The Ticket Collector

A drivers tale…

We have just been E-mailed this article which was posted on the Guardian Website.

At 9.45am on Saturday, June 23 2007, I killed a man. A perfectly ordinary man, on a perfectly ordinary summer’s day. CCTV pictures show him entering the station, unremarkable among all the passengers going to the West End. He waited at the front of the platform until he could hear my train approaching, then he calmly stepped down on to the tracks and looked directly at me as he waited for the impact.

The impact was only a matter of seconds in coming, but those seconds felt like minutes. This wasn’t how it was meant to be. It wasn’t how I had imagined it during my years as a Central line train driver. We talk of “jumpers”; workmates tell of blurry images flashing in front of them, of the shock of the impact. I wasn’t expecting to see a young man in jeans and a summer shirt waiting for death, looking me in the eye.
As I hit the emergency brake, I was thinking, “Please, get out of the way. Now. Please let it be a prank.” Youngsters on the track are a regular event, though no less frightening for that, and for train drivers it’s something we learn to live with.

But this wasn’t a typical game of “chicken”: he wasn’t laughing and he wasn’t with friends. When it became clear he wasn’t going to move out of the way, I closed my eyes, covered my face and held my breath.

By the time we were stationary, four of my eight cars were in the platform and I was on autopilot. I told the passengers there would be a delay in opening the doors due to an “incident”, and was calling the line controller for assistance when I heard a tap on my cab door. A smart man inquired, “Do you know there’s a person under your train?” I looked at the blood on the windscreen momentarily before assuring him that, yes, I was aware.

He paused for a heartbeat, looked at his watch and said, “So, how long before we get on the move again?”

I was to look back on this exchange with amusement and also, strangely, comfort: in the midst of the horror, normality was briefly restored by a commuter asking for alternative travel arrangements.

I’d advised the passengers to stay where they were and not to try to open the doors because we weren’t fully in the platform; amazingly, they all complied. I walked back through the carriages opening the adjoining doors and shouting: “Please leave the train, and leave the station as quickly as possible!” Terrorist attacks were still very much on people’s minds, and as each carriage emptied I looked to the next, seeing anxious faces through the windows. No one tried to leave until I opened the doors. Only a few asked the reason, none complained. I was hugely impressed.

The next few hours were a blur of activity as the body was removed and service restored: station staff, police, firefighters, the emergency support unit and trauma counsellors all came and went in a smooth, well-practised exercise. I was reassured that it wasn’t my fault, that there was nothing I could have done; it was his choice. All of which I knew, but it was good to hear from someone else.

As a child of the enlightenment, a rationalist and an atheist, I was sure I wouldn’t be unduly affected by the death of a person unknown. I was told I’d need some time off in case of post-traumatic stress; I agreed to counselling to assess my fitness to resume work, but was convinced this would be a formality.

My return to work was speedy and for weeks I was seemingly unaffected. But in August a policeman came to brief me before the inquest and to show me the pictures. The unknown person now had a name, a family and a tragic story.

Henrik Alexandersson had moved from Sweden to find work in London; he was successful and popular, but had been unwell. For some reason, he’d convinced himself his illness was Aids-related and that week he had gone for a check-up to find out the truth. By that Saturday, he could bear to wait no longer: he called his parents in such a state of distress that they booked a flight to London (arriving just hours too late.) He left a suicide note, and headed off for his fateful meeting with me. Had he waited a day longer, he would have learned that the tests were negative.

I left work and went home in the full realisation that perhaps I am not such a rationalist after all, because I sobbed my heart out in the arms of my partner. A year has passed now, but I can still see Henrik standing on the track, awaiting the inevitable.

© Guardian News and Media Limited 2008.

Network Rail staff to strike again over Management Failure.

Over 12,000 Network Rail maintenance workers in the RMT union are to strike again next weekend after talks on the long-running dispute over harmonisation of terms and conditions failed to make sufficient progress.

RMT members will not book on for shifts that commence between midday on Saturday July 26 and 17:59 on Sunday July 27. Members will also not undertake any overtime or ‘on-call’ work between 06:00 on Saturday July 26 and 06:00 on Monday July 28.

Weekend maintenance work was brought to a virtual standstill during the first stoppage in the dispute, over the weekend June 14 and 15.

“We had hoped that fresh talks after our first strike would make some progress, but it is clear that the company is still trying to use what should be talks about harmonisation as a cost-cutting attack on jobs and conditions,” RMT general secretary Bob Crow said today.

“Our reps met today and to say they are angry at the lack of progress would be an understatement, and the RMT executive has agreed to call the second weekend’s stoppage our reps have demanded.

