Good news! There are now automated ticket barriers at Thornton Heath,
so the local pikey scum will have to buy tickets!

The bad news is that:

* ticket barriers slow people down, and this is a very busy station,
with a narrow gate-line;
* they're not very good at reading Oyster cards, most cards I observed
taking at least two attempts to read them

Of course, it's possible that the second problem will be solved by
tweaking the hardware (but why would that be needed - surely they should
come from the manufacturer set up right) and the first will no doubt be
mitigated somewhat over time as people remember that they'll need to get
their ticket out *before* they get to the barrier.

Although judging by the ****wits throughout central London, where
everyone *knows* that you need to put your ticket through the barrier
machine thing, who don't do so until they're standing right next to it
thus holding up decent people, that won't happen enough. We'll just
have to rely on the local scrotes to knife people who don't move fast
enough.

--
David Cantrell | Godless Liberal Elitist

You are so cynical. And by "cynical", of course, I mean "correct".
-- Kurt Starsinic

On Jun 5, 7:05*pm, David Cantrell wrote:
Although judging by the ****wits throughout central London, where
everyone *knows* that you need to put your ticket through the barrier
machine thing, who don't do so until they're standing right next to it
thus holding up decent people, that won't happen enough. *We'll just
have to rely on the local scrotes to knife people who don't move fast
enough.

Haha! That's the second-funniest thing I've read today. I love the
concept of decent commuter norms being enforced by south-east London's
knife-wielding little *******s...

As it happens, this thread was the funniest:
http://bloodandtreasure.typepad.com/...1570bef195970b

--
John Band
john at johnband dot org
www.johnband.org