Tube overcrowding creating 'ruthless' travellers

Source: itnnews - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iPWhK6P79Tc

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Tube Overcrowding 2 December 2009

The Telegraph: Tube overcrowding creates 'dog eat dog' commuters
Overcrowding on the Tube has created a ruthless, survival-of-the-fittest mentality among passengers, a report claims.

''Dog-eat-dog'' travellers sometimes suspend normal behaviour to grab seats at the expense of pregnant women and people carrying babies, the report from the London Assembly found.

Some passengers have to psyche themselves up to prepare for the ''struggle to clamber on board, with 80% of those surveyed for the report experiencing ''discomforting overcrowding'' on the Underground. Other travellers ''shut down'' by listening to music and ignoring other passengers.

The report also found that more than half of the 716 people polled were sometimes unable to board the first train because of the overcrowding.

The report also criticised what it described as the ''chaotic'' Tube Jubilee line upgrade which has seen sections - and sometimes the whole line - shut at weekends.

The report, from the London Assembly's transport committee, highlighted passengers' ''coping strategies'' for dealing with the daily commute. These included:

:: Mental preparation - psyching oneself up for the ''struggle to clamber on board'';

:: A dog-eat-dog or survival-of-the-fittest attitude;

:: Suspension of the normal codes of behaviour - for example, going after a seat regardless of who else might want it, ignoring pregnant women and people carrying babies;

:: Adopting a Tube persona, more ruthless and selfish. One passenger said: ''I'm a different animal on the Tube to normal life. I'm not me. I'm a bit less interested in others.''

:: Switching off/shutting down - ''going into an automatic pilot routine'', listening to music, turning one's back;

Making sacrifices one would not usually consider - for example, losing personal space and comfort to be at a meeting on time;

:: Deliberately going the wrong way for one or two stops in order to get a seat.

The report took evidence from the Madrid metro system where upgrade work involved far fewer line closures than has been the case with the Jubilee line.

The transport committee's chairman Caroline Pidgeon said: ''Our report highlights shocking levels of overcrowding on the Tube and the impact this has on people. London Underground cannot be complacent about finding ways to make the situation more bearable.

''We are also calling for new thinking on how Tube upgrade work is managed. We cannot have a repeat of the way the Jubilee line upgrade works have been handled when it comes to upgrading other lines. There is an assumption that seemingly endless line closures are inevitable but, as our report and the evidence from Madrid shows, this is simply not the case.''

A Transport for London spokesman said: ''The committee rightly acknowledges that more and more people are travelling on the Tube which is why it is so crucial that we deliver the much-needed improvements.

''We are spending billions to increase capacity on the Tube by 30% in what is the biggest investment in decades.

''This will mean more trains, able to carry more passengers, with faster journeys and larger stations.

''Even today, the improvement in reliability means that more people are carried on the Tube compared with three years ago with no additional crowding caused.

''With new trains running on the Victoria line, the opening of a new ticket hall at King's Cross St Pancras and the first new air-cooled train due to enter service on the Metropolitan line by next June there are tangible improvements for customers.''

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BBC News: Tube crowds 'at shocking levels'

"Shocking" levels of overcrowding on the Tube network means passengers often have to psych themselves up to travel, a London Assembly report has claimed.

More than 80% of Tube users said they experienced "overcrowding which caused them discomfort", the study suggested.

It called for a "traffic-light" system in ticket halls so people can judge exactly how packed the trains will be.

Transport for London (TfL) said it was spending "billions" of pounds to increase space on the Tube network.

"This will mean more trains, able to carry more passengers, with faster journeys and larger stations," a spokesman said.

The report said some passengers developed a ruthless "dog-eat-dog" mentality when boarding trains because they knew it would be difficult to find a seat.

Sometimes they would grab seats at the expense of pregnant women and adults carrying children, it added.

Others came up with "coping strategies" to deal with the lack of space, such as listening to music or turning their backs on fellow passengers so they would not see the crowded carriage.

