Email to Lynne Featherstone

Right, enough moaning it's time for action. I've emailed Lynne Featherstone, Councillor, Haringey Council and more importanly, chair of the
London Assembly Transport Policy Committee and part of emergency talks taking place today on the London Underground.

Dear Lynne

Please, please, please help us with the recent problems on the London Underground, I heard you on the radio this morning and I know that you are asking the Mayor about safety and number of important issues regarding the tube since its part privatisation.

I have been running a popular site about the London underground for five years now - www.goingunderground.net. This year I added a blog as a companion piece where I record my daily commute into London (trying to have a sense of humour about it) www.london-underground.blogspot.com

This blog has now overtaken my main site in popularity and over recent weeks has got a number four or five position in Google when people search for the term London Underground and many variants , so consequently it's been getting a lot of public attention.

I've posted my email to you on it today and I would be really grateful if you could reply to me or make a comment in the comments area on the blog itself

Many thanks

Annie


Let's see if she responds and if other people make a comment or email her too, perhaps it will make you feel better if nothing else. Must go now as I have to leave loads earlier than normal due to all the problems.

STOP PRESS - Just received an email from Lynne who is happy to make a comment to the blog, but she can't log on right now and hopefully will reply tomorrow, so keep those comments coming.

STOP, STOP PRESS - Lynne has replied!

STOP, STOP, STOP PRESS - Tom Watson Labour MP has replied!

London Underground; Tube Posted by Unknown Thursday, October 23, 2003 Permalink COMMENT HERE
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Beyond a joke

OK guys it's only been a few days of Northern Line disruptions (see my previous entries for the whole week so far) and I've had enough. The tube Gods and fairies are conspiring against me. Normally I do not have to use the Misery Line as it is known to all, but yet again, I'm going to have to use it, as the District Line is screwed up (suspended) between Richmond and Turnham Green (Late finish of engineering works at Richmond apparently) and I have a morning meeting in King's Cross today.

So my options are - walk to Kew Bridge or Mortlake and get a train into Waterloo and get on the Northern Line to King's Cross.

Walk to Kew Bridge and get an overcrowded bus to Hammersmith where I'll get on the Metropolitan & City Line to King's Cross or the Piccadilly Line to King's Cross.

Decisions, decisions, what a great start to the day.

London Underground; Tube Posted by Unknown Thursday, October 23, 2003 Permalink COMMENT HERE
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Asking for trouble on the tube

My first nasty incident on the London Underground since doing this blog, but fortunately years of tube travel put me in good stead to cope with it.

I got on the Piccadilly Line after a great night out seeing Cyberjam with a friend (don't believe the reviews about why there are free tickets, it was really good fun). At Knightsbridge three really loud Northern blokes got on and one holding the door open for his late and bladdered mate - who'd obviously been doing some late night shopping at Harrods.

They then proceeded to do that "what are you looking at" stuff to my end of the carriage and one guy in particular who decided to sit opposite me was really agressive, blowing raspberries (how childish) and giving the whole carriage the finger. So I and the four people around me said nothing, stared ahead and hoped they'd shut up. They didn't. The bloke opposite with an eyebrow stud said "Aaaargh" a lot, continued to blow raspberries and gave the finger right into people's faces.

As my ex-husband would say, they were "asking for trouble" and he probably would have belted them. It was an occasion when part of me wished he had been with me, for safety, he's a big guy, and another part was glad he wasn't as I know he would have hit one of them.

We got to the next stop, South Kensington, and the four people around me legged off the tube, to a chorus of "Big Bum" to one of the fleeing women from Eyebrow Stud.

"You f**king cowards" I thought, "There is no way all of you would have normally got off there". So I was left by myself with the drunks and thought, "You bastards are not driving me off the train".

Amazingly with less of an audience they quietened down. "Is this the right track love", said Eyebrow Stud to me. Paramount Tube rule - ignore everyone around you. Do not say anything. Do not make eye contact. Do not get out a book. Do not do anything to give him the chance to make a comment. Look at an area above his head and focus on it. Very much like this lady and Tony Blair. It worked. Fortunately they got off at Gloucester Road and I breathed a sigh of relief. Phew.

