Let the Games Begin...
 

An obvious title of course, and one open to all sorts of comedic
reinterpretation I guess, but perhaps I can get away with it as it's the
title of an open letter from Transport Commissioner Peter Hendy, which
can be read on the Get Ahead Of The Games (GAOTG) website he
http://www.getaheadofthegames.com/news/1359.html

I imagine many on here will have already had a look at the GAOTG site,
but nonetheless it's worth a mention - I think it does a pretty good job
of conveying a complicated message w.r.t. the predicted and ever
changing transport scenarios during Games time, and the message will
continue to evolve as the Games takes place.

One particularly useful feature of the GAOTG site is their Daily
Bulletins he
http://www.getaheadofthegames.com/bulletins/default.html

Click on the particular day (the hyperlink in magenta) to get a summary
of what's happening on that day, and its effects on...
* public transport in London
* the road network in London
* and also areas outside of London.

There are also more detailed PDF bulletins covering the those three topics.

At the moment TfL seem to be particularly pushing the West Ham option
for travelling to the Olympic Park, which I'd say was a good idea too -
around a 15/20 minute walk from West Ham along the snazzed-up Greenway
path to the Olympic Park's Greenway Gate.

All in all a big challenge to London's transport network - fingers
crossed it all works out ok... (though I'm sure there are those who'd
rather be sticking their fingers up instead!)

(Tech issue prevented me posting this earlier, so I'm posting it now, 2
hours and 12 minutes before the opening ceremony... yes, twenty hours
seem to have gone missing - hope Omega's timekeeping is better than mine!)

Let the Games Begin...
 

I've just come back from the Olympic Park this afternoon, and Stratford
was straining to cope with the sheer weight of numbers at 5pm - the Park
itself wasn't particularly busy, notably, there were almost no events
going on in the park, and it had a 'soft launch' type feel to it - but I
wandered through Westfield and it was absolutely heaving.

I'm not a huge fan of Stratford's layout, though I obviously appreciate
that without starting from scratch, it's hard to see how it could have
been done much differently. However, I'm still not sure that they've got
their flows quite right, as there were a lot of people trying to come out
at the bus station side, while nobody could get into the station on the
Westfield side. They'd even closed off the mezzanine entrance at that
time due to overcrowding.

By contrast, I got a number of trains today, including a North London
Line across to Stratford at lunchtime, and numerous Central Line trains,
and they were far from overcrowded. I have said all along that I believe
Stratford station itself is most likely to become the bottleneck as it's
pretty cramped, even with all the improvements, and there just isn't
enough exits/entrances.

Let the Games Begin...
 

On Sat, 28 Jul 2012 17:57:18 +0000 (UTC), martin_petrov
wrote:

I've just come back from the Olympic Park this afternoon, and Stratford
was straining to cope with the sheer weight of numbers at 5pm - the Park
itself wasn't particularly busy, notably, there were almost no events
going on in the park, and it had a 'soft launch' type feel to it - but I
wandered through Westfield and it was absolutely heaving.

I'm not a huge fan of Stratford's layout, though I obviously appreciate
that without starting from scratch, it's hard to see how it could have
been done much differently. However, I'm still not sure that they've got
their flows quite right, as there were a lot of people trying to come out
at the bus station side, while nobody could get into the station on the
Westfield side. They'd even closed off the mezzanine entrance at that
time due to overcrowding.

By contrast, I got a number of trains today, including a North London
Line across to Stratford at lunchtime, and numerous Central Line trains,
and they were far from overcrowded. I have said all along that I believe
Stratford station itself is most likely to become the bottleneck as it's
pretty cramped, even with all the improvements, and there just isn't
enough exits/entrances.

I was there a few days ago, without Olympic crowds, and it struck me
that one problem was that the route from the cross passages to the
Olympic site wasn't as easy as it should be, given the difference in
levels. It must be really bad when you get tens of thousands of extra
people trying to get through. I wonder how it coped when last night's
ceremony (predictably) over-ran?

Presumably this is why they're trying to steer more people into using
West Ham, even though it's much further away.

Let the Games Begin...
 

In message , at 21:32:30 on
Sat, 28 Jul 2012, Recliner remarked:

I wonder how it coped when last night's ceremony (predictably)
over-ran?

What happened to the late night trains from London (eg the last extra
train to Derby from St Pancras is at 00:30), did people miss them and
have to sleep at the station?

Not that it would have been sensible to plan on using those services
after a late evening event anyway.
--
Roland Perry

Let the Games Begin...
 

Roland Perry wrote:

What happened to the late night trains from London (eg the last extra
train to Derby from St Pancras is at 00:30), did people miss them and
have to sleep at the station?

No idea about the MML, but LM and VT delayed their last trains and ran some
extras to sweep up the crowds. I assume fine structures for delayed trains
must have been changed for this purpose else I doubt that would have
happened.

