Incident management on mainlines into London

[chris parkinson]

Most of the mainlines into London are operating on a knife edge, very close to [or at] maximum capacity during peak hours.

How are they monitored and who by? For example, a failed train on the slow up at Wimbledon on the SW Mainline in the AM pk. By whom and how would a decision be taken to divert slow trains onto fast paths? How quickly are such decisions taken?

Is there a real-time control centre for operations on each of the lines run by the franchises, or do franchisees rely on the expertise and skill of signalmen [employed by network rail?] to respond to operational incidents?

Thanks,

 

[GB]

Even in todays bureaucrat filled signalling grade, signallers are still afforded some degree of regulating discretion and it is within the purview of such signallers to divert around the disruption where possible providing the subsequent trains can still reach thier inteded station/destination should they need to be diverted onto parallel running lines.

If however trains need to be stopped short of their destination, cancelled, terminated or run fast, this would need to be decided between the TOC control and NR control with instructions being given to the appropriate staff at ground level.

Rescue of the striken train would usally be coordinated between the various controls (as with service recovery) with information being passed down.

As for how fast these decisions are made it all depends on how quickly an issue is brought to the attention of the signaller. The sooner he is aware of the problem the sooner he can hold trains back at suitable locations (ie before a facing crossover) to potentially divert around.

If hes not told in good time then there is potential for trains to queue up behind the failed train with no where to go.
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How are they monitored and who by?

Obviously signallers have their various panels or workstations aswell as TRUST but also NR control has a computer system that they can use to view trains and areas in real time and I expect it would be the same for the TOC controllers...they soon pick up on anything that is not right!

 

[SWT Driver]

I'm sorry to say that most (but not all) signallers these days haven't got the backbone to do that magical thing called Regulation, Woking & Wimbledon are probably the worst of the lot for doing it.

I was once told by a signaller, booked order driver, at which point I uttered, if the book told you to plug your fingers in the mains socket & turn it on would you do it?

I got told not to be so facetious & asked for my name at which point I reset the radio to shut him up, otherwise a REAL row would have kicked off.

The one thing I cannot stand is bloody-mindedness & some signallers are so bloody-minded and stubborn, yet others are so fast & forward thinking.

 

[Metroland]

Is there a real-time control centre for operations on each of the lines run by the franchises, or do franchisees rely on the expertise and skill of signalmen [employed by network rail?] to respond to operational incidents?

Thanks,

Yep, in general. NR control might pull strings in the background, putting blocks on certain lines. Much of the skills of day-to-day regulating, platforming, incident handling is down to signallers, supported by control and to a cetrain extent SB supervisors. If you have 15-25 trains on your Panel/Workstation, the decision making has to be real time, unless its a big incident where lines become blocked, there isn't time for someone to be ringing around directing routing of each trains, its only in limited very special circumstances.

Chiltern lines: Marylebone IECC
WCML: Wembley SC
MML: West Hamsptead PSB
ECML: King's Cross
Great Eastern: Liverpool Street IECC
LTS: Upminster IECC
SE 3rd rail routes: London Bridge
Southern (central) 3rd rail routes: Victoria PSB
Lines into Waterloo: Wimbledon PSB
GWML: Slough IECC

 

[royaloak]

But everytime a siggy regulates trains all the managers come out of the woodwork and pick over what they have done, now if the train that was let out early sits down all the delays come back to the siggy because he let it out, the fact it would have sat down anyway and delayed other trains is irrelevant.
Once a siggy gets chewed over for this they just say sod it, booked order and to hell with it, and who can blame them for that!
Most siggies would love to be allowed to do the job properly but they cant in the current climate, unfortunate but its hardly their fault.

 

[Metroland]

Everyone works differently, some are more adventurous than others with regulating/replatforming, some are willing take take more risks than others, some are better at handling incidents than others, some will do everything by the book, others are willing to go the extra mile. All depends on personality, skill, local culture, culture on certain shifts and so on.

 

[GB]

Sadly Royaloak is right

Most regulating decisions are picked over by both Network Rail and the TOCs/FOCs if it results is a delay...even if only 3 minutes.. If a signaller delays something then the minutes are put down to that specific signaller. Get too many and you can be put on poor performance, get put on poor performance too often and you can end up at a disciplinary hearing.

Its not so much that signallers are bloody minded (though there are a few of them in every railway grade...inc signallers and drivers) its the fact that its just not worth the aggro you will recieve from your own side:roll:

As Metroland says, alot of it depends on the location and if you have decent managers.

 

[Metroland]

Some signalling managers are more supportive than others - some are ex signallers can and understand the pressures. The normal run of events is to be able to justify what you have done and put over a convincing case, any signalling manager worth his salt will back staff if it can be shown that they have done the right thing.

With most serious incidents you have to write reports anyway, as do others involved, and its the job of managers to pick through the nuts and bolts to work out who has done what, and work out any lessons that can be learned.

 

[Capybara]

I would be interested to know what was going on at Vauxhall on Monday morning. I arrived to see that a number of delays were on the screens then heard an announcement to the effect that the Hampton Court train had been switched to Platform 6. As I only needed to get as far as Clapham Junction I raced up the stairs and got on, only to see a train depart first from Platform 8. Not too much of a problem given the length of my journey (and I've never got on or off at Platform 6 at Vauxhall before!). The train then moved a signal at a time towards Clapham Junction before finally overtaking the train I had seen leave Vauxhall's Platform 8 and crossing over into Platform 11 at Clapham Junction. The trains were all over the place in terms of timing, but clearly some sort of creative thinking was going on.

 

[Helvellyn]

I would be interested to know what was going on at Vauxhall on Monday morning. I arrived to see that a number of delays were on the screens then heard an announcement to the effect that the Hampton Court train had been switched to Platform 6. As I only needed to get as far as Clapham Junction I raced up the stairs and got on, only to see a train depart first from Platform 8. Not too much of a problem given the length of my journey (and I've never got on or off at Platform 6 at Vauxhall before!). The train then moved a signal at a time towards Clapham Junction before finally overtaking the train I had seen leave Vauxhall's Platform 8 and crossing over into Platform 11 at Clapham Junction. The trains were all over the place in terms of timing, but clearly some sort of creative thinking was going on.

Broken Rail on one of the Slow Lines at Vauxhall - can't remember if it was Up or Down now.

SWT and NR have a joint Control - Wessex Integrated Control Centre (WICC) - that is located on The New Raft at Waterloo (above Platforms 1-10). A lot of decisions about what to do if something happens can be taken jointly. SWT also relocated its Customer Communication and Safety Centre (CCSC) to the New Raft this year, so that it is in the same room as the WICC to aid with information coming out.

On SWT there are various disruption plans in place in case something happens that can form the basis for responding to something. For example, if only two tracks were available into/out of Waterloo, then there is a train service plan that could be put in place to deal with that, albeit it with a massively reduced service.

Decisions on what happens can vary depending on who is on Duty, and sometimes it is clear that a reaction to an incident is going more smoothly than at other times.