London Underground; Tube Posted by Unknown Wednesday, October 22, 2003 Permalink COMMENT HERE
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Celebrity Spotting or Stalking on the London Underground

Many thanks to Simon Waldman - Director of Digital Publishing for Guardian Newspapers who mentioned my celebrity spot/ stalk of Rageh Omaar in his personal blog today - Quick Links, top left.

If my stalk somehow gets back to The Scud Stud, I hope he takes it in good humour. Personally I have nothing against red fleeces and you looked great in it Rageh, very much the "bullet dodging dreamboat" that you are. I'll buy all your books when you publish them, please, please, don't sue me.

London Underground; Tube Posted by Unknown Wednesday, October 22, 2003 Permalink COMMENT HERE
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Victoria and Northern Line delays, delays, delays

I don't have to travel on the Northern Line today, thank God, but the poor old Piccadilly line driver on my train today must have given the same announcements about the closure of the line and delays on the Victoria Line many, many times. I managed to record his most tired one on my camera. I particularly like the end where he says: "Do not change onto the Victoria Line at Green Park, you will only be disappointed".

When I got to work I got an email from the friend I bumped into on Monday about her "worst ever journey" today:

"I bet you'll be innundated with tube stuff today. I have been late both mornings due to the Northern Line and got a telling off yesterday, so set off extra early this morning.

Lift to Finsbury Park, waited for 3 tubes before I could get on the Victoria Line then we were stuck in the tunnel outside King's Cross for 20 minutes without light and air and with a driver that didn't seem to be able to construct a sentence. Lots of people having panic attacks and fainting. So I swapped to the Circle Line which didn't go further than Aldgate. Which resulted in me having to get a cab from Moorgate and still being late.

I can't stand another journey on the tube!"


Googlewhack

At last I have a Googlewhack - to the uniniated a Googlewhack is when you put two words in Google.com, - no inverted commas cos that's cheating apparently - and only one result comes up, so if you put

oystercard jehovah

in Google you get this site and nothing else. (Update - 26th October - Bollox - it's no longer a Googlewhack as there's another entry there now)

As you can see it's harder than you'd think to get your site in this position and probably pointless too, unless you are Dave Gorman and you can get a hit comedy show and a book deal out of it.

London Underground; Tube Posted by Unknown Wednesday, October 22, 2003 Permalink COMMENT HERE
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Shaving Minutes off your London Underground Journey

Had a fit this morning when I got into work and I discovered I had forgetten I was supposed to be seeing a client at 11 o'clock. I was looking particularly fetching in a hooded fleece and combat trousers (not my normal 'going to see client' clothes), but thought Jeesus, I need to knock up a quick PowerPoint presentation and then get over to Old Street pretty sharpish. Why oh, why do I have to spend so much time on the Northern Line these days?

So I followed the lessons on my main site - got out the trusty Way Out Tube Map to make sure I got on the best carriage to get off for the exit. Then stood by the "Mind The Gap" floor signs so I would be right in front of the doors when they opened.

Success - despite the Northern line driver (I think) being one of the ones on the unofficial go slow in protest of the fears over safety - I got to the meeting only fifteen minutes late.

London Underground; Tube Posted by Unknown Tuesday, October 21, 2003 Permalink COMMENT HERE
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Coincidences & luck

Today ended up being a weird and fortunate day tube wise.

In the way you only can in London with 3 million people travelling on the tube each day, I bumped into the friend that I was supposed to have been meeting on Friday night at an interchange at Angel station. I was only there on the beleagured Northern Line because of starting my post grad course (see below). She was only there, because of the beleagured Northern Line and having to change at Angel after getting the bus replacement service.



Took lots of pictures which may be used for my friend's book of Bank station looking as crowded as normal despite the media trying to scare everyone into thinking the tube is unsafe after the weekend's accidents.

Then, finally on the way home, earlier than normal because of my course, I heard a really good busker on the tube and amazingly gave him some money. I normally hate the ones who patrol the carriages as you have no choice but to listen and this guy started off in a really odd way by asking if we wanted to hear an original or a cover version. Of course no one replied, so he did an "original" which was actually very good.

At the end of his song he asked again, "original or cover" and again met with complete silence, so did a Bob Marley cover of "Three Little Birds", which was again very, very good. He then slouched through the carriage with his cup and must have got a fair amount of money as although we were all silent, a good fifth of the carriage gave him money.

