Transport For London
October 10th, 2006So I thought it was about time I had a moan at something, and today Matthew that moan is directed towards Transport For London, more directly at their use of the term “good service”.
I am working at Bostock & Pollitt this week, a really nice design and development agency in Covent Garden. I get the train in, and then my favourite, the tube.
Anyway I love the way TFL use the term “good service” to describe when things are going smoothly on the underground. I think any commuter who uses the tube on a daily basis, would agree with me, that there is nothing remotely true in either of those claims. Riding the tube does not equate to service or good. In fact it equates to expense, stress, sweat, smelliness, dirt, grime, delays and a whole plethora of other words that are beyond my vocabulary.
I also loved the summer ads for the tube in which they suggested people bring a bottle of water to work with them. I would suggest they should bring a swimming costume and use the tube as a sauna, ‘cos to put it bluntly it was fu*king shocking. Now we are in Autumn, it is still no better, hot as hell.
Year on year it gets worse. More people, more expensive, more engineering works running late causing delays. Today I jumped off a Holborn, and was engulfed in a sea of people, all trying to squeeze up a staricase far too small to carry more than 20 people at a time. You have to wonder what TFL’s big plan is.
My plan on the other hand, with any luck is to just leave, leave London, leave the UK, and find a place where life is more chill in general.
Ok, lunch time, can’t wait for the scrum down over at Tesco CG, nice…
The tube is an antiquated system that was never designed to carry such numbers of people as it does today and has lacked serious investment for many years; which TFL try and hide by glossing over the cracks with hollow language.
Their website states that:
On the remaining deep-level lines:
- air conditioning units will take up valuable customer space in already crowded carriages.
- the heat will be displaced from the carriages into the tunnels and stations. Large ventilation fans and with shafts leading up to already cramped London streets will need to be installed to expel the hot air above ground.
- air-conditioning units are environmentally unfriendly due to the amount of energy they consume. They will dramatically increase the power consumption of the Tube network.
Surely if they just massively increased the cost for those of us that work in the city and can afford it, it would clear these smelly foreign oiks off our trains and make them less crowded, which would give them the space and money to fit and run proper air conditioning. Perhaps a few of these immigrants could get gainful employment by dabbing ones forehead with a cooling, rose-petal soaked flannel for a handful of coins?
Keep in real, bro.
Peace out.
Posted on: October 10th, 2006 at 2:48 pmYep it must have been ok in it’s day, which was like 100 years ago, now it just sucks, full stop. And I think I am not wrong in suggesting it is THE most expensive transport system in the world bar none. I know the £85 a week I pay could be much better spent on other things, absolutely outrageous…
Cheers
B
Posted on: October 10th, 2006 at 2:54 pmIn Hong Kong we have the MTR. It’s fu*king amazing! it has superb aircon, it’s clean modern and works on schedule, oh and you can get on and off one without being crushed to death, and on that note our busses (which look exactly the same as the ones in London) have aircon too.. and they cost 20p a journey! The MTR by the way costs about 50p a journey, what’s a zone 1 singlein London these days? 2quid ++
Posted on: October 11th, 2006 at 1:30 amWell I use a bike to get to work, its clean, its free, its fun, it keeps you fit, and most of all I love riding past all those big shot bankers sitting in traffic in their Porsches, Aston Martins and Ferraris. I mean come on guys, there are better ways to get about london.
Ellis I suggest you quit moaning and direct that energy into an alternative travel arrangement. You could even get one of these and take this on the train….
http://strida.co.uk/demo/index.php
Finally, yer the tubes suck, but if your not going to find an alternative, dont moan about it.
Posted on: October 11th, 2006 at 9:07 amDo you really find getting knocked off by Belgian lorry drivers and car doors being opened without looking fun?
Cycling gets you to work muddy, sweaty and hyper-aggressive.
Oh, and if those big shot bankers were very good theyd avoid the traffic with a helicopter. Thats the way forward!
Posted on: October 11th, 2006 at 10:05 amJust dont work in town!
Work in the Cuntry like me!
Posted on: October 11th, 2006 at 12:39 pm