d.b

They are still out on streets uncollected around Colwell Road/Playfield Crescent, as of this morning when I left the house.

It has been awful. When I moved here in late 2012 there were 6 trains an hour scheduled to take 12 minutes into London Bridge. Then we have had the rebuild of the station, huge disruptions, and now the strikes. We are on 4 trains per hour if we're lucky (official timetables get changed on a whim) and huge numbers of cancellations due to strikes or staff shortages. When they run the timetabled journey time is now 20 minutes. This is all against a backdrop of rising passenger numbers. I'm sure most people who use the trains here are fed up with Southern and their poor communication, poor labour relations, and crap excuses. The RMT are not much better but as a long-time Londoner I'm used to that. Unfortunately the government seems to want to play politics with Southern rail, either to embarrass the new mayor or to try and break support for the unions. We just get caught up in the middle. One thing that would really ease the burden would be more Overground services through Denmark Hill and Forest Hill/Honor Oak. 4 tph through Denmark Hill is not enough, they are always hugely overcrowded. It's a great route connecting into the tube and a lifeline for people who would normally go to London Bridge. I know there are problems with the number of trains running through Surrey Quays, with so many lines converging there. But maybe we could have some that just shuttle as far as that, where we can change to one of the many other services to go onwards. It might help a little?

Will it even be applicable for people using TfL/Oyster travelcards? It is clearly different for us who can go via alternate (though inconvenient) routes vs someone totally reliant on Southern services commuting from outside of London. Does anyone know what a typical ED travelcard user might be entitled to, if anything?

Does seem rather arbitrary and ill thought-through, at least in the roads I know best. Playfield Crescent is a completely traffic-free, relatively wide residential road with no real parking pressure. Double yellow lines not just on each of its junction corners but seemingly at a bend in the middle are completely unnecessary and a total waste of council resources. I expect it will just serve to irritate those residents who currently park in those spots.

Also agree on Spinach. Very newly opened, we gave them a try last weekend and liked it a lot.

Trains running on time at 3pm is meaningless. They start screwing up just when everyone wants to start using them.

Travellers are people, so there are good ones and bad ones. This particular group on the hospital site broke through the gate into the site, stayed without permission, and dumped rubbish the first night they are there. It's not jumping to massive conclusions that maybe we have some bad ones here...

Sounds like you need to learn a bit about food safety. Rare burgers are a very bad idea. Mince is not like steak. http://www.bha.org.uk/bha_news/q-a-on-medium-and-rare-burgers/

For me the best is the coffee shop in Denmark Hill station, though may not be suitable location for your morning cuppa. Have you tried the van outside ED station? I don't generally want coffee on my commute but it smells good and seems to take itself seriously.

A beggar is someone who seeks to obtain money out of sympathy. Doesn't matter if they are making music. If you are giving out of sympathy then you're giving to a beggar, if you're appreciating the music, they are a busker. I haven't heard this lady so don't have an opinion on which she is...

I don't think we'll get a train service back until Govia lose the franchise. They clearly hate our line, always been the first to be cancelled, probably bring the stats down badly due to all the signal/junction problems and station works at London Bridge. I doubt we're very profitable for them, the government "temporary" dispensation to cancel services is looking quite permanent now.

Hi LondonSport. Some friendly advice... please don't use bit.ly and other link shorteners where they aren't needed. They were invented for twitter where there is a character limit, but clearly the EDF doesn't have any such limit. Unfortunately there are many advertising and malware scams out there, and link shorteners conceal the true destination of a link. Personally I would be very hesitant to click such a link from an unknown source (e.g. with you all I see is a newly created account posting the same message on the EDF a few times). Assuming you are genuine, I and others would be much happier to click on a link that clearly directed to a real website for an official organization. Maybe it seems overly suspicious but I'm afraid that is how we have to be on the web these days, so please help us by following good web etiquette, and sharing the real destination of your link. Thanks

Elphinstone's Army Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > No right turn from Lordship Lane? cars executing > this manoeuvre delay traffic anyway. > The volume of traffic on Lordship Lane would then > free flow, and pedestrians could > cross in safety, particularly buggy pushers, who > are slower. But how else would cars get from Goose Green / Dog Kennel Hill onto ED Grove to head on to Dulwich Village/Herne Hill etc? I'm sure you've noticed the comments on here about restricting Melbourne Grove which is the alternative route between them.

Chris82 Wrote: -------------------------------------------------------You think a modern 'box' like that new > The additional entrances people have mentioned > would make a lot of sense, though I think 'gating' > stations is a big priority for operators Couple of things here. First, as you might have seen at other stations, these kind of side gates aren't always open. Typically they are open for either late nights/sundays when the station office may not be manned, or rush hour when numbers are much larger. Most other times side gates are closed so people are forced through barriers for better enforcement of ticketing. This covers e.g. the 4-5pm after school window. Second, the barriers at denmark hill are usually set permanently open during rush hour periods anyway to try and prevent further chaos while hundreds of people are crushing through two barriers. N.b. it has been particularly awful the past couple of days since one of the barriers isn't reading oyster properly. Agree with you on FCB coffee, it's one of the best I've had in London!