Some admitted they had to psych themselves up for the "struggle to clamber on board", while others said they had to make sacrifices - such as a loss of comfort - to ensure they arrived at work on time.

Caroline Pidgeon, the London Assembly member who chairs its transport committee, warned TfL that it must not be "complacent about finding ways to make the situation more bearable".

The report also criticised the "chaotic" upgrade of the Jubilee Line extension, which has resulted in sections of the line being closed for whole weekends several times in recent months.

"We are calling for new thinking on how Tube upgrade work is managed," Ms Pidgeon said.

"We cannot have a repeat of the way the Jubilee line upgrade works have been handled when it comes to upgrading other lines."

A TfL spokesman said the committee "rightly acknowledges that more and more people are travelling on the Tube, which is why it is so crucial that we deliver the much-needed improvements".

"We are spending billions to increase capacity on the Tube by 30% in what is the biggest investment in decades.

"This will mean more trains, able to carry more passengers, with faster journeys and larger stations."

He pointed to new trains on the Victoria Line, a revamped ticket hall at King's Cross underground station and the promise of air-cooled trains on the Metropolitan Line next year as "tangible improvements for customers".

The survey conducted by the assembly talked to 716 people in September.

The assembly also commissioned Andrew Irving Associates to conduct detailed focus groups with 57 commuters on how they coped during the rush hour.

Responses from BBC's readers on tube overcrowding: http://news.bbc.co.uk/local/london/hi/people_and_places/newsid_8389000/8389376.stm

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theage.com.au: It's 'dog eat dog' on London's overcrowded Tube: report

Chronic overcrowding on London's Tube network turns people into animals who adopt a "dog eat dog" attitude to fellow passengers, according to a report released Tuesday.

Travellers ignore pregnant women or parents with babies in a "survival of the fittest" atmosphere on the underground train system, which is struggling to cope with never-ending tides of commuters and tourists.

"I'm a different animal on the Tube to normal life. I'm not me. I'm a bit less interested in others," one person told researchers for the study, compiled for City Hall bosses.

The British capital's vast underground network - embodied in the iconic London Tube map, much pored-over by tourists - is a perennial source of grumbling for London's weary workers.

Some parts draw more gripes than others. The Northern Line has the worst reputation, but many others can be hellish at rush-hour, with packed platforms and even more sardine-line trains, often so full that no-one else can get on.

Other examples of how people cope with the daily Tube grind include:

- "Suspension of the normal codes of behaviour - for example, going after a seat regardless of who else might want it, ignoring pregnant women and people carrying babies;

- "Adopting a Tube persona, more ruthless and selfish;

- "Switching off/shutting down - going into an automatic pilot routine, listening to music, turning one's back;

- "Developing strategies to reduce the impact of overcrowding - for example, by going the opposite direction for one or two stops in order to get a seat."

Transport for London, which runs the Tube network as well as London's buses and other travel infrastructure, insisted it welcomed the report.

"More and more people are travelling on the Tube, which is why it is so crucial that we deliver the much-needed improvements," said a spokesman.

"We are spending billions to increase capacity on the Tube by 30 percent, in what is the biggest investment seen in decades. This will mean more trains, able to carry more passengers, with faster journeys and larger stations."

But the report's authors said: "The overwhelming majority of passengers perceive the experience of overcrowding as a highly unpleasant and abnormal situation... Some commuters are left feeling tired and stressed out.

"It can take an hour or two to calm down," it said.

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Extreme Commuting: Not Exactly the Sporting Life

March 31, 2005
Original post: Jon Coppelman

There is a relatively new phenomenon for a growing number of working Americans: extreme commuting. According to Business Week, 3.4 million Americans have a commute to work that takes 90 minutes or longer each way. Fueled by outrageous inflation in housing prices, American workers find themselves driving until they qualify that is, driving out from their jobs until they reach a community where they can afford a house. The Blue Ridge Mountains have become a bedroom community of Washington, D.C., New Hampshire is now an exurb of Boston, and Modesto, Calif. is an outpost of Silicon Valley. (If you are interested in learning where your state ranks for extreme commuting, check out the chart in this USA Today article.)

