London Underground Managed Decline

[jumble]

The biggest issue on the Piccadilly line over the weekend was a shortage of train operators.

Whilst there was a reduced service due to the engineering shut down, this was equally hampered by the ongoing driver shortages affecting most lines. Training of new drivers is at full capacity, and has been for some time, before anyone suggests TfL train more.

This was what I thought given that the Rayners train sat in the siding (loop?) doing nothing at Acton town for close to 20 minutes

This is from the timetable notice, an internal document, where the planned service was laid out.



In connection with train arrestor installation at Wood Green and tamping works at Oakwood, the Piccadilly Line train service will be suspended between King’s Cross and Cockfosters from approximately 00.30 on Friday night, 8th September until close of traffic on Sunday, 10th September. On Saturday and Sunday, 9th and 10th September, train services over the remainder of the Piccadilly Line will be revised to operate as follows:- King’s Cross – Heathrow Terminal 5, via Terminals 2 & 3, every 12 minutes. King’s Cross – Heathrow Terminal 4, every 12 minutes. Acton Town – Rayners Lane, every 10 minutes. (extending to Uxbridge every 20 minutes) These services combine to provide a 6 minute service between King’s Cross and Acton Town. Friday and Saturday Night Tube train services will be revised to operate as follows:- King’s Cross – Heathrow Terminal 5, via Terminals 2 & 3, every 12 minutes.

Well they failed to deliver
The Delay at Earls Ct was 12 minutes and We were at Acton town for nearly 20 minutes waiting for a Rayners

 

[bluegoblin7]

The Acton-Rayners shuttle service was generally scheduled 15-20 minutes stand time in the sidings at Acton.

 

[Tubeboy]

As other posters have rightly said, there was a severe shortage of drivers. Reversing off one platform won’t help either.

 

[Mawkie]

As other posters have rightly said, there was a severe shortage of drivers. Reversing off one platform won’t help either.

Being flippant, tell that to the eight of us waiting for our any trains at KX on Saturday afternoon.

There are severe driver shortages on the Pic, which is always the last line of choice for any newly qualified train operator, but Northfields is currently struggling more than most for various reasons. Given that Cockfosters and Arnos drivers had over 2 hours travel time (each way) baked into their duty times - due to the vagaries of the dreaded Rail Replacement bus service - once you add in a meal relief, there isn't much actual driving that can be fitted into the parameters. I drove KX to Acton (where I had my train taken off me for some reason) had a rather long meal relief and then drove back to KX. That was my total contribution for my 8 hour day!

However, @bramling is correct, there is a marked decline in skill and experience across the combine, with the company purposefully de-skilling grades. A good example being the Trains Manager role - the managers in-charge on the weekend engineering at KX were on the platform - but are now reduced to a basic messaging service for the line controller, with little to no autonomy compared to their previous abilities.

Hopefully none of you were on the line yesterday - another diabolical poop-show in the evening peak - a suspension Acton to Heathrow and traction current switched off to facilitate track access. LU people do their best within the confines of their training, management, staff availability, centre costing, etc, but the good will is being squeezed. The issue was a set of point at Northfields apparently, I don't know if it is the same set that's been giving the line problems for months, but the track workers must just be crying inside when they get a job to return to the same area over and over again.

So I'm going to say yes, LU is in a managed decline. They are choosing to understaff depots & stations and most other areas of the business (look how they decimated the Admin roles on stations), they are choosing to sweat their assets, they are choosing to recruit people from "customer service backgrounds" rather than engineering or something more suitable.

*I use the word choosing, but in reality, there are savings to be made so some of those choices are not really choices at all. They are a result of the current funding agreement.

The tube has its own right of way. I really don't think bunching should happen in normal service no matter there is a shortage of resource or not.

If there is a cancellation of train number 1, then train 2 picks up double the amount of people, which slows it down, and that problem is compounded at each subsequent station along the line. The 3rd train then gets closer and picks a few extra people up but is essentially being held up by train 2. Train 4 is racing along as usual, but soon gets caught up in slow running too. And so on.

What's the immediate solution to this? On national rail, they skip stations to make up time, but LU is not set up for that.

 

[miklcct]

If there is a cancellation of train number 1, then train 2 picks up double the amount of people, which slows it down, and that problem is compounded at each subsequent station along the line. The 3rd train then gets closer and picks a few extra people up but is essentially being held up by train 2. Train 4 is racing along as usual, but soon gets caught up in slow running too. And so on.

