Normal service is resumed

Not much to report for the rest of last week, Thursday evening's train ran fine, as did Friday morning's and evening's.

Monday morning I arrived at Goldhawk Road at 8:12 to find a notice saying the next train would not be leaving Hammersmith until 8:25. I thought about walking up to Shepherds Bush Central line, but it being Monday morning I decided I could take the extra 10 minute wait to sit down and read Metro. When I got to the platform I could see a train pulling out from Hammersmith anyway, so the advertised delay didn't occur.

In the evening, the board at the entrance to Euston Square said that the Metropolitan line was suspended, but the H&C had a "good service". By the time I got to the platform they were announcing severe delays to the Circle and H&C due to an earlier person under a train at Great Portland Street. To add insult to injury, a Met line train came through. Despite the reported delay, an H&C train turned up in 4 minutes and I got home at about the normal time.

Maybe this is a new London Underground customer satisfaction tactic - announcing non-existent delays to manage customer expectation.

Delayed

I got to Euston Square to find the Metropolitan Line is suspended between Baker Street and Moorgate, which should free up the track for more Hammersmith and City trains, but for some reason they are announcing delays to the Circle and H&C line anyway. The train pulls in promptly enough, but by the time we get to Latimer Road we are delayed by the backlog of trains going into Hammersmith. I'm no line controller, but I'm sure it can't be that difficult to sort out trains so they smoothly run in and out of a terminus. Perhaps that is the problem, the H&C line has no controller.

This mornings journey was easy enough, and I even got a seat, so so far this week we have 71% reliability.

Track Failure

Well, 4 hassle free journeys in a row would be too much to ask. Last night the Hammersmith and City line train arrived promptly at Euston Square (so I don't have an excuse to rant about the frequency of H&C line trains yet). I should have known something disastrous was about to happen as the front carriage was almost empty, so I had my pick of seats. When we reached Baker Street however, the driver announced that due to something on the track in the Westbourne Park area we were being held up and the likelihood was that the H&C line was going to be suspended. Sure enough, the platform announcer then announced the suspension. The train was held at Baker Street while the trains in front made it through Edgware Road. I got off at Edgware Road and joined the milling throngs between platforms 3 and 4, listening to the confusing advice from the tannoys. It really doesn't help for passengers to be advised to take the Wimbledon train on platform 2 when there is no train on platform 2. Eventually the Circle Line train on platform 3 pulled out and I changed at Notting Hill Gate for the Central line down to Shepherds Bush.

At least the communication of the problem was better than the last time, when I waited 1/2 hour for a Hammersmith train without any announcements being made, only to be told by a pimply faced customer service representative that there was no delay, it was a "reduced service".

The Rastafarian flautist who often plays outside Shepherds Bush Central line station wasn't there, which was a shame.

This morning's journey was relatively easy, although there were no seats free by the time the train had come 1 stop from Hammersmith and the train got quite busy, it didn't turn into a sauna like some mornings.

Nothing to report

An easy journey home last night, although I was worried when the display showed the next train as being delayed, even as it was pulling into the station.

I seem to have got into the swing of arriving at Goldhawk Road just as my train is about to pull into the platform. This morning I resigned myself to standing, when I spotted that a seat was taken up by a woman's bag, so with a quick "excuse me", I got a seat. One stop further a man with crutches got on, so I gave up my seat.

First Train

Since my wife has become addicted to London Underground blogs, and I'm getting tired of complaining about London Underground (and my colleagues are also getting tired of my complaining) I thought I'd start my own blog and try and record my daily journeys between Goldhawk Road and Euston Square.