The average commute in America is still only 25.5 minutes. In the not-too-distant past, people drew the line at 45 minutes. But economic necessity has caused that number to double, with no end in sight. When you combine tremendous commuting distances with the inevitable congestion as you near centers for employment, you have a recipe for serious anguish.

The Business Week article tells the story of a Whirlpool employee who crosses a time zone to get to his job. Waking at 3 a.m., the employee drives 105 miles from Chicago's West Side to company headquarters in Benton Harbor, Mich. During the drive he conducts business on his cell phone. He started the job with a brand new Range Rover, racking up 62,000 miles in the first year. Now he drives an $84,000 Mercedes sedan. My question for the employee, and his deep-pocketed employer, is whether his prolific cell phone use puts this employee at higher risk for an accident and if so, is the employer comfortable with this open-ended liability?

Commuting Stress and Workers Compensation
So are all these stressed out commuters ripe for workers compensation claims? Under most state laws, they are not. Comp does not ordinarily cover the to and fro of commuting. Coverage generally begins when you get to your workplace and ends when you leave it. Indeed, the state of Missouri recently changed its to and fro rule to eliminate coverage for drivers in company cars, closing the loop on an unusual and ill-advised definition of working.

Indeed, not only are most extreme commuters not covered by comp, the stress of their (non work-related) commute is so great, they are unlikely to qualify for any comp stress claim because they will be unable to prove that work comprises at least half of the stress in their harried lives! The stress of their commute is likely to dwarf any stress that occurs in the workplace.

Some employees may be covered by workers comp during the commute. If people routinely take work home, using their homes as an office, in some states the definition of the workday may expand to incorporate their commute. For these workers, and for on-call workers, coverage may be door to door. Nevertheless, even if they are working while commuting, they will face a very high standard to establish that any serious stress problems are work related.

For those of us fortunate enough to face a modest and possibly even pleasant commute each morning, let's take a moment to sympathize with our fellow workers who face the challenges of extreme commuting. It's no sport and it's no fun. Here's wishing that their next job involves a five minute walk up the street.

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Urban public transport lab

Sunday February 14, 2010
On the right track for change
By LEONG SHEN-LI
newsdesk@thestar.com.my

The use of laboratories to identify problems and provide solutions has proven successful in drawing up the Government Transformation Programme roadmap.

WHEN Mohamad Nur Kamal was told that he was going to head the laboratory tasked with finding solutions to the country’s urban public transport problems, the first thing that crossed his mind was “Why me?”

Then he tried to recall the nasty things he could have done in the past to deserve such punishment.

“I really thought of it as a curse,” the special advisor to Transport Minister Datuk Seri Ong Tee Keat says.

And who could blame him for thinking that way? It was, after all, something new as far as the Government was concerned.

“In Government, we are used to a particular way of doing things. It is always menurut perintah (following instructions),” he explains.

“I was to manage a group of people who theoretically did not need to work together. They could have given me a very difficult time,” he adds.

Mohamad Nur’s lab was one of six set up as part of Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak’s move to overhaul the Government under the Government Transformation Programme (GTP).

Under the GTP, six critical areas – identified as National Key Result Areas – were targeted for improvement. The labs were set up for each of the areas to identify problems and brainstorm for solutions.

Improving urban public transport is one of the NKRAs, the other five being reducing crime, reducing corruption, improving the quality of education, improving rural infrastructure and improving the living standards of the poor.

Twenty-five people were chosen for the urban public transport lab and they began their daily sessions for six weeks beginning in October last year.

Instead of the ordeal that everyone expected, the whole experience turned out to be rather pleasant.

“When we were approaching the end of the exercise, we felt a bit sad that it was all going to be over,” says Mohamad Nur.

