please empty your brain below
The Network South East-branded flashes on the platform edges maintained the long-standing tradition of marking (originally by a white paint mark) where the train doors line up: and I can recall commuters dutifully queuing up behind them in an orderly manner.
However, the NSE flashes mark where the doors stop on the old 1940-vintage carriages still in use in 1987 when the floor was tiled. For the last twenty years, they have been in the wrong place!
Although you describe access to and from the W&C at Waterloo as if interchanging with another Tube line, very few people actually do this - there are easier interchanges from these lines at Westminster, Embankment, Kennington, Elephant, and London Bridge if you are going to Bank. The vast majority of users of the line are interchanging with the SWT main line services, and the two entrances serve opposite ends of the concourse; the entrance nearer the Bakerloo/Northern hall comes out near Platform 19, and the other one near Platform 8. In peak hours you can bypass the concourse altogether as a subway communicating with all the platforms runs parallel with the W&C platforms (which are at right angles to the main platforms above)
On a different note, there's an interesting account of driving the W&C on Audioboo here: http://audioboo.fm/boos/549329-walking-the-tunnel
It was hidden for 90 years, but was rediscovered 25 years ago.
http://www.ianvisits.co.uk/blog/2008/03/29/greathead-shield-at-bank-station/
IMHO, there are no other distinctive colours left, given the allocation of solid orange to the Overground.
If the proposed split of the Northern Line happens, the new line (the "Southern Line", perhaps) is going to need a distinct colour from solid black.
Perhaps The Drain (sorry, Waterloo and City line) will get a lime-green OUTLINE instead?
The previous IoW trains were ex-Picadilly "standard" stock from the 1920s
I believe the specific trains used on the IOW were taken from the pool working the Northern City line between Moorgate and Drayton Park, when that line changed from being a branch of the Northern line to being operated by British Rail. As the trains were already rather ancient at that point, LT didn't mind letting them go.
It was a 1938 stock train which crashed into the buffers in the Moorgate disaster, shortly before the aforementioned transfer.
The 1940-vintage W&C units would not have been suitable for the Isle of Wight as, having been designed for an entirely subterranean existence, they lacked certain features considered necessary on other trains, such as windscreen wipers and heaters! Indeed, on rare occasions they ventured out, using the long-lost lift. This was possible as they operated on the same electrical system as the Southern - the arrangements were modified in 1940 to allow this, and again in 1993 to accomodate standard London Underground trains. These sorties were usually to Wimbledon, for maintenance jobs not possible in the limited subterranean facilities at Waterloo, but could only be done when it wasn't raining!
The old trains were really quite an experience given their tiny windows and rather cramped seats. In comparison the 92 stock was something from a different world.
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