What they should have done (and may still be able to do relatively cheaply / easily) is put another entrance closer to the bus stop that links to the new ramp. It wouldn't need to be manned, wouldn't need a new building/ticket hall, just a gate in the fence with a couple of oyster readers. I don't know why we need actual ticket gates, plenty of stations don't have them and just tap in/out on a reader. This would split the traffic rather than have multiple routes all converging on two gates in a tiny crowded ticket hut.

Just read a very thorough and interesting summary of the issues. Basically the issues go way beyond Driver Operated Only trains or staff shortages, that is one of many problems (and is a handy excuse since the blame can be cast onto the unions). http://www.londonreconnections.com/2016/railway-roulette/

Reading / listening to some of the coverage today it struck me that the rationale for cutting all the trains was "to provide a more reliable service". They are actually suggesting that removing all the scheduled services will help us passengers somehow!? How does this get approved by government? In no way do passengers benefit from moving from a regular service with unfortunate delays/cancellations to virtually no service at all. Looks very much like Southern have taken advantage of the chaos to avoid having to run a troublesome unprofitable part of their network, their passengers be damned.

I think we're all aware that there have been problems on this line for a while, with all the work going on at London Bridge, many overcomplex routes joining together causing delays through congestion etc. However I also can't help but think a lot of the operational/staffing related problems could easily be remedied by just spending a little more money. Paying staff enough to attract and retain new drivers, not being cheap about contract offers and antagonizing the RMT. I don't know and don't care what the issues are between Govia and their staff, as a selfish passenger as far as I'm concerned they need to deliver a service and they are getting paid a lot of our ticket money and government subsidy money to deliver it. Anywhere else in the private sector an inability to deliver an acceptable product would be met with losses, management getting fired, potentially bankruptcy. "Privatised" rail seem to get subsidized to make profits regardless of service so the only incentive they have is to cut costs. It shouldn't surprise us that this is the result...

So let's get this straight. Here we have a woefully underperforming rail franchise with appalling customer satisfaction, frequent delays and cancellations, and longstanding known issues with hiring and retaining enough staff to properly run their daily services. They seem to be cutting up to 3/4 of peak time services between ED and London, bizarrely justified by strikes on other parts of their network. In response to 14k people signing an official government petition we get a response from the transport committee which looks very much like it was drafted by Govia's own PR team. Meanwhile the government keeps pumping enough subsidies into the company to let them increase profits year after year. What exactly are our options here? Do we need to start waving placards outside Govia head office or something?

There aren't even strikes on our line. The Metro services through EDW are already driver only operated and have been for a long time. No idea what the justification is for this.

Surely the government has to make an example out of Southern. Despite woeful service, labour relations, and customer satisfaction, they are guaranteed profits each year. Not only that, but they have gone up year after year, despite requiring large government subsidies to run. http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/markets/article-3452793/Go-Ahead-profits-soar-17-amid-deluge-customer-complaints.html

There are two trees that cause difficulty for buggies, wheelchairs, people pulling suitcases to the station etc. They are both on the same side of the road. It's really not that hard to cross the road if getting past is a problem for you.

I do find the petition for a second referendum slightly disturbing. As a strong Remain supporter I nevertheless admit we lost, that huge numbers of people outside of London voted to leave and it was at least in part a reflection of a feeling of resentment and disenfranchisement from the London economy and the Westminster political bubble. To ignore or seek to overrule that result is not only undemocratic, it risks huge anger and quite possibly civil unrest. For remainers, the only way forward has to be to fight for the best deal, vote for the government that will negotiate in the interests of the country, and don't just let the right wing of the Tory party take over because everyone else is so busy infighting or sulking about the result. The best opportunity to reconsider before the insanity is set in stone would be in a second vote once we know what the Leave option really means. A similar Yes/No to confirm whether we leave based on the actual negotiated deal, or whether we decide it offers no advantages and we wish to stay in the EU. That way there is a credible position - the question is different, the facts are on the table, and people have a chance to go forward with their eyes open or stop the process before it becomes irreversible. I hope the Remain parties can get their act together to push at least for this sensible and defensible opportunity to reconsider before it is too late.

You didn't think this public post about not being given a free drink might make you sound a little entitled?

Seems worse than ever right now. Ran to catch the 22:25 last night which was on the platform, all set to go on the train, engine running on the platform. At about 26 minutes past the train was cancelled due to a staff shortage... Not just incompetent management of their staff but total disregard for their passengers that they do this kind of thing with no notice, giving no opportunity to adjust travel plans. 8:30 train this morning also cancelled. Whatever your views on the strike action/rail unions let's not forget Southern are run by a private company and heavily subsidised by the government. It's their responsibility to have adequate staffing levels and manage their labour relations while providing a good service for rail passengers. At the moment they seem to be failing on all three counts, they're just hoovering up subsidies and paying themselves healthy profits.