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Old May 9th 07, 09:51 PM posted to uk.transport.london,uk.railway
Michael R N Dolbear Michael R N Dolbear is offline
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First recorded activity at LondonBanter: Dec 2004
Posts: 651
Default Willesden- Clapham Junction


MIG wrote
On May 9, 2:19 am, keithy wrote:
Well all i can say is that you picked a bad day to travel on this

[...]
incumbents Railtrack. If you looked very carefully at the timetable

a
Southern service is due to leave Clapham at 03 past the hour from
platform 16 and a Silverlink service is due to leave at 05 past

each
hour from platform 2. This is rather pathetic as the Southern

service
is always late.


This is a good example of where the journey planners treat stations

as
a single point, with a number of minutes for any interchange. This

is
particularly odd where the number of minutes is high and the station
is obviously large (or three adjacent stations sharing a name, as

with
CJ).


Last time we discussed journey planners it was stated that while the
German Railways planner treated stations (including British stations)
that way the National Rail planner didn't.

There is a table on p5 of the SWT timetable "Connection times" which
sez 5 minutes at most stations but allow 10 minutes at Clapham Junction
except for Southern services, when it is 5 minutes.

If something like this table is used it may have the effect you want

So if you ask for, say, Twickenham to Olympia, the planner will

direct
you to the 03 departure despite it being more than two minutes walk

to
the furthest possible side of Clapham Junction, rather than go to the
adjacent platform for the 05.


Suggest you try this on both planners. Try Epsom or Banstead or Horsham
to Olympia which could be a Southern to Southern interchange as a
further test.

Note that only a train arriving between xx53 and xx00 might cause the
xx05 departure to be offered since if the connection time rules allow
the planner will always select the earliest scheduled arrival.

--
Mike D