Those who attended the lab were representatives from all bodies connected with public transport, namely the operators such as Keretapi Tanah Melayu and RapidKL; relevant government agencies such as the Commercial Vehicles Licensing Board and Road Transport Department; academics and other stakeholders such as the local authorities.

Mohamad Nur says gathering the group together was the hardest part of his job.

“They were from various agencies and parties and they had to be of a certain level to be aware of the issues and to commit to solutions,” he says.

An interesting thing was the choice of the Transport Ministry as the ministry in charge of the urban public transport NKRA.

“If you really look at it, the Transport Ministry has the least among the various agencies when it comes to public transport,” he points out. Nevertheless, he says, the support given by Ong was nothing short of “fantastic”.

The members of the lab were all locked in from 8.30am to 8pm. Some sessions lasted until the early hours of the morning, a fact which Najib got to know about and openly praised when launching the GTP Roadmap at the end of last month.

Open discussion

Problems were discussed and solutions deliberated in an open and honest manner. No one felt the need to downplay problems or were compelled to opt for certain solutions.

“They just put everything on the table and discussed enthusiastically. No one cared where the idea came from,” he says.

As such, Mohamad Nur is confident in saying that the urban public transport laboratory was one of the more successful ones.

“We came up with realistic solutions. There were no airy-fairy ideas and almost 100% of our solutions were accepted,” he says.

The solutions from the lab were also among the first to be rolled out. At the end of last year, four-car light rail transit trains which can carry double the number of passengers compared to the old trains began operating along the Kelana Jaya LRT route.

Then last month, a new concept in bus travel – the Bus Express Transit which used tolled expressways and limited stops – began running, cutting travel time between the suburbs and KL city centre by half.

All these moves are aimed at encouraging more people to use public transport, and the improvement of public transport usage will be used to measure the success of this NKRA.

While common in the business world, the use of labs by the Government in the quest for solutions is certainly a first in Malaysia. Mohamad Nur believes this methodology is the right one to be adopted for the GTP.

“You know the usual way in which the Government would have tackled the task? It would have set up a task force. Meetings would have been held every two weeks.

“Before every meeting, everyone will be frantically reading the minutes of the last meeting and scrambling to do what he or she was supposed to do.

“The meetings will drag on for hours because more often than not, the same things will be discussed as nothing would have moved from the last meeting,” he says as a matter of fact.

Mohamad Nur says his background as a management and financial consultant brought a fresh perspective to the task. Prior to joining Government, he held positions like the strategy and business architecture group manager at Accenture’s Kuala Lumpur office, head of DRB-Hicom’s management support and group synergy division, and associate with US management consultancy A.T. Kearney’s Chicago and South-East Asian practices.

“Many are not familiar with business and economic elements when handling issues. When you bring in things like cost benefit analysis and returns on investment, you will very quickly be able to get your point across to the leadership,” he says.

And he believes the new approach also helped bring the best out of the participants.

“When a person is put under a menurut perintah situation, he is going to give you just enough to fulfil the perintah.

“My group did not need to listen to me nor work together. Yet, I think they gave virtually everything they had,” he says proudly.

The whole GTP exercise certainly broke a few records. The labs got together and began their work in October and by mid-December, their findings were completed.

Instead of just passing the results to the Government, the findings were presented to the public in the form of a stylish exhibition at a suburban convention centre. It was deliberately held on a public holiday so that working people could come.

An essential part of the exercise was getting the public’s feedback. The lab leaders were required to make presentations and many of them were grilled for hours by those attending the sessions.

At the end of the day, although there were those who were cynical about the ability of the Government to implement the findings, most if not all who visited the exhibition were impressed by the new approach that it is taking to improve its performance.

Looking back at the whole experience, Mohamad Nur says he would miss the adrenaline push, the constant get-the-job-done feeling, and the amazing team spirit of the lab.

Those elements made the job very addictive. He adds: “I am almost ready for more such challenges.”

But what really pushed everyone on was the feeling that they were bringing change for the better. “That made everything we did worthwhile.”

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