certainly some shouty men in blue vests (edit: Not LU staff, to the best of my knowledge) in the Tube ticket 'hall' this afternoon, directing exiting passengers via the ramp to the Overground to the audible dismay of some.
Apparently it was a one-way system. No word on the morning, when it was actually busy!! I thought it might be to do with an escalator being out of order, but that's been broken all week and I've never experienced it before.
I am curious what exactly putting more people into the station unnecessarily is supposed to achieve?

It is probably to do with the broken escalator, perhaps there was an accident there as walking down stopped escalators is a bit awkward as the steps are quite big and there are no "landings". But I can see the sense in it - it brings people into the station in the middle (between the two sets of departure boards, an underused space) and it avoids the conflicts as people "cross over" between the two sides in the Tube station which can when it's crowded be a bit unpleasant.

Almost everyone exiting the Tube is going into the station anyway. There's not actually a lot else you'd take the Tube to around Euston that isn't nearer to another station unless you lived there.

It's a real shame it wouldn't be simple to turn the 8-11 Tube access ramp the other way round or that could potentially work really well. Particularly if you bothered to tell people if their train was going to go from 8-11 so they wouldn't need to go up to the concourse at all.

 

[Starmill]

Are NR even fit for purpose? Do they think announcements and shouty men are the solution to every problem, rather than designing for passive safety (e.g. appropriate capacity)?

I'm very pleased to see that London Travelwatch have demanded the release of the information concerning what changes Network Rail have implemented to date. It is a stain on the whole industry that Network Rail are refusing to publish this.

I think all the Westminster press heading up to the Labour & Tory conferences in Liverpool/Brum has spotlighted it a bit more this last couple of weeks.

It is apalling really that senior management at Network Rail have allowed this issue to hit the headlines to this extent. They could have scotched it when it first came out by being honest... but clearly haven't been transparent with the public. It is an insult to the selfless professional service many hundreds of their staff do give in pursuit of a safe, reliable service to the public every day.

 

[artemic]

It is probably to do with the broken escalator, perhaps there was an accident there. But I can see the sense in it - it brings people into the station in the middle (between the two sets of departure boards, an underused space) and it avoids the conflicts as people "cross over" between the two sides which can when it's crowded be a bit unpleasant.

Which I would also see the sense in, had it been at all busy!
I would tend to agree that for those platforms it's more convenient to go up that way, and indeed avoids another set of escalators at the cost of doubling back up the ramp. However not everyone wants to do that walk! Plus anyone trying to come down from a train that way would have been directed up, around, and in through the front entrance.

I noticed the handrail seemed to have been lifted out so you may be right - perhaps there had been something occurring before, but it was long gone by the time I turned up!
The other two escalators were operational as normal, and people were still allowed to come down... Again, that particular escalator has been broken before [and indeed was only fixed the other day!] with no similar procedure.

It all seemed a bit overkill. Perhaps they had done it in preparation for the evening peak, but 2pm seems a bit keen!

Almost everyone exiting the Tube is going into the station anyway. There's not actually a lot else you'd take the Tube to around Euston that isn't nearer to another station unless you lived there.

There isn't a lot, but there also isn't no reason at all to exit the station, particularly if going somewhere close by but on the 'wrong' branch of the Northern line (I wonder how many people would rather walk a bit further in the direction of Warren St/Kings Cross instead of trying to change at Euston or Camden Town!)
I know I always get stuck behind people trying to walk down to Euston Road!

You also couldn't get to the lifts or the staircase up towards Melton/Drummond St as a result, which while not necessarily an accessibility issue is again an inconvenience for what I perceive to be little overall benefit at that time of day.

It's a real shame it wouldn't be simple to turn the 8-11 Tube access ramp the other way round or that could potentially work really well. Particularly if you bothered to tell people if their train was going to go from 8-11 so they wouldn't need to go up to the concourse at all.

Now that would be too good of an idea...

 

[Starmill]

Some people use Euston for London Underground - Bus interchange as it's hypothetically a fast route. It must be a horrible interchange to make during even minor disruption, however.

 

[uww11x]

Has Hendo resigned yet?

 

[Bletchleyite]

Some people use Euston for London Underground - Bus interchange as it's hypothetically a fast route. It must be a horrible interchange to make during even minor disruption, however.

In normal two-way use, that is probably one of the few use-cases that having moved the Tube entrance to the outside wall has improved.

Replied with some other thoughts on the Tube station layout here: https://www.railforums.co.uk/threads/how-to-improve-euston-station.274522/page-4

 

[anthony263]

Has Hendo resigned yet?

