Transport for London
While I know our English friends would often heartily disagree, the mass transit system for Greater London works remarkably well, at least compared to U.S. systems.
I just returned from a week of travel in England, divided mostly between Reading, Uxbridge (on the outskirts of London for our local readers), and London proper. The entire trip was, door-to-door, completed on public transportation and all but three legs (cab rides) were completed on mass transit -- and the transit was quick, safe, and almost always on time.
To the disdain of my travel partner, I spent most of the trip recording interesting transit innovations. Those will be the subject of many coming posts. Before I start, however, I wanted to relay a story that proves just how nerdy us transit people really are:
While on the platform at Reading waiting for a train into Paddington Station, I came across the following sign (and sorry for the poor quality - I only had my cell camera with me):
The sign basically advertises the fact that Thames Trains is operating 800 services daily without receiving any subsidy from the government.
The fact that Thames Trains is successfully running commuter lines without public subsidy is, in itself, an amazing accomplishment. The fact that it's running them on time is even more fantastic.
The fact that while taking a picture of a sign about Thames Trains' subsidy-free service with my cell phone two pretty girls stopped by and said, "Want us to stand there? It'll be a lot more interesting picture" and I actually thought "No, I'm taking a picture for my blog," just proves how much help we really need.
Post Author:
amg | 8:22 AM |
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Well, there goes our chance to make the bigtime by changing the site to "Commuters Gone Wild." I suppose I'll have to resort to handing out beads on the MARC in exchange for showing a little skin.
I've always thought that Camelot or some other strip club should sponsor a free-ride day, a-la ING Direct. Certainly would make the Metro a more lively place.
Why not? The trains already have plenty of polls.
poles, that is. I've been reading too much about the primaries.
I can see it now:
Strippers for Kerry, dancing around the metro, asking people their opinions on the issues.
Yes you need serious help. It's not very often that pretty girls come up to you in London and ask to be in your picture. For a Londoner that was an absolutely MASSIVE chat up line, and you blew it ;-)
Hope you enjoyed your stay in London anyway and you must have travelled on the ONE day a year that everything works OK on London transport.