As he moved down the carriage with his guitar slung across his back, I saw it was plastered with a massive red and white sticker in classic London Underground Johnston font - "No busking - penalty �200".

London Underground; Tube Posted by Unknown Monday, October 20, 2003 Permalink COMMENT HERE
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Northern Line - not called the Misery Line for nothing

After yesterday's derailment and accident at Camden Town, the Northern Line looks like it might be closed for a while in parts. Currently its closed between Euston and East Finchley and between Golders Green and Charing Cross. (suppsosedly real time travel alerts from The London Underground).

Major investigations are on the way following the accidents and threats of industrial action by tube staff. Capital Radio are running a survey asking people to text a message to 83958 to say whether they still feel the tube is safe.

And me, I was thinking "Mmmm - what's the Piccadilly Line going to be like today after Friday, aha, I start a postgrad course at City University today so don't need to use it on Monday. But, which station do I need, oh right, Angel on the Northern Line.....aaargh". Fortunately it doesn't appear to be on a bit of the line that is closed, but we'll see. Maybe time to look at Tube Refund pretty soon as I'm sure loads of other people will be delayed and now we've got a quick and easy way of getting compensation under the Customer Charter. And as you can claim through this site or by mobile phoone for free until 1st November - we're sorted.

London Underground; Tube Posted by Unknown Monday, October 20, 2003 Permalink COMMENT HERE
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Another tube derailment - this time at Camden

What the hell is going on? Only on Friday night there was a derailment between Hammersmith and Baron's Court. Now I've just learnt there has been another London Underground train derailed at Camden Town and this time seven people were injured.

From the BBC:

"One carriage hit a wall at Camden Town station in north London. It happened as three carriages of the northbound Northern Line train came off the tracks as the train pulled into the platform just after 10am on Sunday. Five injured people are described as walking wounded, but one person has a broken leg. "

All the latest news on this from various online sources at Google News.

There is definitely going to have to be a major investigation now. Two derailments in less than 48 hours is totally unacceptable.

It looks like there may be some strikes as a result of this, and for once, rightly so:

"The leader of the country's biggest rail union has threatened industrial action unless maintenance contracts given to private companies earlier this year were immediately suspended in the wake of the weekend accidents.

Bob Crow, general secretary of the Rail Maritime and Transport Union, said: "If the Mayor of London, Transport Commissioner or the Government do not take action to suspend these contracts, then I shall be recommending to my executives and to the other rail unions on London Underground that we ballot to take strike action to defend the safety of our members and the travelling public." - read more from ITV's report.

London Underground; Tube Posted by Unknown Sunday, October 19, 2003 Permalink COMMENT HERE
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Piccadilly Line train derailment

Just listening to the radio while blogging to learn that a Piccadilly Line tube has been de-railed at Hammersmith at 9.25pm on Friday. As regular readers of this blog know, I get the Piccadilly Line train from Hammersmith every day, so feeling quite freaky that I could have been on it. I was due to have gone out this evening and my friend had to cancel at the last minute. I would have certainly faced the knock on effect of the line being closed when I rolled out of the pub.

Fortunately, no one was hurt as the train appeared to be going slowly.

According to the BBC:

A London Underground spokesman: "There was a very low speed derailment on a Piccadilly Line train.

"There were no reported injuries. As far as we understand at this time only the last wheels on the last carriage came off.

"We don't know the cause of the derailment. There will be a full investigation."

How this will affect the Piccadilly Line, we'll have to wait and see. The derailment and crash on the Central Line in January caused actual injuries to 32 passengers and then months of havoc on the line itself as large proportions of the line remained closed. The tube paid millions in compensation to passengers whose journeys were totally screwed up.

Apparently part of the track at Piccadilly in that area was badly rusted and then snapped. Good job, as I travel on this part of the line every working day.

In the light of the recent report about passenger overcrowding only issued two days ago (see my blog entry) the London Underground is certainly going to be in the spotlight again.

This is the first accident to happen since the tube was privatised so it's clear there's going to be a major investigation here and rightly so.

For more on the derailment see the various reports from Google News.

