Quality of 00s station improvements during the PPP Tube Lines vs Metronet

[RacsoMoquette]

Hello, I was wondering why the Piccadilly, Northern and Jubilee Lines under the Tube Lines consortium really improved the ambiance of some of its Zone 2/3 stations. E.g Northern line Edgware and High Barney branches, and the Piccadilly line to Cockfosters from Finsbury Park. It is quite clear that around the early 00s the stations were given effective new lighting, new DMI platform indicators aswell as new CCTV cameras. Though why didn’t Metronet refurbish it’s Bakerloo Line stations. examples such as Lambeth North, Kilburn Park and Warwick Avenue really look so scruffy and neglected now. It is evident that they received very little investment by Metronet, hence why they still retain their dull strip bare tube lighting, and platform DMI indicators from the late 1980s (which are still in operation in 2025! Why did Metronet leave the Bakerloo stations to essentially rot! and by appearance, they may have left the central SSL stations rather neglected also.

 

[announcements]

Nothing wrong with those 1980s' DMIs. While PFI brought some good, a trend was quite often spending for the sake of spending or in the name of standardisation, even if what was being replaced was not life expired or required urgent replacement.

But, yes - those 1980s' DMIs are, in my view, some of the best on the system. A sleek stylish design, and far better than the really small, hard-to-read screens they installed in more recent years.

 

[Snow1964]

From memory, there were a few improvements to token number of stations, but can't remember any details now. I vaguely remember seeing stark new bits against the generally worn stations.

Fairly sure it was generally on platforms or in passageways (there had been lot of work in ticket halls decade or two earlier when the wall mounted ticket machines had been installed)