On Sat, 20 Aug 2005 11:44:40 +0000, Neil Williams wrote:

On Sat, 20 Aug 2005 11:39:22 +0100, steve wrote:

If we are talking about closing the bank section of the Northern Line
again then quite rightly given last time they closed it for several
months.

I am proposing, quite seriously, the idea of closing a complete line at a
time (with suitable bus replacement services feeding other lines via areas
of as low traffic congestion as feasible) and completely renewing all of
the tired infrastructure, which would result in a reduced maintenance
requirement for years to come. The idea would be to bring the
infrastructure up to the superb standard of, say, the Hamburg system. New
track, new signals, new cabling, the lot.

A bit of short term pain for a *lot* of long-term gain, both financial and
in terms of fewer blockades.

Heard the shot term gain before, now the section that was closed needs
replacing.

Neil

Sounds a goog idea but who will pay for it. The infra co's will not pay
for anything that is not life expired and will TfL stump up the money,
probabley not.
What would prababley happen is that other essential works would be
starved of money to pay for what is after all, non essential work.

Kevin

On 22 Aug 2005 00:48:37 -0700, wrote:

What would prababley happen is that other essential works would be
starved of money to pay for what is after all, non essential work.

I would argue that it *is* essential work, and that it'll be cheaper
to do it like that than to deal with the fallout from not doing so.

Neil

--
Neil Williams in Milton Keynes, UK
When replying please use neil at the above domain
'wensleydale' is a spam trap and is not read.

Never heard of all-night buses? or cabs?
Not sure if it's relevant but I was feeling nostalgic the other day for the
on-station bar which Baker Street and a few other places used to have. Might
make delays and cancellations more bearable.
But regarding open-all-hours drinking, I see supermarkets also want to get
in on the act (a jolly thought for staff not to mention other shoppers if
the marathon drinkers come reeling in to fight on the checkout or throw up
around the place).
Meanwhile transport police are concerned they will need extra shifts as it
is.

"Adrian" wrote in message
. 244.170...
An idle thought...

The pub licencing hours are currently - as you may have heard... - being
overhauled (finally), with the result that a lot of pubs may well be open
later into the night.

Let's assume that the doom'n'gloom scenario doesn't happen, and we don't
descend into a Tracy Emin reinterpretation of a Hogarth painting. I'm an
optimist on this one - any initial chaos will soon disappear, and we'll be
better off than currently. I hope.

Anyway - The question is... Will LU reflect this in extending the time of
the last trains? It's a bit pointless pubs applying for later licences if
people still have to leave at the same time to get home.

Charles Pottins ) gurgled happily,
sounding much like they were saying :

Never heard of all-night buses?

Yes. They don't come within 15 miles of this tube station.

or cabs?

Yes. A black cab to here is about £60+.

Not sure if it's relevant but I was feeling nostalgic the other day
for the on-station bar which Baker Street and a few other places used
to have.

You mean like the Wetherspoons that's just above Baker St Station?

On 27 Aug 2005 11:15:04 GMT, Adrian wrote:

Charles Pottins ) gurgled happily,
sounding much like they were saying :

Never heard of all-night buses?

Yes. They don't come within 15 miles of this tube station.

I still don't think that Chesham (or was it Amersham?) justifies an
all-night service from London of any kind more than High Wycombe,
Milton Keynes Central[1], Didcot or any other similarly-far-out
commuter station does. The Met isn't really a Tube line in the
conventional sense.

[1] As I've posted before it has 00something and 0200 departures,
which is really as much as can be justified, and the same could
probably be said for the Met. I think it only has those because the
WCML is open for freight and the likes anyway - if the signalboxes had
to be opened purely for those two runs they probably wouldn't exist,
IMO.

Neil

--
Neil Williams in Milton Keynes, UK
When replying please use neil at the above domain
'wensleydale' is a spam trap and is not read.

Neil Williams ) gurgled happily, sounding
much like they were saying :

Never heard of all-night buses?

Yes. They don't come within 15 miles of this tube station.

I still don't think that Chesham (or was it Amersham?) justifies an
all-night service from London of any kind

Despite the fact I wasn't necessarily asking about an "all-night service",
you quite obviously haven't seen how full the last trains are, every night.

On 28 Aug 2005 13:10:04 GMT, Adrian wrote:

Despite the fact I wasn't necessarily asking about an "all-night service",
you quite obviously haven't seen how full the last trains are, every night.

As are the last trains (or buses, sadly, of late, certainly on the
WCML) to many other destinations from London.

What time is your current last train, and what do you feel it
realistically should be?

Neil

--
Neil Williams in Milton Keynes, UK
When replying please use neil at the above domain
'wensleydale' is a spam trap and is not read.

I think the late-finish service will be scuppered by the need to get
home all the train and station staff who presently manage to use the
last National Rail trains (signalling staff are usually on nights at
this time) to reach the Home Counties. The only way seems to be a
massive increase in the LU staff taxi system and, apart from the cost
involved, there's doubt that sufficient capacity exists in the London
night taxi trade to cover this.

Of course many will ask why LU provides taxis in the first place and
will consider it the employees' own responsibility to get to/from work
as with other organisations. However LU "is where it is" on this, and
the taxis themselves are long-established, having replaced the staff
coaches which had taken the place of LT's own staff buses (ordinary red
RT types) which in turn had been put on to allow the withdrawal of
staff trains (ironically to allow longer engineering hours).