London Underground; Tube Posted by Unknown Saturday, October 18, 2003 Permalink COMMENT HERE
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Victor Lewis-Smith Savages Tube Nerd

And it's not me, before you ask.

On Friday, the TV columnist in The Evening Standard reviewed a programme Metroland: Race Around the Underground which followed Geoff Marshall in his quest to beat the world record for travelling around every tube station in London in less than 19 hours, 18 minutes and 45 seconds. Now if you know Victor Lewis Smith you know he is just going to slag off the programme,

"Wherever there are trains, there are nerds, but this programme introduced us to a new and more virulent strain: the Super Nerd."

I never saw the programme myself so I can't tell whether his comments about the production are justified:

"the programme transmogrified into a televisual version of Mornington Crescent, with Geoff rushing nimbly from Knightsbridge to Sloane Square, while congratulating himself on the shrewdness of his sideways manoeuvre. But despite his claims of exceptional speed, what we saw mostly involved him sitting still and eating sandwiches, and the inaction wasn't improved by the dismally obvious choice of music, with The Jam's Going Underground giving way to The New Vaudeville Band as we approached Finchley Central.

More clich�d still were the speeded-up Koyaanisqatsi-style people-as-ants montages (complete with Philip Glass process music) that most documentary makers stopped inflicting on us a decade ago, and as the world record attempt neared its anticlimax, I suddenly realised what was wrong with the entire venture. Unlike most sportsmen nowadays, these boys didn't take drugs, but to make this futile journey tolerable, drugs were precisely what was needed. Not for them, but for the viewers."

Classic Lewis-Smith.

I'm not sure how Geoff feels about all this. We have been in touch in the past and we've swapped links, had the odd email, that's it. He seems a pleasant enough bloke from these exchanges and I'm not sure he takes it as entirely seriously as Lewis-Smith makes out.

This tube challenge has also been made into a very funny lads novel called Tunnel Vision (check out my interview with its author Keith Lowe) and I think anyone who does this sort of stuff knows they're setting themselves up for a certain amount of ridicule or certainly the label of "trainspotter".

I'll see if Geoff is prepared to comment.

London Underground; Tube Posted by Unknown Saturday, October 18, 2003 Permalink COMMENT HERE
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Scud Stud Celeb Spot

After not seeing any celebs on the tube this year, until seeing John Hannah from tube flick Sliding Doors last week, today, someone got on at Gunnersbury tube station who looked remarkably like BBC War Correspondent Rageh Omaar also known as the Scud Stud. As I was sitting opposite a Poppy Appeal advertisement that featured him this was a weird co-incidence (see middle bottom row in the picture below).



"It can't be Rageh Omaar", I think as the guy stands next to me against the glass partition that I'm sitting against. I look down at his bag and he has one of those credit card style luggage tags on it and even though it was the wrong way round I could see the name said "Rageh Omaar"

So I took a picture of the bag (like you do) and was just too close to him to take a picture without making it obvious to his mate, who was facing me, that that was what I was doing.



After a few stops he moved over to the middle of the carriage and was nearer the Poppy Appeal poster he was on, at which point my bloody camera decided it was low on batteries. Fortunately I had another set on me so changed them as quickly as I could and do have a picture of Rageh Omaar but from the angle I took it, it could be have been any guy in a red fleece.



Confirmation of Rageh was provided when his friend got off at Hammersmith with me and said, "See ya Rageh" and then the whole carriage was suddenly alerted to the fact that we were travelling with The Scud Stud ("branded 'eye candy' by his jealous peers" - The Observer). He certainly didn't look 35 either.

OK the pictures are up now and you can see Rageh above in a red fleece (does he only ever wear red fleeces?). The Iraqi War shot him from being a little known reporter, to being the BBC's next David Dimbleby. Even Viz the UK's cult comic dedicated an issue to "Britain's best-loved bullet-dodging dreamboat". He's even on best selling T Shirts in Che Guevara style.

He's secured a book deal "reportedly worth �850,000 with options abroad, for two books. Revolution Day, to be published in March 2004, will be about his experience of reporting on Iraq before, during and after war, drawing from diaries he kept in Baghdad.

"A second book, due in late 2005 or early 2006, will be a more personal take on Somalia - where he was born to wealthy parents who sent him to be educated in England - and the impact of war on his family."

