"Jack Taylor" wrote in message
...

There should be no safety inplications in the case of fire - the
problems are most often with securing the doors, rather than releasing
them.
There is a manual override for freeing the doors, in addition to the
emergency door releases in each vestibule.


The problems to which I am referring have all related to opening.

The latest of which I am aware occured about 0800 on Saturday morning at
Gatwick when a London bound train was stuck for nearly half and hour before
being withdrawn from service.

The report I had from someone who was on it was that it took staff about ten
minutes just to get the doors open hence my concern about fire safety.

The fundamental problem is that South Central (I refuse to insult the
British Railways operator by using the new name) does not trust its
train crews and door releases have to be done by GPS and not a human
being. This adds an unnessecary element to go wrong.

When the driver presses door release the train has to be certain its
where it is meant to be before a release will occur. If it dont know
where it is you have to hope the driver can get an emergency release,
if he cannot get one of those then its waiting time.

Take the GPS out and put it back to the guard/driver to open the doors
and YAHTZEE you have less door related problems.

In my opinion a case of being too complicated and therefore shooting
itself in the foot!

wrote in message
oups.com...
The fundamental problem is that South Central (I refuse to insult the
British Railways operator by using the new name) does not trust its
train crews and door releases have to be done by GPS and not a human
being. This adds an unnessecary element to go wrong.

When the driver presses door release the train has to be certain its
where it is meant to be before a release will occur. If it dont know
where it is you have to hope the driver can get an emergency release,
if he cannot get one of those then its waiting time.

Take the GPS out and put it back to the guard/driver to open the doors
and YAHTZEE you have less door related problems.

In my opinion a case of being too complicated and therefore shooting
itself in the foot!

Sounds like a likely scenario because apparently the on-board "next station"
display was showing Ford as it was approaching Gatwick which suggests that
the GPS had really got itself screwed up..

They seemed to have overlooked the 'human being' factor. SWT dont need
any fancy GPS door opening on their DESIROs and so I dont see why it
should needed on Electrostars.

As I said before the 377s are decent enough trains but they do not need
half the fancy computer stuff on them and a little faith in the
traincrews to do their job would have solved a lot of problems.

wrote:
They seemed to have overlooked the 'human being' factor. SWT dont need
any fancy GPS door opening on their DESIROs and so I dont see why it
should needed on Electrostars.

As I said before the 377s are decent enough trains but they do not need
half the fancy computer stuff on them and a little faith in the
traincrews to do their job would have solved a lot of problems.

This is a feature of selective door opening. The system is programmed to
only open the right doors at the right location. If GPS is wrong then
the software needs to be overridden but it take time. There was a
problem getting the satellite signals to the trains at Victoria and
Cannon Street and this used to be more of a problem. I don't know for
sure but perhaps some signal repeater has been installed now.

Chris

Serious issues seem to repeatedly arise on the Arun Valley's notably:

Last carriage(s) refusing to open at Victoria (especially in on platform 19)
Ununusually long delays between stopping at Vic and then actually opening
the doors.
The GPS system quite often seems to refuse the existence of Redhill (down
side) mind you if I had my way, I would want to block Redhill from
exsistence as well!!

And then there is the farce of the on board CIS (Customer Information
System) system:

Swanick seems never to be recognised as having been passed through and
continues to say 'The next station is Swanick' all the way to Soton or
Fareham!
The station stops on the Arun Valley's are frequently either in the wrong
direction ('We are now arrving at London Victoria...' when you are heading
south through Arundel!!) or alternatively the wrong stops displayed (Redhill
and Horley usually).

I note that there are a few Conductors who just get fed up with the system
and after a few stations just turn it off!! (To those I say thank you!!!!)

Another irritation is the seemingly total lack of abililty by Southern to
show destination detail on splitters. South Eastern manage to achieve it
with coach numbers stated for individual coaches, on Southern however chaos
seems to reign. It is most odd going to Bognor Regis on a train that until
Haywards Heath claims it is going to Hastings and any of the innumerable of
dopey (read dumb) tourists on the line must end up in the most obscure of
places!!

Rant over - except can they please shut that irritating announcer lady up or
turn her volume down, some of us in the front coach are trying to get some
shut eye you know!!

