MIG wrote:
On Feb 26, 4:19 pm, "Richard J."
wrote:
MIG wrote:
On Feb 26, 10:08 am, "Joe Patrick"
wrote:
Given that London is a major international tourist destination,
and having noticed many tourists staring in bewilderment at the
line diagrams in the trains, I think it's likely that many
passengers do appreciate being told the next station name in
advance. There are many examples of over-provision in
announcements, but this isn't one of them.

But if you're going somewhere, do you just get on a train and
hope someone will announce where you've got to get off? Whenever
I've been somewhere I've researched in a guide book or online to
find the nearest station. It's rather like announcing where you
can change for other lines, surely you'd plan your journey
beforehand and work out yourself where you've got to change.

Or, looking at it another way, if you didn't know where any of the
lines went without an announcement, it wouldn't be any use to be
told that you could change to one of them, because you wouldn't
know if it took you where you wanted to go.

I can't see any point in any of the announcements, apart from the
ones reminding you that the next station is closed and other
variations from the published service.

I found it helpful to be told that Notting Hill Gate was the next
stop today, having been engrossed in Metro for several stations.
Seriously, all you are saying is that you know your way around
without any help. Thousands aren't so fortunate.

I am saying nothing of the sort. I thought I was quite clear that I
thought that these kind of announcements don't help.

You made it clear that the announcements don't help *you*.

Let's imagine that I am in Paris. I get on a train on Line 4
without knowing what line my destination station is on or where to
change.

How would it help me to hear an announcement that I am at a station
with a French name where I can change to line 6?

Barbès Rochechouart, in fact, and of course it wouldn't help if you
hadn't done *any* preparation.

In real life, I would have found out what line my destination was on
and where to change, and I would recognise the place from seeing its
name written on a station sign, having looked at the diagram and
noticed as I passed the stop before.

Yes, yes, we know you understand all these things and are terribly well
organised and intelligent, but please don't assume that all visitors or
occasional passengers are like that. My experience is that many people
look at the Tube map at the start of the journey, and can see that they
need, say, the Piccadilly, then the Bakerloo, but may not notice or
remember the name of the interchange station. I've also seen many
people who may manage eventually to work things out from the Tube map,
but do appreciate having things confirmed by announcements or fellow
passengers.

--
Richard J.
(to e-mail me, swap uk and yon in address)

"John Rowland" wrote in message
...
wrote:

(a) the new name for the Imperial War Museum

National War Museum...

and (b) the replacement for the Order of the British Empire?

Order of the British Nation.


Other Bu**ers Efforts surely?

Paul S

MIG wrote:

Let's imagine that I am in Paris. I get on a train on Line 4 without
knowing what line my destination station is on or where to change.

How would it help me to hear an announcement that I am at a station
with a French name where I can change to line 6?

It would help if you were blind or visually impaired. A lot.
--
Michael Hoffman

On Mon, 26 Feb 2007, Arthur Figgis wrote:

John Rowland wrote:
wrote:
(a) the new name for the Imperial War Museum

National War Museum...

But which nation - or should the Commonwealth stuff go?

The British Museum do not seem to have had a problem with this!

and (b) the replacement for the Order of the British Empire?

Order of the British Nation.

Could that risk getting bogged down in the concept of a "nation" as a
"people", with its ethnic/linguistic connotations?

There are plenty of Nation or National this-that-and-the-others that don't
incur this problem; National Express, Test The Nation, National
Curriculum, Video Nation, Royal National Lifeboat Institution, National
Front, Terry Nation, etc. I don't think most people draw a distinction
between 'nation', 'state', and 'country'.

That said, i think 'Order of the British Nation' sounds a bit silly (and
as James observed, the acronym has already been taken by Private Eye!).
'Order of Britain' would, IMHO, be better.

It's not a problem with Empire, which is purely a bit anachronistic.

Not purely - it's also a painful reminder to some people. It's ever so
slightly like having a theme park in Germany called Himmlerspassland or
something.

Hey, is that Godwin's law i can hear kicking in? Does that mean this
thread's over?

More practically, if the honours were abolished or given a more
touchy-feely name, it would mean that the newspapers would have nothing
to moan about during the slow news period around the new year.

Do not underestimate the resourcefulness of journalists.

tom

--
They didn't have any answers - they just wanted weed and entitlement.

On Mon, 26 Feb 2007, Michael Hoffman wrote:

MIG wrote:

Let's imagine that I am in Paris. I get on a train on Line 4 without
knowing what line my destination station is on or where to change.

How would it help me to hear an announcement that I am at a station
with a French name where I can change to line 6?

It would help if you were blind or visually impaired. A lot.

How exactly? May i suggest you read the original question again?

tom

--
They didn't have any answers - they just wanted weed and entitlement.

Tom Anderson wrote:
On Mon, 26 Feb 2007, Michael Hoffman wrote:

MIG wrote:

Let's imagine that I am in Paris. I get on a train on Line 4 without
knowing what line my destination station is on or where to change.

How would it help me to hear an announcement that I am at a station
with a French name where I can change to line 6?

It would help if you were blind or visually impaired. A lot.

How exactly? May i suggest you read the original question again?

I sometimes get on a train without knowing the exact details of the rest
of my journey, figuring them out en route. I figure them out on the
train. A visually impaired person could do the same with a braille map.
I believe you can order a braille map of the Paris Metro from the
Association Valentin Hauey.

