Euston overcrowding

[bramling]

The built environment counts for a lot.

• The Kings Cross concourse feels spacious even when packed to the rafters, whereas Euston feels a bit cramped even when empty - perhaps it's the shape and the clutter everywhere.
• Kings Cross has large open lines of view, well-lit with high ceilings. Euston is cluttered with retail units, and platforms are accessed down a narrow, low-ceilinged, grotty corridor.
• The Cross has straight platforms at concourse-level. Euston's ramps and curved platforms tell you to hurry.
• The departure board is in a logical place on the KX concourse, but you struggle to see the correct
• KX station ops feel largely orderly, with trains generally called in good time. Euston calls trains with short notice a few minutes before. Their piss-poor running of the station has caused crowding and scrumming even when only the London Overgrounds are running!

Need I go on?

I'd like to know what building design specialists would make of the two stations. I suspect they'd tell you that Euston encourages rushing and stress, whilst KX is a much calmer environment.

The other thing about King’s Cross is there has always been a culture of attempting to run the station in the interest of the passenger.

The staff have always attempted to get services advertised in good time, to the point where the GN station staff have been allowed to open up trains themselves.

Even in the days of the old concourse, when the station was a lot more cramped than today, it seemed to work better.

Sure they’ve had their moments occasionally during disruption (the day when the 700s had their power meltdown was one such moment!), but generally a lot fewer and far between than Euston.

 

[modernrail]

The other thing about King’s Cross is there has always been a culture of attempting to run the station in the interest of the passenger.

The staff have always attempted to get services advertised in good time, to the point where the GN station staff have been allowed to open up trains themselves.

Even in the days of the old concourse, when the station was a lot more cramped than today, it seemed to work better.

Sure they’ve had their moments occasionally during disruption (the day when the 700s had their power meltdown was one such moment!), but generally a lot fewer and far between than Euston.

Maybe a passenger petition is an idea. It seems like my recurring thought that the running of and general attitude at Euston is a big part of the problem is shared by many.

Something along the lines of ‘Euston station is a shambles. It is being run in an anti-passenger way that is creating an unpleasant, unhelpful and sometimes dangerous environment. Passengers have lost confidence in the management of the station who should be replaced with a team that knows how to run a station in the interests of those using this vital public infrastructure’

 

[Dr Hoo]

How often are ‘Meet The Manager’ events held at Euston? (I don’t use it often enough to know for sure.)
Are these well attended, with a wide range of NR, Avanti, LNW/WMT and Overground representatives to meet?

 

[Bill57p9]

How often are ‘Meet The Manager’ events held at Euston? (I don’t use it often enough to know for sure.)
Are these well attended, with a wide range of NR, Avanti, LNW/WMT and Overground representatives to meet?

And are they advertised more than a few minutes before the managers are due to depart?

 

[DJ_K666]

I always get the feeling that in the case of Euston the way the station is run seems to make things worse than if they did nothing. At times it almost feels like someone is actually going out of their way to make the whole place as awful to use as possible.

The routine late announcing of services is one of the problems, as it encourages people to make a frantic dash, which has become ingrained in how many people behave there.

It also doesn’t help that some of the staff seem to have undergone their training at Blackpool North, not so much the LNWR staff but certainly Avanti.

Maybe you should tweet (or X) that to LNWR and Avanti. I know the platform staff at BPN are, to put it mildly, idiots, but I didn't think it was spreading.

And are they advertised more than a few minutes before the managers are due to depart?

[Snigger]

 

[Peter0124]

At Kings X the trains were all unlocked , and I just boarded the train half an hour early to bag the table seat in the unreserved coach. Wasn't even on the screen but I used a combination of RTT and Signal Maps to determine where my train is.

I think turnarounds at Kings X are longer than Euston.

 

[modernrail]

Maybe you should tweet (or X) that to LNWR and Avanti. I know the platform staff at BPN are, to put it mildly, idiots, but I didn't think it was spreading.


[Snigger]

This is spot on for me. Every single addition from the last 10 years has made things worse.

Some of the decisions are truly baffling. For instance, who specified the hand rails on the ramp on the low numbered platforms? Did they think the average down force from the human hand is likely to increase exponentially in the next few years? Were they reading ‘Elegant station design for Dummies’ upside down and in reverse? It looks like they have used approximately 20x more metal than could possibly be required even if 100% of passengers were King Kong.

 

[jon0844]

At Kings X the trains were all unlocked , and I just boarded the train half an hour early to bag the table seat in the unreserved coach. Wasn't even on the screen but I used a combination of RTT and Signal Maps to determine where my train is.

I think turnarounds at Kings X are longer than Euston.