What's the immediate solution to this? On national rail, they skip stations to make up time, but LU is not set up for that.

If there is less than the full service, the headway should be widened accordingly. For example, if 30 trains are available for a 2-minute headway for a full-service, giving a round-trip time of 60 minutes, then when only 25 trains are available, the headway should be 2 minutes and 24 seconds.

Alternatively, if during the process of running and assuming no cancellation, train 2 is delayed outside the control of the railways, a gap will eventually form between train 1 and train 2. Then the solution is to hold train 1, or also some preceding trains slightly, to keep the service interval down the line and prevent train 2 from getting overcrowded.

 

[Mawkie]

If there is less than the full service, the headway should be widened accordingly. For example, if 30 trains are available for a 2-minute headway for a full-service, giving a round-trip time of 60 minutes, then when only 25 trains are available, the headway should be 2 minutes and 24 seconds.

Alternatively, if during the process of running and assuming no cancellation, train 2 is delayed outside the control of the railways, a gap will eventually form between train 1 and train 2. Then the solution is to hold train 1, or also some preceding trains slightly, to keep the service interval down the line and prevent train 2 from getting overcrowded.

If you don't mind me saying, this shows an incredibly simplistic understanding of the operational nuances of a railway.

To your first point, even fast urban metro services run to a strict timetable - without which, the service would simply collapse! Service controllers can only run the service with the trains they have available and the operators available to drive them. You seem to be suggesting a new daily timetable being invented depending on the resources available on the day. That is impossible.

To your second point, it is true that a service controller will hold a train with a large gap behind it for "2 additional minutes please driver", but hopefully never at the expense of its return trip. By that I mean, a terminating train gets a minimum of 4 minutes turnaround time (usually more), but ideally that would be an on-time departure. Once you add in the various framework agreement for operators (4hr 15m driving time for example) and you'll soon be told by drivers that they have run out of driving hours and their train will be put away in the closest siding.

The Underground still employ spare drivers to mitigate some of the worst of the cuts due to "Operator Not Available" (ONA) - for example, when a driver is running into overtime, or in excess of driving parameters - but the managed decline means those spare operators are now being given full running timetabled duties, which means the late running train will be put away on sidings, rather than picked up by a spare operator and continue to run.

To be fair, this is part of a managed decline discussion is maybe deserving of its own thread.

 

[miklcct]

To your first point, even fast urban metro services run to a strict timetable - without which, the service would simply collapse! Service controllers can only run the service with the trains they have available and the operators available to drive them. You seem to be suggesting a new daily timetable being invented depending on the resources available on the day. That is impossible.

For example, if the full service requires 30 trains and operators to run, the operator can make a plan for 27 trains, 24 trains, 21 trains, etc. and pick the one depending on how many staff turn up for work.

To your second point, it is true that a service controller will hold a train with a large gap behind it for "2 additional minutes please driver", but hopefully never at the expense of its return trip. By that I mean, a terminating train gets a minimum of 4 minutes turnaround time (usually more), but ideally that would be an on-time departure. Once you add in the various framework agreement for operators (4hr 15m driving time for example) and you'll soon be told by drivers that they have run out of driving hours and their train will be put away in the closest siding.

The return trip will be corresponding delayed as well, creating a domino effect. If the headway is 3 minutes, and eventually the domino effect will make every train on the line delayed 3 minutes, which is equivalent to no delay. For example, if 9 minutes of delay is accumulated on the whole line, 3 departures will be cancelled correspondingly to restore the timetable with the run number of the whole fleet increased by 3. This is very common in Hong Kong.

If a driver is running out of driving hours soon at the wrong place, which should be known by one round trip before the limit, a spare driver can be sent out from the depot to pick him up. If not, the train is simply removed from service with the frequency temporarily reduced until driver availability restores.

 

[MaidaVale]

Not sure I'm allowed to provide the exact number (let's just settle at "a lot"), but as previously mentioned in this thread the main issue that weekend was a severe lack of train operators coupled with the long reversing times at Kings Cross and the lack of Cockfosters and Arnos Grove drivers due to those being within the closed area. The Piccadilly is currently the line with the highest amount of trainee drivers on the combine which should help to alleviate the issue.