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Fatal accident on the DLR

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ijmad

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There's plenty of places around the Tokyo area where you have PEDs and mixed-stock: you simply provide PEDs for all train formations, and open the appropriate PEDs for the stock in the station. This would likely imply standardising the B07/09 stopping positions so that four/six car formations stop appropriately (i.e., a four-car would stop either at the same place or 1/3rd back). For some of the busier stations (Shadwell? Bank?) I'm honestly surprised there are PEDs: they're certainly very, very crowded in the peaks (and Bank is often bad partly due to people waiting by where the doors are open if it's the wrong destination!).

Good point, although I suppose it remains to be determined if that would be practical for such different arrangements of doors, there might not be enough 'null space' for doors to retract into on two different designs that both have their doors close together (compared to a regional/intercity train where the doors are sparse). I wonder if there'd be a way to build a half height PED that lowered into a gap on the platform and could deal with any door configuration, and whether this could be made safe for passengers.
 
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gsnedders

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Good point, although I suppose it remains to be determined if that would be practical for such different arrangements of doors, there might not be enough 'null space' for doors to retract into on two different designs that both have their doors close together (compared to a regional/intercity train where the doors are sparse). I wonder if there'd be a way to build a half height PED that lowered into a gap on the platform and could deal with any door configuration, and whether this could be made safe for passengers.
Again in the Japanese case, you occasionally see double-wide PEDs which are presumably there to fit multiple doors in similar positions. Yes, you lose some of the advantages, but you still have a continuous barrier along the platform edge till they open.
 

Peter Mugridge

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The French have developed a very long vertically lifting PED design to get round both the issues of stock mix and the possibility of stopping out of position.
 

ainsworth74

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The French have developed a very long vertically lifting PED design to get round both the issues of stock mix and the possibility of stopping out of position.

I'm quite partial to the "rope" designs as seen below (Korea first, followed by Japan) which seem like, as long as you're careful with the placement of the equipment, they would be easily able to cope with different door placements on different stock but still offer significant protection against people falling onto the track (perhaps less so against trespass but it would take a lot more effort than now!). It also avoids the issues with a half height barrier which could still see people falling over them.


 

Bletchleyite

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That setup does appear to make it rather difficult for the guard to see properly to dispatch, though, so it'd only really work properly with DOO cameras.
 

Trackman

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That setup does appear to make it rather difficult for the guard to see properly to dispatch, though, so it'd only really work properly with DOO cameras.

I can imagine people here getting their heads stuck in it at busy times or undesirables using it as some sort of play thing.

Do these countries have a massive problem with people falling on the tracks?
 

gsnedders

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I can imagine people here getting their heads stuck in it at busy times or undesirables using it as some sort of play thing.

Do these countries have a massive problem with people falling on the tracks?
Japan has a history of suicide-by-train (which has become less common with the estate charged for the delay), but also just people (salarymen in particular) falling sleepily while travelling (overwork, alcohol, etc.).
 

Trackman

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Japan has a history of suicide-by-train (which has become less common with the estate charged for the delay), but also just people (salarymen in particular) falling sleepily while travelling (overwork, alcohol, etc.).
Thanks. I've just googled it - it's a massive problem. South Korea is worse.
I'm not talking about suicide-by-train, but as a whole.
 
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delt1c

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You will never get 100% safety, accidents will happen and that is a fact of life. How much money do you spend trying to eliminate every eventuality, before to long the cost when passed on to the customer will mean travel is to expensive, far better to spend on educationg the customer to take care of their own safety.
 

Applepie356

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Such incidents are rare on the DLR so it would be surprising if any money was spent on extra safety features.

If the PSA was confined to a cab in the front seat with a big red STOP button then things may have been different

However DLR is due new rolling stock soon so perhaps that will have better equipped safety features.
 

mmh

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A potential barrier (hah) to platform edge doors in the DLR would be if they were deemed inappropriate or undesirable at unstaffed stations.
 

Kingspanner

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You will never get 100% safety, accidents will happen and that is a fact of life. How much money do you spend trying to eliminate every eventuality, before to long the cost when passed on to the customer will mean travel is to expensive, far better to spend on educationg the customer to take care of their own safety.
Well, one method is to think about how much on average a premature death costs the economy (somewhere in the region of £1,500,000) and how often that particular type of death occurs and use that as a benchmark.
I forget how much the total bill for Great Heck was, but realising that this was thought to be potentially a 1-in-ten-year event, take the total cost, divide it by ten and the resulting number suggests an amount you might consider spending on incursion protection. But spend it well by surveying all road-rail interactions and prioritising them on a risk assessment basis.
And that's why you see additional barriers in place to protect parapets on overbridges. Education is good too of course
 

philthetube

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Japan has a history of suicide-by-train (which has become less common with the estate charged for the delay), but also just people (salarymen in particular) falling sleepily while travelling (overwork, alcohol, etc.).
Anything which makes people think before jumping is worth doing, it may seem heartless but if it saves even one life then it is worth doing.

many suicides are spur of the moment, if a potential suicide realised that his/her jumping will leave the family paying the costs then some, (admittedly not all) will not do it.