Just be mindful that if everyone started to do this and it got in the way of cleaning/prepping the service then they might decide to impose some restrictions in the future. Nobody wants that.

So be courteous and perhaps consider just waiting outside the door to board if it's exceptionally early. You're still going to be on first!

 

[uglymonkey]

I usually wait until they get off with their full rubbish bags , then get on with a " thanks guys: or similar.

 

[jon0844]

I usually wait until they get off with their full rubbish bags , then get on with a " thanks guys: or similar.

Good move. At the end of the day, as more people get 'early access' there's a risk of some people ruining things. That then leads to measures being introduced to try and stop it.

 

[Kite159]

And at Kings Cross you run the risk of a late late notice set swap if LNER needs to get one unit to finish the day at Doncaster depot rather than Edinburgh.

Best thing with Kings Cross is to use the overbridge, then you can normally jump the main rush to grab a decent seat etc

 

[Bletchleyite]

Best thing with LNER is to use the standalone reservation tool with seat picker to choose your preferred seat and saunter up at your leisure. Why have the stress?

(Something similar might well help at Euston)

 

[lachlan]

I always get the feeling that in the case of Euston the way the station is run seems to make things worse than if they did nothing. At times it almost feels like someone is actually going out of their way to make the whole place as awful to use as possible.

The routine late announcing of services is one of the problems, as it encourages people to make a frantic dash, which has become ingrained in how many people behave there.

It also doesn’t help that some of the staff seem to have undergone their training at Blackpool North, not so much the LNWR staff but certainly Avanti.

Yep, mad rush to the train (which ended up having plenty seats), as a result barriers had to be left open to cope with the number of people.

New departure boards impossible to get close enough to read without barging past people, with a big distracting advert where the boards should be.

 

[BRX]

Were they reading ‘Elegant station design for Dummies’ upside down and in reverse? It looks like they have used approximately 20x more metal than could possibly be required

This is what network rail specialise in. See station footbridges (and other structures) nationwide.

 

[uglymonkey]

King's Cross seems to be run for the benefit of passengers ( maybe a shopfront for Harry Potter's on 93/4ers and large numbers of internationals transiting wandering about from eurostar have something to do with it?)- Lovely "new" concourse, whereas Euston seems to be run for the benefit of Euston ("It would be perfect if it wasn't for all the passengers/customers who keep turning up") It doesn't have any of that "shop front" appeal, just the appearance of a brutalist concrete car park, opening out onto a non descript road when you leave ( dodging the buses). Kings Cross has the lovely plaza outside ( sometimes with "cute" markets and particularly since the "refurb" much better ambiance. KX is "fit for purpose" (As is St Pan next door). Euston is not.

 

[ScottGallagher]

There's just too much going on at Euston retail wise especially at the platform ramps.

We will still be here in 5 years cursing the crowd and platform management as nothing will have changed

 

[HSTEd]

I very much agree with the earlier posters that the station needs to be completely torn down and rebuilt from scratch.

Probably need a mezzanine over the platforms to allow departing and arriving passengers to be completely segregated, with departing passengers able to gather within a few metres of the train along its entire length as the arriving passengers disembark.

 

[Dr Hoo]

There's just too much going on at Euston retail wise especially at the platform ramps.

We will still be here in 5 years cursing the crowd and platform management as nothing will have changed

I thought that at least for 8-16 all the retail has gone (and the ramp for 8-11 greatly enlarged).
The approach to 1-3 in particular is still cramped but even there the ramp has been doubled in width (although some are upset at the lack of design finesse on the central handrail).
The remaining retail units in that area have been broadly similar for many years.
As I see it, the real challenge is that (ideally) any arrival at 1, 2 or 3 should not have a pending departure from that group loading at the same time - to avoid conflicting flows.

 

[350401]

There were similar fun and games today. The 11.13 Euston to Manchester was not called until 11.08; and even then barrier staff were loudly complaining to themselves that people were being allowed to board too early. They then removed the train from the boards at 11.10. Train left on time but half empty.

 

[Hadders]

There's just too much going on at Euston retail wise especially at the platform ramps.

The problems at Euston aren't to do with the amount of retail. In any case there's fewer retail units on the concourse than there was 15 years ago.

In recent years a mezzanine has been installed that has various coffee shops and eateries but this takes people away from the main concourse and provides more space for passengers.

 

[Geogregor]

There were similar fun and games today. The 11.13 Euston to Manchester was not called until 11.08; and even then barrier staff were loudly complaining to themselves that people were being allowed to board too early. They then removed the train from the boards at 11.10. Train left on time but half empty.

This is just ludicrous. Why do they do that? Are they deliberately trying to increase everyone's misery?

Is there anyone in charge of the station or just random grumpy staff members do whatever they like?

