Mmm, I do agree with a lot of your criticisms of GTR but frankly I think this one is a bit petty. The announcement not only achieves its goal of enunciating the notice, but it's also temporary, it's not as if it'll be there forever. The fact that it isn't in the usual voice may also help draw attention to it above the usual announcement spam of modern rail services. Letting a transport enthusiast record a message, assuming they do a satisfactory job, is not unprofessional. Where would you stand on the DLR PSAs that let 'front seat' children do the PA announcements?
We might have to amicably agree to disagree on this one.
Part of my issue is that in my view it *isn’t* a satisfactory job. The announcement, to me, sounds like the person recording it is on some kind of ego trip, which having now found out who it is sadly comes as no surprise to me. Not an appropriate tone for something which is potentially a major disruptive inconvenience. It was the fact that, in my view, the message sounded stupid and unprofessional is why it got my nose (mildly) out of joint.
The only thing I took from it was something about a Brighton improvement project. I didn’t “hear” the rest because of the silly voice and the way the emphasis came over as being the person reading the message, not the messsge itself. My take-away would be that it was some kind of self-congratulating GTR message about their new trains and timetable! Which, after all, is allegedly a Brighton improvement project.
I don’t have a problem with kids being allowed to do announcements, or adults if it really floats their boat - albeit it shouldn’t be something important and definitely not safety-related. But having someone record an announcement being played on a regular basis IMO takes this too far. This TOC certainly has more than enough far more important things to be doing.