Not that it would have been sensible to plan on using those services
after a late evening event anyway.

Given that that is their explicit purpose that seems a silly statement,
though as with taking any last train or bus there is always a small risk of
getting stuck.

Neil
--
Neil Williams in Milton Keynes, UK. Put first name before the at to reply.

Let the Games Begin...
 

In message
.
net, at 08:10:57 on Sun, 29 Jul 2012, Neil Williams
remarked:
Not that it would have been sensible to plan on using those services
after a late evening event anyway.

Given that that is their explicit purpose that seems a silly statement,
though as with taking any last train or bus there is always a small risk of
getting stuck.

The services are simply not late enough to be able to make an exit from
the events and get to the stations in time. eg The late basketball
sessions don't even start until 22.15 and are scheduled to run up till
midnight. A last train at 00:30 is hopeless for that.
--
Roland Perry

Let the Games Begin...
 

Roland Perry wrote:

The services are simply not late enough to be able to make an exit from
the events and get to the stations in time. eg The late basketball
sessions don't even start until 22.15 and are scheduled to run up till
midnight. A last train at 00:30 is hopeless for that.

True. But they are later than normal, no?

The WCML seems to have added some very late services, some of which may
well be worth considering keeping.

In particular when the wires go up Manc to Liv you could perhaps run a very
late one to both destinations. Years ago they used to do this with a
diesel. Suppose you could use a Voyager, and split at Manc for a portion
to Scotland.

Neil
--
Neil Williams in Milton Keynes, UK. Put first name before the at to reply.

Let the Games Begin...
 

In message
.
net, at 09:29:04 on Sun, 29 Jul 2012, Neil Williams
remarked:

The services are simply not late enough to be able to make an exit from
the events and get to the stations in time. eg The late basketball
sessions don't even start until 22.15 and are scheduled to run up till
midnight. A last train at 00:30 is hopeless for that.

True. But they are later than normal, no?

The last train for Derby (via Nottingham) is normally 23.15, or to
Leicester 00:15.

The latter has an Olympic train at 01:15, so it's really the people
north of Leicester who need to plan not to go to very late events (or
use Leicester as a P&R).

The WCML seems to have added some very late services, some of which may
well be worth considering keeping.

In particular when the wires go up Manc to Liv you could perhaps run a very
late one to both destinations. Years ago they used to do this with a
diesel. Suppose you could use a Voyager, and split at Manc for a portion
to Scotland.

I thought the early shutdown was so Network Rail could do maintenance,
rather than a lack of demand.
--
Roland Perry

Let the Games Begin...
 

On Sun, 29 Jul 2012 09:49:46 +0100, Paul Corfield
wrote:

On Sun, 29 Jul 2012 07:05:06 +0100, Roland Perry
wrote:

In message , at 21:32:30 on
Sat, 28 Jul 2012, Recliner remarked:

I wonder how it coped when last night's ceremony (predictably)
over-ran?

What happened to the late night trains from London (eg the last extra
train to Derby from St Pancras is at 00:30), did people miss them and
have to sleep at the station?

Not that it would have been sensible to plan on using those services
after a late evening event anyway.

There was an endless flurry of tweets from National Rail telling
people that last trains with a whole pile of operators running from
London terminals were held for 20-30 minutes so that people caught
their trains home. It was an admirable effort and showed that
flexibility had been designed into the arrangements.

That's good to hear. It would have been a pity if people who'd enjoyed
the fantastic opening ceremony then had a nightmare journey home.

Let the Games Begin...
 

On Sat, 28 Jul 2012 17:57:18 +0000 (UTC), martin_petrov
wrote:

I've just come back from the Olympic Park this afternoon, and Stratford
was straining to cope with the sheer weight of numbers at 5pm - the Park
itself wasn't particularly busy, notably, there were almost no events
going on in the park, and it had a 'soft launch' type feel to it - but I
wandered through Westfield and it was absolutely heaving.

I'm not a huge fan of Stratford's layout, though I obviously appreciate
that without starting from scratch, it's hard to see how it could have
been done much differently. However, I'm still not sure that they've got
their flows quite right, as there were a lot of people trying to come out
at the bus station side, while nobody could get into the station on the
Westfield side. They'd even closed off the mezzanine entrance at that
time due to overcrowding.

By contrast, I got a number of trains today, including a North London
Line across to Stratford at lunchtime, and numerous Central Line trains,
and they were far from overcrowded. I have said all along that I believe
Stratford station itself is most likely to become the bottleneck as it's
pretty cramped, even with all the improvements, and there just isn't
enough exits/entrances.

I came across this set of pics via Twitter showing how at least some
of the in-costume performers at the opening ceremony successfully made
their way home on the Tube:
http://liberalconspiracy.org/2012/07...pics-ceremony/