Nope

 

[oversteer]

It's a real shame it wouldn't be simple to turn the 8-11 Tube access ramp the other way round or that could potentially work really well. Particularly if you bothered to tell people if their train was going to go from 8-11 so they wouldn't need to go up to the concourse at all.

You will probably remember the departures screen that used to be opposite the tube exit gate line. Why was it removed?*

As I’ve said before, that passageway is criminally underused. They should allow platform 6-7 and 12-13 arrivals to walk around to the 8-11 gate line and use the ramp entrance, perhaps moving the buffers back and filling in.

And revert the concourse tube entrance so it is actually accessible from the concourse..


* because NR and TFL refuse to consider it a single station, to the detriment of passenger experience

 

[Mag_seven]

You will probably remember the departures screen that used to be opposite the tube exit gate line. Why was it removed?*

I agree it was useful but I wonder if passengers coming off the tube were gathering there rather than on the concourse which would of course create its own problems?

 

[Wolfie]

I agree it was useful but I wonder if passengers coming off the tube were gathering there rather than on the concourse which would of course create its own problems?

It was useful but also small, so you had to be close to it to read it, and the positioning right on a corner helped exacerbate congestion in the tube station ticket area (which itself is hopelessly undersized).

 

[deltic]

Not sure where the original comes from but this was posted on X by one the Economist's journalists. Fruin is effectively a measure of ease of movement for people. Shows how moving the departure boards removes blocking of access to platforms. Image shows a heatmap of before and after the new departure boards were installed.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Thanks for posting that - the Economist is wrong as usual!

Those heatmaps clearly show that the position of the new departure boards has caused increased obstruction of the "walkways" from the entrances to the tunnel - you'll note they are blue on the "before" and green on the "after", showing them being busier. This is one of the biggest problems of the new layout and is why one of them has been turned off!

It's also important to note that the advertising board *in and of itself* is an element of contempt. If it had instead been static advertising posters which aren't as imposing (as per when they first trialled distributed boards at Waterloo), I think there may have been less objection.

Plus the new boards themselves show too few trains (this needn't have been the case, there's room to have gone longer).

It might have made it easier to move directly towards the tunnel, yes. But people knew that bit was congested and typically went sideways towards the relatively empty side "corridors" anyway.

 

[jackdoyle]

Not sure where the original comes from but this was posted on X by one the Economist's journalists. Fruin is effectively a measure of ease of movement for people. Shows how moving the departure boards removes blocking of access to platforms.

This appears to be the original https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/requ...wing/response/2471291/attach/5/attachment.pdf

 

[Bletchleyite]

This appears to be the original https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/requ...wing/response/2471291/attach/5/attachment.pdf

Wow, the amount of points missed in those slides is immense. Thanks for posting them.

Literally nobody is going to walk into the station, along the back and down under the boards. It wouldn't even enter my mind to do that. It psychologically feels odd to walk through in front of people who are standing looking at something. Also note that they claim a bit where people are standing by the main entrance "corridor" is a 3m wide corridor to walk down!

Also note how the new layout has caused the tunnel itself to become more cluttered with people, hence the shouty men! And it's interesting that the zoom on the two pictures is different, perhaps intentional to give a false impression?

And that my suspicion that the right hand side was the main entrance (facing the station) is true - the left hand side is relatively uncongested in the pictures.

Clearly this is just about one specific KPI that's been "solved" at the expense of everything else (plus the income from a whacking great ad). Very very poor indeed.

 

[oversteer]

It was useful but also small, so you had to be close to it to read it, and the positioning right on a corner helped exacerbate congestion in the tube station ticket area (which itself is hopelessly undersized).

I believe Euston has a good supplier of oversized display screens

 

[sh24]

I'm at Paddington this evening, they have announced several times that "staff monitor boarding, there is no need to run", which I haven't heard before. Could it be that NR are paying attention to the media?

That is very new - thought I've never found Paddington anywhere near as bad. The proximity of barrier to train seems to reassure people.

 

[Bletchleyite]

That is very new - thought I've never found Paddington anywhere near as bad. The proximity of barrier to train seems to reassure people.

At Paddington people tend to use whatever tool they use to find out the platform (or even look at the train if your eyesight is good) and stand very close to the gateline, so there's less distance to run. It's still unpleasant, though, just a bit less dangerous.

I read a news article last night (can't recall where or I'd quote it) that said Network Rail are looking at options including calling trains once they're being prepared and the doors have been locked rather than waiting for preparation to be complete so people can queue by the doors if they wish. Who'd have thunk that that might work?