Certainly puts my mate's book about the tube - One Stop Short of Barking into context! If only she could get a deal like that I'd be laughing, as I'm helping her research it in return for a share of royalties.

London Underground; Tube Posted by Unknown Friday, October 17, 2003 Permalink COMMENT HERE
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Trauma on the London Underground?

I've been in two minds about whether to report on the recent report by the House of Commons - Overcrowding on Public Transport. Up until now I couldn't be arsed. But thanks to a discussion taking place on Clear Blue Skies I thought I would.

The report says that commuters face "daily trauma" and travel in "intolerable conditions", really, I'd never noticed!

Travellers found their journeys "not simply uncomfortable, but positively frightening". Extreme in my opinion.

To me "trauma" is something you can't live with and literally takes over your every waking hour or at least for more than a couple of hours spent commuting on the tube.

Tube travel is indeed a pain in the arse and the overcrowding is unaccaptable, but it always has been and is unlikely to change. It's not "traumatic" every day or tantamount to a "personal tragedy", that's simply sensationalism.

Amazingly I'm with The Star on this

"Something called the Commons Transport Committee has arrived at the conclusion that trains are overcrowded.....

"And the point to note in indelible ink is one delivered by Gwyneth Dunwoody, the committee's chairman, who says: "Overcrowding is not an act of God."

"So there you are. It is official.

"Sadly, accidents are acts of the divine one, as are over-inflated hikes in ticket prices, the existence of the smarmy work-shy loafers in the peaked cap operating at work-to-rule pace and John Prescott's Jaguars.

"If you don't want to take our word for it, you can ask God yourself, care of Mr T Blair on Platform 10."

All of these news reports are interesting in itself I spose, so I realised that I talked myself into blogging it. Particularly when my journey home on the District Line section was unusually overcrowded. I wasn't traumatised when I got home and by the time I had walked for two minutes I had forgotten about it.

If this report means something will be done about overcrowding great, but there have been reports like this ever since 1884, and the underground is still overcrowded.

The most notable/interesting/funny of all of these reports to me was one in 1936 where W J Kelley, Labour MP for Rochdale, said: �Young girls and men are crowded in such a way that the question of decency even comes up�.

London Underground; Tube Posted by Unknown Friday, October 17, 2003 Permalink COMMENT HERE
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Everyone's still reading Middlesex

Another picture of the woman pictured on Wednesday reading Middlesex.

The thing this demonstrates is that tube travel is almost as bad as rail travel when it comes to people getting on in the same carriage each day and sitting in the same seat. Me and this woman obviously travel at the same time and deliberately get on at the front carriage of the train as it's the nearest one to the exit for when we get off (well it is for me and the excellent Way Out Tube Map will show you which carriage to get on to best get off, so to speak)

London Underground; Tube Posted by Unknown Friday, October 17, 2003 Permalink COMMENT HERE
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Guardian British Blog Awards 2003

The opening for these awards has just been announced and I will enter - not sure under which category yet, although probably specialist - as I passed being under 18 more than 18 years ago, my photography's not wonderful, design is worse, and best written...mmm. there's so many other blogs which are better written than mine I wouldn't know where to start. Anyway if anyone with a blog reading this wants to enter, you have until the 21st November. Good luck??? - do I mean that?

London Underground; Tube Posted by Unknown Thursday, October 16, 2003 Permalink COMMENT HERE
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Everyone's reading Middlesex

I still get a kick from seeing people reading the same book on the tube and it happens more often that you would think. Not including the "adults" that are reading the latest Harry Potter brick (sorry - I can't see the appeal they have to anyone who's over 16 years old), but I often see people in the same carriage reading Haruki Murakami or Alice Sebold's The Lovely Bones. I have also seen a lot of people reading Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides, so was delighted to see a woman sitting next to me and a woman sitting opposite me both reading it today.

I feel like winking and nudging them in a "nudge, nudge, wink, wink" way, but they'd think I was a psycho.

London Underground; Tube Posted by Unknown Wednesday, October 15, 2003 Permalink COMMENT HERE
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Reading over people's shoulders

Classic piece of London Underground etiquette, basically, don't do it, it makes you look like a cheapskate.

