On Jan 28, 5:33*pm, Paul Corfield wrote:

On Thu, 28 Jan 2010 06:51:38 -0800 (PST), martin
wrote:
on BBC London News this lunchtime:
"Transport for London (TfL) has been called "stingy" and "Scrooge-
like" for imposing a £1 charge on rail passengers using a short-cut
through a station."

Full story at
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/e...on/8484960.stm

What's the real deal here? Is this just a charge to enter one station
and exit another, or if I got the Jubilee to Southwark and exited
through an exit at Waterloo East, would I be charged an extra quid?
(I've never used Waterloo East, and think I've only been to Southwark
once, so I'm not clear on the layout of the station or this
'expensive' corridor.)

I'm not entirely clear what is going on here but one factor to bear in
mind is that South Eastern have recently gated Waterloo East thus
creating the situation of a no man's land between their new exit
gateline (at what is the eastern end of their station) and the entry
gateline at the western end of LU's Southwark Station. Therefore it is
now possible to be marooned between two gatelines with no exit to the
street (as such an exit was never constructed). *Quite how that
situation was allowed to arise I do not know nor how it was ever
approved on safety grounds.

AIUI there's no exit to the street for planning consent reasons.

I presume the safety issue is predominantly that of effectively
managing heavy crowds, yes? I can certainly see the potential issue
there, what with two independent gatelines under the responsibility of
two different sets of staff, working for different companies.


Whether the new gateline has created a need for platform tickets to be
required in the LUL station or whether there is a recorded abuse of the
old "let them through" attitude I do not know. * I suspect this will run
and run given the political pressure sitting behind it - cue lots of
Mayor's questions.

There used to be a poster or two in the main ticket hall at Southwark
tube station (i.e. the one on the corner of The Cut and Blackfriars
Road) which stated that gate passes were available for NR season
ticket holders, which were IIRC free - said gate passes were to enable
them to make use of this shortcut. That was a while back, and when I
looked more recently I couldn't find any such notices.

I'm therefore wondering if these gate passes, if they were indeed
still available, have now been withdrawn - but the article makes no
mention of this whatsoever. So I'm tempted to actually think this is a
new arrangement put in place because the new Southeastern gates might
have made the 'old "let them through" attitude' unworkable - perhaps
the SE gates swallow tickets to 'London Terminals', whereas previously
there was an informal arrangement whereby pax brandishing NR tickets
were let through at both gatelines?