please empty your brain below
The new trains on the Thameslink route have displays showing the loading along the train, presumably to encourage folk to move to the quiet section. I think it's based on weight gauges.

IslandDweller | 05.02.18 - 7:13 a.m. | #

On some lines you also see the opposite effect, where carriages get busy because passengers board the carriage nearest their platform *exit*.

You certainly see this on the northbound Victoria line, where crowds wedge into the rear (for Highbury and Islington) and the front (for Walthamstow).

Dan | 05.02.18 - 7:15 a.m. | #

I predict that there will be more comments in the morning because that's when most of us wake up, however, I expect a greater dispersal at the weekend, seasonal events may also have some bearing.

Ken | 05.02.18 - 7:16 a.m. | #

What it does show is that having open plan carriages on the sub-surface lines didn't encourage people to move to emptier parts of the train.

There is a metaphor about life in general in there somewhere, in that many people are prepared to take what they're given, even though there are opportunities nearby.

Still Anon | 05.02.18 - 7:33 a.m. | #

This has been a significant issue on the Victoria line with rear loading of northbound trains and front loading of SB trains. The latter has been evened out a little since the north entrance opened at Kings Cross St Pancras. Thw same is likely to happen at Victoria when the new escalators from the main entrance to the interchange escalators open. I suspect that the effect has/will just make the whole train busier.

100andthirty | 05.02.18 - 7:51 a.m. | #

There could be a Poisson-distributed random element as well.

If you arrive on the platform when a train has just left, you should have time to move along the platform to your best position for exit at your destination exit (assuming you know where this is). If you arrive as a train is pulling in you might get on at the nearest door rather than waiting for the next one.

CG | 05.02.18 - 8:00 a.m. | #

@ CG

The Poissons in question being sardines?

timbo again | Homepage | 05.02.18 - 8:05 a.m. | #

I love a good nerdy blog post in the morning.

Jon Jones | 05.02.18 - 8:20 a.m. | #

I suppose you could see it as a real-life experiment in behavioural economics. Many people are happy to put up with the certainty of a non-ideal situation for a short time, rather than investing some effort towards achieving the probability of a better situation. Sunk costs, risk and loss aversion, etc.

Andrew | 05.02.18 - 8:49 a.m. | #

Even if you plan to walk down the platform to a quieter part, if the train arrives whilst you are walking down, you are more likely to get on where you are. Therefore, if it takes a minute to walk to the far end of the platform, but trains are every 3 minutes, you are 33% likely to get on at tne end which is busiest for your station.

Also, if you are a regular commuter, you are more likely to get on where your exit is. So for the District line, if you get on where carriage 7 is busiest, but also get off at a station where carriage 7 is closest to the exit (eg. Barking), you aren't going to walk down the platform/train even if you know it is quieter.

This makes modelling this stuff v.complex.

Jimbo | 05.02.18 - 9:01 a.m. | #

I was about to argue against this analysis, convinced that surely all passengers choose their optimal alighting point as the place to board the train.
This was before i found myself at the front of a sparsely populated Jubilee line tube. The rear is packed to capacity for no apparent reason other than proximity to the entrance.

louise | 05.02.18 - 9:10 a.m. | #

@louise
I imagine (from your description) you've experienced a similar example to me - westbound Jubilee line trains out of Stratford/West Ham?

As for trains departing London mainline termini, if it's not rush hour and it's a shorter suburban service I can very often find an empty carriage...

the orange one | 05.02.18 - 9:40 a.m. | #

During a brief period of commuting from Leyton to Holborn - before Stratford was rebuilt with the extra platform - the added advantage of just squeezing on at Leyton was that the doors then didn't open on the same side until Holborn, as all other stations had platforms on the right hand side of the train.

Housesitter | 05.02.18 - 9:45 a.m. | #

Train companies have known about this for decades. There's a reason why First Class is generally placed at the London end of an expressed train or at the ends of a unit; it's the closest to the barriers at London.

Silent Hunter | Homepage | 05.02.18 - 10:09 a.m. | #

Here on the subway platforms in Japan, there are diagrams to show which carriage will be closest to the exit(s) at every station along the line.

Therefore people can choose their carriage based on the optimum alighting point.

Perhaps similar diagrams on the Tube could even-out the spread of people. Equally, it could worsen the situation if the optimum alighting points are all the same carriage.

