"CJG Now Thankfully Living In The North" wrote in
message om...

So if they know so much about the railways how come

a) they patrol in police cars rather than on the actual trains.

How do you suggest that they attend trackside incidents by travelling on the
train? Incidents occur on other parts of the railway than just those served
by passenger trains. Then there is a question of response time. There is an
incident (say, an attempted armed robbery at a ticket office) at a station
further down the line. Do you seriously suggest that the BTP wait, for
example, half an hour for the next service train? Barking!

b) One of them jumped on a train track at a major UK station without
any high visiblity clothing or asking the signal box if there was a
train coming or even just looking to see if there was a train coming?

How do you know that he didn't check with the box? Television programmes are
edited. He may well have done so but it was cut from the final edit. It
would have been advisable for him to have worn an HV but, on the other hand,
the railways operated safely for over a hundred years without them - it
isn't the end of the world.

If you have concerns about the way that people behave on the track then you
should see the behaviour of some of the contractors. I've seen them walking
in the four-foot, with backs to the approaching traffic, with mobile phones
clamped to their ears, on main running lines. Now that really is plain
stupid (and dangerous). That is far more deserving of your concern than the
fact that a member of the BTP jumped (briefly) onto the track in a station
area, where speeds are generally low, and on a lightly used platform road
(if it is the one that I am thinking of at Cardiff Central).