Regards
John M Upton

My Fotopic Collections:
South Central/Southern, Model Railway & Other Rail Pictures:
http://gallery39764.fotopic.net/

Bus Pics:
http://gallery42239.fotopic.net/

JMUpton2000 wrote:
Serious issues seem to repeatedly arise on the Arun Valley's notably:

Last carriage(s) refusing to open at Victoria (especially in on
platform 19)
Ununusually long delays between stopping at Vic and then actually
opening
the doors.
The GPS system quite often seems to refuse the existence of Redhill
(down
side) mind you if I had my way, I would want to block Redhill from
exsistence as well!!

The delay at Vic of approx 20 secs is because the train cannot get a
GPS signal and the driver has to do it all manually!

And then there is the farce of the on board CIS (Customer Information
System) system:

To give it the correct title P.I.S - which it takes quite a lot!!

Swanick seems never to be recognised as having been passed through
and
continues to say 'The next station is Swanick' all the way to Soton
or
Fareham!
The station stops on the Arun Valley's are frequently either in the
wrong
direction ('We are now arrving at London Victoria...' when you are
heading
south through Arundel!!) or alternatively the wrong stops displayed
(Redhill
and Horley usually).

Wrong stops can be due to driver mistyping the PIS code into MITRAC or
being given the wrong code.

I note that there are a few Conductors who just get fed up with the
system
and after a few stations just turn it off!! (To those I say thank
you!!!!)

Don;t thank us, we can't do it! The driver is the only one who can turn
it off. All we can do is put up the information messages and make PAs.

Another irritation is the seemingly total lack of abililty by
Southern to
show destination detail on splitters. South Eastern manage to
achieve it
with coach numbers stated for individual coaches, on Southern however
chaos
seems to reign. It is most odd going to Bognor Regis on a train that
until
Haywards Heath claims it is going to Hastings and any of the
innumerable of
dopey (read dumb) tourists on the line must end up in the most
obscure of
places!!

Lack of detail, and lack of ability to properly split!! On SWT the
guard can make announcements to the whole train, Front 4, Middle 4, or
Rear 4. We can only announce to the whole train!

Rant over - except can they please shut that irritating announcer
lady up or
turn her volume down, some of us in the front coach are trying to get
some
shut eye you know!!

The ping pongs have been moaned about so many times now! All we need is
'We are now approaching xxxx' This train is the 'xxxx' service your
next station is 'xxxx', the scrolls are fine as you can choose whether
or not to pay attention to them, but listing all calling points at
every stop is madness!

The fundamental problem is that South Central (I refuse to insult the
British Railways operator by using the new name) does not trust its
train crews and door releases have to be done by GPS and not a human
being. This adds an unnessecary element to go wrong.

Sounds about right. Technology for its own sake and solutions looking
for problems are everywhere these days thanks to suppliers chucking in
as much as they can to the design make as much money as they can
and dim witted customers falling for it. I guess railways are no
exception.

B2003

Vernon wrote:
The report I had from someone who was on it was that it took staff
about ten
minutes just to get the doors open hence my concern about fire
safety.

There is a way to open a specific door instantly (by using the door
emergency open button / lever) as explained in the safety notices which
are now on all trains. It's worrying to hear that you haven't noticed
and familiarised yourself with the poster because it could well save
your life.

The staff on the train taking 10 minutes were quite probably trying to
open all doors at the same time (to prevent a crush) and to not have to
use the emergency releases (because the train would then be stuck in
the platform until fixed)

"Chris!" wrote in message
oups.com...

Vernon wrote:
The report I had from someone who was on it was that it took staff
about ten
minutes just to get the doors open hence my concern about fire
safety.

There is a way to open a specific door instantly (by using the door
emergency open button / lever) as explained in the safety notices which
are now on all trains. It's worrying to hear that you haven't noticed
and familiarised yourself with the poster because it could well save
your life.

As I say, it was a close relation who was on the train, not me. I will
mention that for future reference.

The staff on the train taking 10 minutes were quite probably trying to
open all doors at the same time (to prevent a crush) and to not have to
use the emergency releases (because the train would then be stuck in
the platform until fixed)

The train did eventually end up stuck - and taken out of service.