Dave | 05.02.18 - 10:12 a.m. | #

If you are doing the same journey, day in day out, for your daily commute to work (slavery) you eventually get to know whether to gravitate towards the front or the back end of the tube, rarely the middle though in my experience. I had no qualms about walking along the platform, once I'd sussed where would be the best chance of getting a seat, and also for letting 1 or 2 trains go, if they were that bit too over-crowded. Also used to piss me off when I saw people trying to cram in like sardines, even though the next train was one minute behind

Marty | 05.02.18 - 10:18 a.m. | #

For the vast majority of passengers travelling east on the District line beyond Mile End, the optimum alighting point is in the front carriage. So that's not ideal.

diamond geezer | Homepage | 05.02.18 - 10:20 a.m. | #

Really interesting - as an occasional Tube traveller, I do tend to walk down the platform to where there are fewer people waiting, rather than think about how full each carriage is likely to be, as I don't know. Once the train arrives, one tends to just get on, unless there's another one due to arrive in a minute or two. It only really matters if one is going a fairly long way at peak times - I can put up with most things for ten minutes and besides, I've reached the age where I'm often offered a seat. I wonder if others have noticed the increased courtesy in the past two or three years? Young people often stand up for older ones, both men and women in both instances.

Z | Homepage | 05.02.18 - 11:07 a.m. | #

@ the orange one

Spot on!

louise | 05.02.18 - 11:14 a.m. | #

I used to use Upminster Bridge and the train invariably came in as I was walking along the passage below so I had to rush up the stairs and get in at the back. I never had to stand as most city bound had caught the overhead from Upminster. Conversely in at the back travelling east as always a mass exodus at East Ham.

Dave B | 05.02.18 - 11:18 a.m. | #

I commute to and from Waterloo on the suburban trains, and it always amuses me around 6pm on the way home just how rammed the carriage closest to the ticket gates is. There can be 2-3 minutes left before departure, but people will still cram themselves into someone's armpit in that first carriage rather than walk 30 seconds down the platform and find loads of room and usually a seat. My exit at the other end is at the back of carriage 2 or front of carriage 3, so I tend to walk down the platform at Waterloo until the guard's whistle blows, and then hop onto a reasonably empty carriage, smugly.

gooneruk | Homepage | 05.02.18 - 11:51 a.m. | #

DG is lucky to have a station where there is 'sometimes' standing room only in the carriage by the entrance. At Bermondsey in the morning peak the dilemma is different, because every single carriage is jammed packed. Do you stand, in queues behind the platform doors, near the rear of the train, knowing that significant numbers of people will get off but where, therefore, the line will be ten to twenty deep; or do you move to the least crowded front part of the platform, where there are fewer people, because only one or two people per door leave the train and you have to edge your way more slowly to the front of your queue?

My record in nine trains though, once, travelling with a friend who had stayed overnight, we separated and he only caught the twelfth. And trains were running at regular, two-minute intervals.

About every eight trains has started back at North Greenwich and this sometimes clears the platform, enabling the crowds to build up again.

You can walk to London Bridge (20 minutes), where lots of people get off, but then they often close the entrances because there is no room on the platforms, and you have to queue even to get in.

Which is why it is pointless to deal with traffic congestion by trying to persuade more people to use public transport. You need more infrastructure first. So Bermondsey might well see a big change with the opening of the Elizabeth Line, but that will have been ten years in construction

Martin | 05.02.18 - 12:08 p.m. | #

I walk down the entire platform to get to a carriage that coincides with my alighting point while waiting for a train.

G | 05.02.18 - 1:36 p.m. | #

Shh! Don't tell everyone! :) As a regular "walk to the front of the train at Bow Road" person, it's quite nice to not be crammed in like sardines.

Though I disagree that H&C are necessarily less busy - there's fewer of them, so in the peaks they're often fuller than the District services.

Moogal | 05.02.18 - 1:59 p.m. | #

One might hope that additional capacity and new routes will reduce waiting times, but you have to contend with Braess's paradox.

Andrew | 05.02.18 - 2:21 p.m. | #

As a mainline suburban train driver I can confirm that this is a huge problem. Even off peak one stop where people queue for the nearest door or all leave by the one nearest the exit is enough to tip a train into delay. As for the peak...well some may notice that trains arriving around 7am are generally punctual but by 8am, the aggregate effect of this behaviour across the network means that delays have rippled out, blocked junctions at the wrong times etc etc to kill any chance of being on time. Not to mention how everyone leaving by the same door makes it harder to dispatch the train because the crowds back up and block the driver’s view of the doors.