The case where the person knows that the destination station is on line
6 but doesn't know the interchange point is much more likely I think. In
this case an announcement would be as useful as the interchange points
being on strip maps.

This branch of the thread was started by Keith Raeburn complaining that
"announcing every station name in advance, despite everybody coping
perfectly well without LU doing so before" was "over-provision." It
should now be obvious that this is not true.
--
Michael Hoffman

On 26 Feb 2007 09:41:32 -0800, "
wrote:

I am in agreement with you. I travelled past Imperial College
(Paddington) today and was reminded that this institution, on its
divorce from the University of London had the prime opportunity to
"update" its name, and has chosen not to do so. Good for them!

(a) The secession is not totally complete yet;
(b) The current Rector of IC[*] has already committed one re-branding;
I expect the new one (due later this year IIRC) to go through another
one.

You may, of course, have seen deprecated signage (dark blue with the
crest) that is yet to be replaced. The new brand is, of course,
ridiculous.
[*] The Rector has banned such an acronym, but I have always been of
the opinion that he can call it what he wants, but he can't make me
call it anything other than what I want.

On Mon, Feb 26, 2007 at 08:05:19PM +0000, Michael Hoffman wrote:

The case where the person knows that the destination station is on line
6 but doesn't know the interchange point is much more likely I think. In
this case an announcement would be as useful as the interchange points
being on strip maps.

Nonsense. If all I know is that my destination is on the Picadilly
line, I'm not going to get on a random train at (say) Victoria) and hope
it's going in the right direction. That way lies Brixton and Upminster
and other forms of depravity. No, I'm going to look at the damned map.

That said, I do like announcements like "the next station is Green Park"
because it tells me to extract myself from whatever trash sci-fi I'm
reading that day.

--
David Cantrell | Nth greatest programmer in the world

Anyone who cannot cope with mathematics is not fully human.
At best he is a tolerable subhuman who has learned to wear
shoes, bathe and not make messes in the house.
-- Robert A Heinlein

David Cantrell wrote:
On Mon, Feb 26, 2007 at 08:05:19PM +0000, Michael Hoffman wrote:

The case where the person knows that the destination station is on line
6 but doesn't know the interchange point is much more likely I think. In
this case an announcement would be as useful as the interchange points
being on strip maps.

Nonsense. If all I know is that my destination is on the Picadilly
line, I'm not going to get on a random train at (say) Victoria) and hope
it's going in the right direction. That way lies Brixton and Upminster
and other forms of depravity. No, I'm going to look at the damned map.

Yes, but I didn't going to say what *you* were going to do. You probably
don't need a message telling you to take your belongings when you leave
the train either. The announcements aren't designed for David Cantrell.

In any case, it is easy enough to know which direction to go at the
start (through instructions or otherwise) but forget which station you
want to change at en route. I know when I waas initially unfamiliar with
the Tube, I got on a train in the right direction but then sometimes
forgot my interchange station. The difference between a blind person and
me is that I could still look it up on the strip map inside the train.
--
Michael Hoffman

On Feb 26, 7:09�pm, Tom Anderson wrote:
On Mon, 26 Feb 2007, Arthur Figgis wrote:
John Rowland wrote:
wrote:
(a) the *new name for the Imperial War Museum

National War Museum...

But which nation - or should the Commonwealth stuff go?

The British Museum do not seem to have had a problem with this!

and (b) the replacement for the Order of the British Empire?

Order of the British Nation.

Could that risk getting bogged down in the concept of a "nation" as a
"people", with its ethnic/linguistic connotations?

There are plenty of Nation or National this-that-and-the-others that don't
incur this problem; National Express, Test The Nation, National
Curriculum, Video Nation, Royal National Lifeboat Institution, National
Front, Terry Nation, etc. I don't think most people draw a distinction
between 'nation', 'state', and 'country'.

That said, i think 'Order of the British Nation' sounds a bit silly (and
as James observed, the acronym has already been taken by Private Eye!).
'Order of Britain' would, IMHO, be better.

It's not a problem with Empire, which is purely a bit anachronistic.

Not purely - it's also a painful reminder to some people. It's ever so
slightly like having a theme park in Germany called Himmlerspassland or
something.

Hey, is that Godwin's law i can hear kicking in? Does that mean this
thread's over?

More practically, if the honours were abolished or given a more
touchy-feely name, it would mean that the newspapers would have nothing
to moan about during the slow news period around the new year.

Do not underestimate the resourcefulness of journalists.

tom

--
They didn't have any answers - they just wanted weed and entitlement.

Tom,

To equate the British Empire in any way with Nazi Germany is an insult
to the millions who served the Empire, in war and peace, and whose
sense of duty ensured that, for example, India was united and governed
with the smallest per capita civil service ever heard of.

Why should one man's "painful reminder" outweigh another man's "proud
heritage"? I write as someone who is a descendant of one of the
"forced migrations" which the do-gooders might regard as a "painful
reminder" best avoided of which you write, but I do not see it that
way: if that had not happened, I would not be here today. There was
good and bad about the British Empire (as with all countries'
histories) but that is not a reason to erase its memory, or for those
of us who are actually proud of that history, and feel that we have
benefited from it, to feel ashamed of either fact.

So, would you also rename Trafalgar Square, Waterloo, Victoria, King
George and Canary Wharf and Canada Water Stations (and hundreds of
other place names) just because their origins might be questionable
"painful reminders" of our Imperial past?

Marc.