At the very least the Japanese stats should be looked into.
 

Meerkat

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I'm quite partial to the "rope" designs as seen below (Korea first, followed by Japan) which seem like, as long as you're careful with the placement of the equipment, they would be easily able to cope with different door placements on different stock but still offer significant protection against people falling onto the track (perhaps less so against trespass but it would take a lot more effort than now!). It also avoids the issues with a half height barrier which could still see people falling over them.


Can’t see the rope design ever getting approval. Big risk of people/things getting caught on them, and if we have to spend money on stopping people using 80x wiring as a ladder......
I wouldn’t want to be near those with kids - it’s basically an adventure playground they will not be able to resist. Especially once they realise they go up!
 

61653 HTAFC

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Anything which makes people think before jumping is worth doing, it may seem heartless but if it saves even one life then it is worth doing.

many suicides are spur of the moment, if a potential suicide realised that his/her jumping will leave the family paying the costs then some, (admittedly not all) will not do it.

At the very least the Japanese stats should be looked into.
I'm not sure Japan is the place to look if we want to reduce suicide rates overall... but something like that might make a difference looking at railways in isolation. My main concern would be the unintended consequences: if someone is determined to end their life and can't do so in way that they believe (mistakenly in many cases admittedly) will be "quick and painless" without causing a financial burden to their family they may be driven to take other action such as killing their family first- which is messed-up in so many ways, but there are plenty of cases of such things happening.
 

crablab

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It must have been horrific to have seen the lady fall onto the tracks and be completely powerless to stop the train, and realising what was about to happen.

My condolences to all involved.

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Obstacle detection on the front of the train might be a solution. As I recall, there have been similar issues with people throwing things onto DLR tracks which trains have subsequently hit.

The issue being whether the detection can see far enough ahead for the train to stop, false positives triggering emergency brake applications (which with people standing could cause injuries) and seeing around corners etc.
 

Bucephalus

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....Obstacle detection on the front of the train might be a solution....

The most sensible idea I've heard so far. Considering that very old technologies such as burglar alarm and security light sensors already exist, some kind of obstacle detection seems feasible to me.

Additionally i think it might be best to put the Passenger Service Assistant at the front of the train. They then could have separate staff do random ticket checks like they do on Manchester Metrolink
 

Taunton

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DLR ticket checks are not random, they take place on most/all trips. That's how they manage with ungated stations. The PSA (I still want to call them the Train captain) works down through the units as the journey progresses. There are random checks by squads at station exits as well.
 

gsnedders

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DLR ticket checks are not random, they take place on most/all trips. That's how they manage with ungated stations. The PSA (I still want to call them the Train captain) works down through the units as the journey progresses. There are random checks by squads at station exits as well.
As someone who pre-pandemic used the DLR on a near daily basis, I definitely didn't get checked on most trips. Maybe 10% at most?
 

bramling

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As someone who pre-pandemic used the DLR on a near daily basis, I definitely didn't get checked on most trips. Maybe 10% at most?

It's dropped off a lot over the years. Back in the 1990s it was standard to be checked. However with developments like three-vehicle trains (where the PSA cannot pass from one vehicle to the next) it has made such checks less viable. Instead they have moved to the model of doing revenue blocks.
 

K.o.R

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On the Nuremberg U-Bahn lines fitted with UTO, there are obstacle detectors at platforms which should stop trains coming in if someone or something big has fallen onto the tracks.

With the new single-train rolling stock it'll be easier to justify the cost of PEDs as the door arrangement will be in its final evolution. With PEDs you're pretty much stuck with one type of door arrangement for the rest of time, unless you are willing to remove the PEDs completely before switching to a different type of rolling stock.

I imagine the kind of modular barrier system similar to how gatelines are put in at stations. Should be fairly easily reconfigured if the door arrangement changes.
 

NotATrainspott

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I imagine the kind of modular barrier system similar to how gatelines are put in at stations. Should be fairly easily reconfigured if the door arrangement changes.

The problem is the system-wide dependencies. It's somewhat rare for new train fleets to be introduced in a big and somewhat irreversible bang. If the door arrangement is different, then you'd need to set up all of the PEDs across the entire network covered by the new trains to be compatible with the new and old layouts at the same time. In practice, if the door layout is any different, that would mean removing the PEDs before the first new train comes into service, and then reinstalling them once you're wholly certain that any of the old trains will never have to run again. That could mean taking out the PEDs for an entire year, at which point you have to have a system with the safety features to operate entirely without PEDs in the first place. If so, then PEDs won't be as useful. Having PEDs will also change the dynamic of the network, as passengers and the network operator will be happier to allow greater overcrowding on platforms as there is less risk of someone falling or being pushed onto the tracks. Removing the PEDs would require this to be undone.

All in all, once you've got PEDs, you're probably sticking with that door arrangement until the end of time. That's not normally a major problem though, as you'd have designed the trains for the absolute maximum possible capabilities of the rest of the infrastructure anyway. New trains 40 years down the line won't be any longer or wider or able to handle more people on board by moving things about, so you're not going to be that limited by mandatory door placements. Train manufacturers are used to having very modular designs for metro systems because of these sorts of line-level constraints.
 
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