Anonymous | 05.02.18 - 3:13 p.m. | #

@anon
"one stop where people queue for the nearest door or all leave by the one nearest the exit is "

Cause and effect, I'm afraid. If everyone leaving the train is doing so from one carriage, that is where people will wait to join the train. You can't really expect people to wait at a point where they're not going to be able to get on! (Especially where trains run only every 15 minutes)
Double-ending the busiest stations, such as Wimbledon, would improve punctuality enormously.

timbo again again | Homepage | 05.02.18 - 3:35 p.m. | #

I gather that the Elizabeth line's trains (when 9-car, though the 7-car on TfL Rail likewise) will have the clusters of 2+2 transverse seating for longer-distance passengers in cars 2-4 and 6-8, leaving the end and middle cars where people typically will arrive on the platforms at busy stations with only longitudinal seating.

Also this problem on the District is why TfL were very keen to have walk-through stock on the SSLs - that way people can move down the train to emptier parts of it. However they abandoned the idea on the Victoria, which has rather a lot of boarding/alighting points at the southern end of platforms - I guess partially as busy platforms get people spreading out along them, especially if they find out they can't board a train on certain doors.

Si | 05.02.18 - 4:16 p.m. | #

I remain unconvinced by the concept of walk-through trains helping to even out the loading. When the train is crowded enough to need it, it's too crowded to be able to move along. Meanwhile we now have a large space at the car ends where it's difficult to stand because there is no longer a wall to lean against and the floor keeps sliding around.

Andrew S | 05.02.18 - 9:44 p.m. | #

That depends on the rolling stock. The current Goblin trains don’t allow for much standing at either end of the carriages. Walk through trains are more than welcome on that line in April.

Mark | 05.02.18 - 10:00 p.m. | #

@Mark: April? This quick? It seems that the 710s aren't even out yet!

Patrickov | 06.02.18 - 12:34 a.m. | #

@mainline suburban train driver - surely the answer (in the absence of re-engineered platforms) is to allow more dwell time during peak hours in the timetable ?

it really annoys me when i've patiently waited for all the passengers to alight, and the driver (usually tube driver) tries to close the doors before anybody (at my door) has even started boarding !

ADS | Homepage | 06.02.18 - 1:12 a.m. | #

ADS, Increasing dwell time reduces the overall capacity of the line. Some allowance for this is made in the peaks which is why some routes operate at lower peak frequencies, counter intuitive though that seems.

Anonymous | 06.02.18 - 6:19 a.m. | #

Anonymous - if the actual dwell is longer than the scheduled dwell time, rescheduling does not cause any resulting loss in actual capacity (scheduled capacity may fall).

Messiah | 06.02.18 - 12:39 p.m. | #

Messiah that smacks of playing with semantics to me. It’s still not possible to timetable more trains if scheduled capacity falls without a knock on effect elsewhere, ie everything being late for the rest of the day unless we have one of Chris Gibb’s breaks in service to catch up.

Anonymous | 06.02.18 - 3:38 p.m. | #

@gooneruk. I have a feeling we use the same station but I'll keep that private. But incase we do, just a tip. When it's rainning, go to the front of the third carriage as that will often end up being in line with the end of the platform shelter so you don't have to get wet until your down the stairs.

Honestly, if there's a full carriage, I'll just walk and get the next train. It boggles me when on the Victoria line, people sprint down the platform to get to a quieter carriage when the next train is essentially already trying to burst into the platform

Ethan | 06.02.18 - 5:15 p.m. | #

@gooneruk
the "everyone crammed at the back" syndrome was graphically (literally!) displayed yesterday. As I got to Waterloo at the last minute, I had to jump on the second-rearmost coach despite it being very full as the "OFF" light on the platform was already lit. The carriage was absolutely packed, and the fancy display showed the rear five cars as "orange" (full and standing). However, the display showed the front five cars to all be "green" (seats available). Unfortunately the "walk through" feature is not available between the fifth and sixth car of these trains.

timbo again | Homepage | 07.02.18 - 10:33 a.m. | #











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