On 13 July, 12:56, Tristan Miller
wrote:
Greetings.

I just got back from a trip to Moscow. *I made extensive use of the Metro
there and thought I'd post my observations on how it compares with the
London Underground.

Things I like better about the Moscow Metro:

* The trains seem to run a lot more frequently. *I used the system on both
weekends and weekdays, at various times of the day (morning and evening
rush hours, mid-afternoon, and late at night), and never had to wait more
than three minutes for a train, even if I arrived just as one was leaving
the platform.

* The stations are (famously) very beautifully decorated with marble,
columns, chandeliers, statues, reliefs, murals, etc.

* The stations are very spacious. *Even during the crowded rush hour in
central stations there was plenty of space to move around. *I was able to
walk quite fast in the crowds; there was no crunching or bottlenecks along
the platforms, though sometimes there was a bit of queuing at the
escalators.

* There is little or no visual advertising. *There were no posters on the
platforms or escalators, and inside the trains themselves there were
usually only a couple small recruitment posters next to the maps. *However,
some stations did play audio ads on the escalators.

* The pricing is simple: it's 26 RUB for each journey, regardless of
distance or number of interchanges.

* The stations look so clean! *In London many of the stations look very
grimy, particularly on the ceilings and far sides of the tunnels. *In
Moscow many of the stations are gleaming white everywhere.

* The platforms and trains don't seem to get as hot as London. *It was 30
degrees every day I was in Moscow, and yet travelling on the Metro wasn't
particularly uncomfortable. *(The buses, on the other hand, were terrible. *
Interestingly, instead of displaying the name of the next stop on the bus's
overhead LED display, it would display the internal and external
temperature. *The former would be as high as 40 degrees.)

* There seems to be a mobile phone signal in many stations I passed through
(maybe all of them -- I didn't check).

Things I like better about the London Underground:

* Our stations have countdown timers showing the destination of and time to
the next two or three trains. *(Though I'm particularly upset at the recent
penchant for installing advertising projectors right in front of them,
obscuring their view and thus making them completely useless from most
viewing angles.) *However, this would not be quite so advantageous in
Moscow, where the trains seem to run quite often and the lines don't tend
to split.

* LU stations have better station identification on the platforms: the
station name tends to be repeated conspicuously several times along both
sides of the tunnel, making it easy to tell at a glance through the train
windows where you are. *In most of the Moscow Metro stations I passed
through, there were only one or two station signs in the tunnels which
weren't visible from every car, or sometimes even from the platform. *If
you weren't listening carefully to the announcements, or counting stations,
then it was impossible to know where you were. *Even where signs were
posted, sometimes it was in a very stylized font that took a while to read.

Other observations:

* There was much more uniformed presence in the stations and on the trains. *
Station staff and militsiya were numerous and highly visible, though quite
bored-looking.

* The stations don't have entry gates or turnstyles. *The only defence
against fare-dodgers seemed to be some uniformed old women standing at the
entrance who would yell, "Aren't you ashamed of yourself!" at people who
passed through without a ticket.

If anyone else here has used both the London and Metro underground systems,
I'd be interested in hearing how you thought they compared.

Regards,
Tristan

--
* *_
* _V.-o * * * * Tristan Miller * * * * * *Space is limited
*/ |`-' *-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- * *In a haiku, so it's hard
(7_\\ * *http://www.nothingisreal.com/* *To finish what you

Here is Gants Hill station on the Central Line, reportedly "inspired"
by Moscow (but not as ornate!):

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Ga..._concourse.JPG