This morning spotted the following ad for the Evening Standard:



Closely followed by a person reading a copy of Metro (published by Associated Newspapers, the publishers of the Standard), over someone's shoulder.



Weird huh?

London Underground; Tube Posted by Unknown Wednesday, October 15, 2003 Permalink COMMENT HERE
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PS I am not a terrorist or am I?

Not about my journey but I received the following email from a yahoo.co.uk account today:

Hi

I'm in the process of writing a book which includes the possibility of a terrorist attack between Embankment and Waterloo. I was wondering if you know how probable it is that a bomb could go off under the River Thames and flood the entire tube network?

If you could get back to me with any info that you've got on the structure of the tube, and what's protecting it from being flooded by The Thames, I'd be very grateful.

Many thanks

(I've not shown the person's name)

P.S I am not a terrorist.

I got back to the person and told them that I couldn't help. a) because just by saying you're not a terrorist doesn't mean you are not a terrorist, and b) because I have no idea and haven't got the time to spend on researching someone else's book for them (other than what I'm already doing for One Stop Short of Barking).

I also said to the person that if they write to the London Underground with a similar email to the one they sent me, they won't get a positive response either.

It must be tricky doing this sort of research because anyone is likely to be highly suspicious of their motives, so unless you are really famous - like crime writer Barbara Vine (Ruth Rendall) whose excellent book King Solomon's Carpet did involve a terrorist plot to bomb the underground, you're not going to have much luck.

London Underground; Tube Posted by Unknown Wednesday, October 15, 2003 Permalink COMMENT HERE
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Life is not always overcast on the tube

Coming home, it was a good journey. But good in the real sense of good. I'm not going to get all religious, but it was one of those evenings when you see total strangers doing things and think perhaps the world doesn't suck.

First off I went down into the bowels of Piccadilly Circus and a whole group of school boys were coming up and the sheer look of excitement on their faces as they hit the open air and saw all the bustle of London and the bright lights of the giant animated McDonalds and Coca Cola advertising was amazing. "Wow", they said, just "Wow".

Hardened old commuter like me and millions of others see this everyday and the only thing I normally think is "God those ads are getting bloody bright, why don't we just get McDonalds to sponsor street lighting and it would save us a fortune in council tax".

Then onto the tube itself and a woman was throwing pennies at people on the train. First I thought she knew the girls she was throwing them at, but she didn't. There was nothing malicious in it, she was just deciding to give away some of her spare change.

Next the guy sitting next to me eating some Cadbury's Dairy Milk from a vending machine, asked the guy opposite if he could have a copy of Metro that was on the little ledge behind his back. "Sure" the guy replied and gave it to him. Guy sitting next to me said to him "Would you like a piece of chocolate?", Metro guy didn't, but again I thought, how sweet.

Then, penny woman, who we shall call Penny, sat down when the girls had left and like the "mild tube nutter" yesterday, proceeded to quietly talk to herself whilst going through some documents on her lap. I'm not sure what it is about the Piccadilly Line, but why is everyone rehearsing for plays, presentations, speeches or whatever? Anyway Penny just made me stifle my laughter as, with not a care in the world and oblivious of the rest of the carriage, she spent the next fifteen minutes animatedly having this inner presentation complete with hand gestures until I got off to change at Baron's Court.

All very surreal and as Dave on Clear Blue Skies says "Because Life is not Always Overcast".

London Underground; Tube Posted by Unknown Tuesday, October 14, 2003 Permalink COMMENT HERE
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Rehearsal on the tube

I was either sitting opposite a mild tube nutter this morning or someone who was practising his lines from a play. It was quite funny if the latter as this guy sat opposite me, had a document on his lap and was just talking quietly to himself.

He didn't have the usual signs of a nutter - stained T shirt or dishevelled clothing, his eyes didn't seem too stary and he was talking quite quietly rather than screaming "Mind the Doors" then laughing manically like a woman on the train last week.

But you never know, he could have been one of the most scariest tube nutters yet, those ones that lull you in to a false sense of security by looking surprsingly normal and yet undernearth it all a 100% nutter keeping it all in the bounds of normality waiting to break out.

London Underground; Tube Posted by Unknown Monday, October 13, 2003 Permalink COMMENT HERE
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