 

[yorksrob]

Leeds' food concourse is as close to the Great Hall as I've seen, though I think the Leeds one is somewhat longer. Indeed perhaps Leeds as a whole, with its slightly hotchpotch layout, is comparable generally?

I suspect it looked a bit more like a smaller version of the utter rathole that is Paris Nord, if you've been there?

If you say improved in quotes, then you've definitely got rose-tinted spectacles on - old Euston would never have coped with the modern-day service, not even close. It would only have been even vaguely viable if the whole local service had been removed to a second Thameslink, but even then it would have struggled and some IC trains would have had to be a lot shorter than now.

The Wellington concourse at Leeds would have been more contemporary with the LMS' planned (but never implemented) rebuilding. It's a magnificent piece of architecture and to my mind one of the finest public spaces in Leeds.

 

[Bletchleyite]

The Wellington concourse at Leeds would have been more contemporary with the LMS' planned (but never implemented) rebuilding. It's a magnificent piece of architecture and to my mind one of the finest public spaces in Leeds.

But equally wouldn't be fit for purpose as the actual concourse now - it's just too small. And that's at Leeds, not many-times-busier Euston!

It's a great little food shopping area though.

 

[yorksrob]

If you look back to the 1960s plans and PR bumpf that British Railways issued (document hosted by the Barrowmore Model Railway Group) you can really see the aesthetic they were going for.

Sadly, as was so often the case with 1960s architecture, it was done badly and on the cheap, and then wasn't looked after properly.

I remember Michael Palin being scathing about Euston when he did his first railway travelogue back in the early 80s, likening it to a plughole. It's fair to say the place hasn't improved much. Nowhere to sit, nowhere to rest, and nowhere to keep the long-distance passengers (who will by necessity arrive in good time for their train) well away from the commuter passengers.

I quite like the new Euston - at least I did before they started boarding bits off and things got too busy !

But equally wouldn't be fit for purpose as the actual concourse now - it's just too small. And that's at Leeds, not many-times-busier Euston!

It's a great little food shopping area though.

It's probably bigger than the current concourse to be fair - just the wrong place for where the platforms are now.

 

[Bletchleyite]

I quite like the new Euston - at least I did before they started boarding bits off and things got too busy !

I even thought it was OK until the new boards were installed, to be fair, though the scrum was much less of an issue when they didn't suppress platforms for local trains, which they have no need to do. They're even shown for boarding seemingly randomly, so the argument of "but they shouldn't be advertised until the driver and guard are there" isn't even valid, they seem to be called when the doors are still locked about half the time. So why not just turn off the suppression and turn on platform alteration announcements for WMT and LO services* and see how that works?

* If you can only turn those on generally, do it, it's not like it would cause any harm to announce them for Avanti too - the information would be spurious but not harmful.

 

[Trainbike46]

This appears to be the original https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/requ...wing/response/2471291/attach/5/attachment.pdf

Thank you for sharing that!

I do think those slides do some rather odd things:
- The old situation has a higher occupancy than the new one - not massively, but even a slight increase in people can move a space from busy to hard to move around in
- There is no explanation of what the colours mean, are we sure that they mean the same thing in both pictures?
- when they draw their 'Corridors', at least one of the corridors is clearly blocked by a dense group of people - so not a useable corridor

It also completely misses the point that the new boards are rather bad at being departure boards - they are truly some of the worst for finding your train on the network, both because they are harder to read than many other ones, and because they simply don't show enough departures

 

[Tester]

I used the 2239 Euston-Milton Keynes on Wednesday.

I arrived at Euston over 15 minutes before (walked from St Pancras) and it was already on the board (platform 7).

Doors locked, and people around all doors - it was busy. Doors opened and people got on. That's a trainload who weren't on the concourse.

What a concept

 

[londonmidland]

The xx:46 LNR Crewe service is a big scrum maker, given its only one an hour. No idea why this service is often suppressed for so long, as when it is finally advertised, the doors have already been unlocked and train has been cleaned.

Advertise services earlier, however keep the doors locked if necessary for cleaning staff and/or if train crew are not here yet. At least pax can wait on the platform, next to their train.

 

[williamn]

Just seen the BBC reporting that the Transport Secretary has ordered the shutting down of the massive advertising board.

Euston station advertising board switched off following criticism

Euston station's digital advertising board is switched off as part of "immediate" improvements.

www.bbc.co.uk

Network Rail has turned off a large advertising board at London's Euston station as part of a review ordered by Transport Secretary Louise Haigh.

The government-owned company said assessing how the screen is used will feature in a five-point plan aimed at improving the station.