“Our first strike was a solid demonstration by our members that they expect talks about harmonisation to produce proposals about harmonisation, not ever-longer lists of the conditions the company wants to destroy.

“We remain available for talks, but if Network Rail wants to settle this dispute it should get around the table and negotiate a harmonisation package that is acceptable to our members,” Bob Crow said.

Leaked internal statment from TFL regarding Oyster card mess up.

A member of staff has sent us the following internal statement regarding the “Very Rare” Oyster card technical problem on Saturday.
In accordance with this sites policies we will NOT name our sources under any circumstances, so don’t even waste your time asking us who leaked it.

Oh and TheTicketCollector is still waiting for his £12 refund, which was promised by TfL to be automatically applied.

Here is the brief.

STAFF BRIEF - No. 14/08
IMPORTANT
Oyster card System Failure – Saturday 12th July 2008

Transport for London (TfL) have advised of a technical problem with the Oyster card computer system on the morning of Saturday 12th July.

As a result Oyster card readers across the TfL network, and also gates at National Rail stations that are connected to the central Prestige system, were not accepting Oyster cards for parts of the day on Saturday.

The problem has been rectified, but as a result, some Oyster cards used Saturday before 0930 on London Underground may not now be working. Customers who topped up their cards for PAYG at newsagents and other Ticket Stop locations during the day may also have been affected.

Please note the following in respect of Oyster cards that have been corrupted and no longer work:-
Customers with standard retail Oysters cards (i.e. Oyster cards issued with NO discount or concessionary travel entitlement) should be advised to go to a London Underground station for a replacement Oyster card irrespective of where the card or any Travelcard season loaded to it was issued.

Customers using pay-as-you-go (PAYG) who incurred a maximum fare during this period will be given an automatic refund via gatelines as from Tuesday 15th July, and no further action is required on the part of the customer. For all other PAYG matters resulting from the system failure, customers should be advised to contact the Oyster card helpline on 0845 330 9876 .

Freedom Pass holders should be advised to contact their London Borough for a replacement. In the meantime any corrupted Freedom Passes will be valid for travel as normal, provided of course that the expiry date on the Pass is “31 March 2010″, and it is being used by the named holder. This temporary arrangement will apply until further advice is issued.

Holders of Barclaycard OnePulse cards should be advised to contact Barclaycard for a replacement.

Holders of ‘Child’, ‘16+’, and ‘18+’ Oyster photocards should contact the Oyster card helpline on 0845 330 9876 for a replacement.

Staff Pass holders should be advised to contact their Staff office.

Where the hell is my refund, London Underground?

Owing to having used my Oyster card on Saturday 12th July for 3 single journeys that morning I was charged the maximum cash fare on each journey.
TfL admitted the “Very Rare” fault pretty quickly and gave everyone free travel till they fixed the fault, they also promised everyone on Pay as you go who was charged the maximum cash fare a refund automatically on Tuesday 15th July.

“All passengers who incur a maximum fare on Saturday 12 July will be given an automatic refund on Tuesday. They do not need to take any action.
“We are investigating the cause of the problem, will ensure that any necessary refunds are honoured and apologise to our passengers for any inconvenience caused.”

As of the time of this posting I am still waiting for a £12 refund as promised by the various TfL spin statements. I have phoned up the Oyster card ‘helpline’ and enquired about this, but all the moron on the other end said “It is not possible, everyone has been refunded, I do not need to check your card, Goodbye”.

When I put my card on the ticket machines at any Underground station, it comes up with “Error this card not initialised for PRESTIGE”.

As someone who has a staff discounted oystercard I belive this is the reason I have not had my automated refund. I suspect all ’standard’ Oyster cards (i.e. a card which does not have a discount on it) have been refunded.

Saturday’s Oyster Card mess up, now makes cards useless.

Imagine the scene on a Monday Morning. Everyone queueing up to renew their season tickets, or to top up their Pay as you go balances.

Now imagine that everyone who used their Oyster Card on Saturday morning between 0530 and 0930 cant use any self service machine and is now queueing up at a ticket office?

Well you don’t need to imagine it, as it happened this morning. While TheTicketCollector was travelling through Paddington there were very long queues of people waiting to have their Oyster cards replaced because of London Undergrounds “very rare” fault.

According to a member of staff I spoke to, the “very rare” fault messed up a lot of peoples Oyster cards and corrupted them, thus making them nothing more then a piece of expensive plastic. This member of staff advised me to queue up with the rest of the corrupted card owners and get a replacement. The member of staff then laughed and said that Oyster has been nothing “but a major f**k up ever since it came into being, even I have had to get my bl**dy staff pass replaced!”

TheTicketCollector is still waiting for his refund.