Best and Worst barriered Stations

[BestWestern]

I wouldn't go down the false imprisonment line simply because staff are not deliberately detaining people with valid tickets, there is a way out albeit a slow one, but yes it is a right pain when there are very few gates available for a certain direction.

Admittedly it's unlikely you'd get anywhere with it, but it remains unacceptable for it to take five or ten minutes (probably an extreme example) to exit a station simply due to a gateline with not enough gates having been installed. Of course, people should ideally leave enough time to make their journey in a relaxed and calm manner (!!) but we all know in reality that doesn't always happen. Anybody who was in a real rush would find this a major inconvenience, quite understandably.

I would add that I fully support the use of gatelines, though I'm not overly impressed with the idea of having them 'remotely monitored' which is clearly a very iffy compromise to save costs. But I do feel that any such equipment needs to be generally sufficient to handle an average peak time flow without people having to stand in a queue for excessively long periods to get in or out. Having enough capacity also removes the need for barrier staff to have to open up the whole lot every time a busy train offloads, thus rendering the whole exercise utterly pointless.

 

[transmanche]

But I do feel that any such equipment needs to be generally sufficient to handle an average peak time flow without people having to stand in a queue for excessively long periods to get in or out. Having enough capacity also removes the need for barrier staff to have to open up the whole lot every time a busy train offloads, thus rendering the whole exercise utterly pointless.

Part of the problem is that some of the newer designs of ticket barrier are so slow. For example, the style installed at many East Coast stations is much slower at processing tickets than the older style used at many LU stations. (I don't know their proper names, so I've attached photos.)

And its not helped by many people waiting for the barrier to fully close behind the person in front of them before inserting their tickets.

 

[Central Trains]

The barrier staff at Tonbridge were awful although they have been some recent staff changes and the "rogues" may have gone elsewhere.
Imagine long queue at the ticket office and barrier staff comes across to me and says "You can get your ticket from the ticket machine" I said "No" . He said "It issues all tickets to all destinations" . I said "Will you show me which button to issue me a privilege ticket?" . He then spends about one minute looking at every button and finally gives up and walks away.
A few days later a friend walks in the ticket office and joins a similiar queue. Same man walks across and says you can buy any ticket from the machine. My friend says I want an Advance return ticket with a Senior Citizen Railcard to Tywyn in Wales. Ticket barrier man walks away feeling beaten.
On many occasions the ticket barriers are left open.

Glad to hear others have had problems at Tonbridge - The gateline assistant was extremely aggressive!

 

[Drsatan]

That's totally unacceptable.

Bearing in mind that false imprisonment laws have been waged at rail staff in the past, I'd be interested to know the legalities of that situation. If you have a valid ticket and are committing no offence of any sort, I'd be surprised to hear that the railway can legally 'detain' you inside a station gateline for ten minutes once you have legitimately completed your journey, simply due to inadequate staffing arrangements.

I have to say that if it was me and I was in a major hurry I'd be reaching for the big red plunger...

I had a similar problem at Polegate station once: I wanted to get onto platform 1, which has a remotely monitored gateline, and as I had a Downlander ticket printed on A4 paper I had to I couldn't use the barrier. Took a good 3 or 4 minutes for the gateline attendant to look at it using the visual help point (would have been quicker if there was more than one attendant). If the attendant had more passengers to deal with I'd have missed my train.

Out of curiosity, under what circumstances are you allowed to use the "red plunger?"

 

[Mojo]

Never had to use the barriers at Newport but when changing trains between the Paddington & Marches line services I find that: you now have to walk a long way in the open as the new bridge is not connected to the platforms canopies. The lifts are far too small - had to let it go twice before I could use it as they were full.

I found the same problem at Slough back in July. A trudge down from the Windsor bay platform out where I got drenched, over the footbridge and then I got drenched again walking along the centre island to the canopy. I hope the closure of the 'original' footbridge is/was only temporary, as it seems in a much better location (can anyone confirm?).

I would add that I fully support the use of gatelines, though I'm not overly impressed with the idea of having them 'remotely monitored' which is clearly a very iffy compromise to save costs. But I do feel that any such equipment needs to be generally sufficient to handle an average peak time flow without people having to stand in a queue for excessively long periods to get in or out. Having enough capacity also removes the need for barrier staff to have to open up the whole lot every time a busy train offloads, thus rendering the whole exercise utterly pointless.

I completely agree. Remote monitoring (or even monitoring from an adjacent ticket office) is poor on both customer service and revenue protection grounds.

Modern installations of the awful Cubic E2, and S&B glass, ticket gates are not helped by poor spacing, poor staffing and inadequate numbers.

 

[mathmo]

I found the same problem at Slough back in July. A trudge down from the Windsor bay platform out where I got drenched, over the footbridge and then I got drenched again walking along the centre island to the canopy. I hope the closure of the 'original' footbridge is/was only temporary, as it seems in a much better location (can anyone confirm?).

The original Slough footbridge reopened in time for the Olympics. Much more convenient now.

 

[dmacw]

Out of curiosity, under what circumstances are you allowed to use the "red plunger?"

I think it was at Oxted that has a remote gateline. My Southern day rover didn't work. As it was a kind lady gave me her ticket to get through (she was already through)

Had the train been coming I would have no hesitation in pushing the red plunger.

 

[OxtedL]

I think it was at Oxted that has a remote gateline. My Southern day rover didn't work. As it was a kind lady gave me her ticket to get through (she was already through)

Had the train been coming I would have no hesitation in pushing the red plunger.

I would be very impressed if you could reach the red plunger (errrr... big yellow button??) from that side of the gates.

It is a fact of life at Oxted now that to stand a decent chance of catching your southbound train you need to arrive at least 2 minutes before the train does. Whereas before you could sometimes make it even after it had arrived - all that was required being running up the staircase straight at the however many people the train had just spat out.

 

[Jack in England]

SWT don't seem very good at this, I had trouble at Vauxhall one Sunday morning when I had a valid pass which did not work the barriers, and missed the train because the one member of staff was some way away from the barriers, and I had to shout to attract his attention.

Why wait until the last minute to catch a train? everything you stated about said incident must have lasted no more than 30 seconds,so in that respect it sounds like you were cutting it fine to catch your train anyway

 

[D1009]

Why wait until the last minute to catch a train? everything you stated about said incident must have lasted no more than 30 seconds,so in that respect it sounds like you were cutting it fine to catch your train anyway

I didn't wait until the last minute, I'd come from Doncaster via the Victoria Line. It must have been 5 minutes before I managed to attract the bloke's attention. The point i'm making is that before the gate line was there I'd have made it easily.

 

[island]

And its not helped by many people waiting for the barrier to fully close behind the person in front of them before inserting their tickets.

Some people think the gate will close on them if they don't do this. A few of the oldest LU gates do.