 

[Alpine Rider]

Is this really just a people issue or will any of this chaos be partially solved once HS2 actually serves Euston?

Assuming the Curzon Street plans are indicative of what the new HS2 Euston facilities will be like, it seems they will be far better suited to handling large numbers of long distance travellers travelling on the very long trains they envisage operating and take some of the pressure off the current station.

The unknown is whether opening HS2 will actually alleviate or exacerbate the current chaotic scrambles. For a short while the Elizabeth Line was brilliant but it quickly sucked in a lot of travellers from other routes (and some entirely new journeys) making some peak hour journeys totally rammed.

While I guess HS2 may free up some platform capacity - so potentially allowing longer dwell time for servicing and loading trains, I suspect that capacity be actually used by Network Rail announcing the start of a long overdue programme to upgrade the existing station - bit like they did a few years back at Kings Cross.

 

[All Line Rover]

There were similar fun and games today. The 11.13 Euston to Manchester was not called until 11.08; and even then barrier staff were loudly complaining to themselves that people were being allowed to board too early. They then removed the train from the boards at 11.10. Train left on time but half empty.

For context, the train forming the 11.13 (an 11 carriage Pendolino) arrived at 11.05.

The idea that, in the space of 6 minutes (if boarding closed at 11.11), 1000+ people can safely disembark from an 11 carriage train and another 1000+ people can safely board that train, when that train is located on a platform a considerable distance from the station concourse down a narrow ramp, is ludicrous. The 11.13's departure time ought to have been delayed. To not do so is to jeopardise safety for the sake of massaging performance statistics.

If Network Rail allowed arriving passengers to exit platform 1 directly onto Eversholt Street, I could sympathise with the above approach. But they don't. Both arriving and departing passengers are forced to clash.

 

[Deafdoggie]

For context, the train forming the 11.13 (an 11 carriage Pendolino) arrived at 11.05.

The idea that, in the space of 6 minutes (if boarding closed at 11.11), 1000+ people can safely disembark from an 11 carriage train and another 1000+ people can safely board that train, when that train is located on a platform a considerable distance from the station concourse down a narrow ramp, is ludicrous. The 11.13's departure time ought to have been delayed. To not do so is to jeopardise safety for the sake of massaging performance statistics.

If Network Rail allowed arriving passengers to exit platform 1 directly onto Eversholt Street, I could sympathise with the above approach. But they don't. Both arriving and departing passengers are forced to clash.

But has been established many, many times, Network Rail simply couldn't cate less about safety at Euston. It never even crosses their mind. If they had even the slightest hint of passenger safety they'd have had the boarding passengers safely on the platform before the train arrived-as happens very safely at virtually every other UK station.

 

[BRX]

I was there a couple of days ago and took these photos to show where people tend to crowd now - on the same side of the concourse as the platform ramps. When it still had the big departures board, it wasn't visible from there so people tended to gather on the opposite side.

 

[Trackman]

I was there a couple of days ago and took these photos to show where people tend to crowd now - on the same side of the concourse as the platform ramps. When it still had the big departures board, it wasn't visible from there so people tended to gather on the opposite side.

We all know what happened after the main departure board went, in fact there's a thread about it.
It has just made matters worse, as predicted.
Makes my blood boil.

 

[Wolfie]

I thought that at least for 8-16 all the retail has gone (and the ramp for 8-11 greatly enlarged).
The approach to 1-3 in particular is still cramped but even there the ramp has been doubled in width (although some are upset at the lack of design finesse on the central handrail).
The remaining retail units in that area have been broadly similar for many years.
As I see it, the real challenge is that (ideally) any arrival at 1, 2 or 3 should not have a pending departure from that group loading at the same time - to avoid conflicting flows.

The other problem with 1-3 is that they are directly opposite the chronically crowded loos....

 

[Nicholas Lewis]

I appreciate this is a NR managed station but how much say do Avanti have in real time running the station?

 

[Peter0124]

They really didn't do themselves justice with those advertising boards either. Bring back the old board!

 

[Mr. SW]

I was wondering if Euston's layout has something to do with their problems? Having the suburban/local annexe right in the middle of the station seems a little curious and appears to have been inherited from pre-rebuild days. Historically, east to west was Arrival/Suburban/Departure/Parcels and this was passed down to the 60's rebuild. Presumably with the run down of Watford services and prioritising long-distance traffic, this was perceived as being adequate at the time and for the near future and no attempt was made to change the overall arrangement.
If they had, say, moved the suburban/local annexe to the east side at rebuild, would there be still the same problems? Allowing the crowds in and out through a dedicated entrance onto Eversholt Street rather than forcing them through the main concourse maybe have been a more desirable layout. Was it considered at the time?