"Overcrowding" you say .......

[Badger]

I can't believe this is real

What d'ya reckon?

[JamieLei]

I've seen that before (it's actually in Japan), and I can believe it completely! Only after you've been in a similar situation in an Asian country (in my case, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia) can you believe it's possible to fit that many people into a tiny space...

[Railwaymodeler]

Anyone remember the game 'A-Train'?

OK, if a train had a capacity of 600 passengers, it could double to 1200 for standees. The manual for the game even references what happens in the video as the reason!

[athanasios]

That's acceptable. In other countries they are hanging from the open doors.

[Dave]

Or off the front of the loco

[JamieLei]

Many suburban Japanese trains have four doors on the side, more typical of a metro system. Even the 'A' stock on the London Underground on the Metropolitan Line, the most Outer-Suburban units only have three sets of doors on the side. The number of doors and layout of seating has a huge influence on standing capacity.

Each 8-car 'A' Stock Met. Line set can hold 448 passengers seated, whereas 976 people can additionally stand. This is when seating is transverse, facing forward and back.

The 6-car 'C' Stock on the Circle, H&C and parts of District can seat a mere 192 passengers seated, but 1080 can additionally stand! As shown, when seating is longitudinal, seating capacity decreases but standing capacity dramatically increases.

The JR Yamanote Line in Tokyo, the equivalent of the UK Circle line goes one step further to increase capacity - they remove the seats during the rush hour by tilting them up. Some 3.5 million people travel on the line each day, in contrast to London Underground's 4.25 million over all it's lines.



Unfortunately, the train in the video is not the Yamanote Line - the yellow colour on the outside suggests otherwise.

[Ameecher]

The number of doors on an underground train is restricted by the physically length of the train, adding more doors would mean it was a solid wall of doors which just wouldn't work, as it is people fall out at stations you make it all doors everyone on one side falls out. And no you can't make the coaches longer due to a rather large issue with VERY tight corners.

One interesting thing is that the new Surface lines stock will be articulated much like a tram allowing more people to be crammed in and also people can spread out along the train.

[JamieLei]

The number of doors on an underground train is restricted by the physically length of the train .... One interesting thing is that the new Surface lines stock will be articulated much like a tram allowing more people to be crammed in and also people can spread out along the train.

I wasn't saying there's a need for more doors - 4 doors seems to be optimal for most metro trains around the world. Some Japanese sets have 6 doors on busy lines such as the Yamanote line, although this is more an extreme example.

All of Singapore's MRT sets are articulated, allowing people to walk through from one end to the other. It works very well - people do stretch out throughout the train (obviously not someone walking down 2 coaches but the crowd gradually shifting to where there's room). It pities me to be stuck in a crowded coach of a Central Line train where the next coach along has seats available. Of course, once in a coach, people don't change as it's too much work and the risk of getting left behind.

Then lastly we had the bit of a ridiculous layout with the Cigs, Veps, Vops whatever (I never understood the naming of SR units) where there was a door next to every seat. I don't remember everyone there falling out at every station!

[Ameecher]

You can use the doors between carriages but only "officially" while they are a station and not in motion.
As for the Southern Slammers argument, I have no idea what relevance this has. People fall out on the underground and other lines because they are so crowded that they are just jammed in, as soon as the door opens, they have now way to stay upright. A slammer is different in that the doors are manual and also a damn sight narrower allowing people to brace themselves against something. Also there was very little standing space on a slammer due to the way they were designed.

[Dave]

Jamei you're an idiot - all trains had "a door near every seat" once - it's called compartment stock - and people didn't open them unless they had to.

[R682818]

Speaking of crowds, the Lexington Ave. Line here (4, 5m 6 Line) hers horribly overcrowded at Rush Hour, due to the fact the closest subway line is at least 3 miles away. The 42 Street Shuttle isin't as bad, due to the fact that it is only 2 stops long, still gets overcrowded though. And last we have the Flushing Line AKA the 7. This line can get so crowded they had to put on an 11th car, thus giving it 11x R62A Cars. I try to avoid this line A LOT, and it's a hellhole when theres a Met game a few hours away. Then the Met fans go apeshit on the 7, as it serves Shea Stadium (same can be said for B, D, and 4 lines for yankee Stadium). The rest of the subway is not as bad, also about the video... can't they wait for the NEXT train?

[tkz]

I had the pleasure of travelling on Shanghai's underground/metro system at a busy time last year - Was pretty similar to that apart from one tall Western guy crammed in there!

[JamieLei]

All Chinese metro stations feel uniform and identical nowadays - seeing pictures of the Shanghai Metro, it looks extremely similar to the Chongqing one or the Singapore one.

It's not just the platform screen doors that gives the impression (even if they are all the same make), it's the positioning of route maps in identical places, heights of ceiling being the same, granite surfaces being used to give a cool impression in the heat and so forth...

[Kevo00]

Then lastly we had the bit of a ridiculous layout with the Cigs, Veps, Vops whatever (I never understood the naming of SR units) where there was a door next to every seat. I don't remember everyone there falling out at every station!

Lol, of course the difference here was that these doors were not automatic. Though slam door stock was abandoned in part because people were falling out of the trains whether it was at a station or not, because they were leaning on the doors smoking etc., or because it was overcrowded (overcrowding can happen even with corridor stock Dave), or because people were too impatient and tried to get off while the train was still moving, which is why the few remaining slam door trains, like the HSTs are now centrally locked.

In terms of present day overcrowding, one way forward for the London commuter routes might be to have some carriages without seats that you can travel on for half price, although no doubt the 3rd rail massiv, a notoriously difficult group of people to appease, would still complain about this.

In A-Train, what I never understood was that the game had about 15 different multiple units to chose from yet the manual had a fetish about the AR3 train, claiming it the most profitable. Yet it could only carry 1200, yet the AR could carry more (about 1400 I think) at the same speed. Go figure...

[Parkey]

Wasn't the worst problem with slam-door commuter trains the way in which people would open doors before the train had completely stopped, hitting people on the crowded platforms? As far as I know that actually killed a much larger number than the people who fell out of them.

[JamieLei]

I remember reading somewhere the ramblings of a slam-door driver. He approached his booked 12-car set at London Victoria to find that there was a 4 car set in its place and 2/3 of the train missing! People were still trying to cram in, and were literally hanging out of the doors desperately trying to squeeze in. He refused to drive the train anywhere until another two sets were found, which magically within a short time arrived from the depot!

This was in the days of British Rail though where operationally things were a bit more flexible. You'd never hear of SWT lending Southern their units at short notice nowadays! Although every now and then, FGW do lend Chiltern a number of 165s to shove those Wembley people in the direction of Marylebone. Glad to see there's co-operation in the privatised era.

[Dave]

There was a time when the 165s were part of a shared pool.

To be honest, Chiltern should these days have enough of their own.

7-car services for huge FA Cup semi-finals with decent Midlands teams, however, just doesn't cut it.

3x3-car would have been so much better, stopping correctly at each platform to allow each set to fill up.

Alternatively - 67+10xmk3+67 would have been much better.

[JamieLei]

The problem is station lengths. Chiltern often run 8car odd-mixes (anything above 4 cars will almost certainly contain a 165 somewhere in the set), but 10 cars would be a problem for most Chiltern stations. The 165s are also 23m rather than 20m so there would be an even bigger squeeze on the platforms...

[Dave]

*shrug* You don't get many stations where 10-cars would fit.

Stourbridge Junction, Snow Hill and Moor Street do though. It would have been perfect - instruct all fans to travel to one of the three stations and board there.

Limited stopper...

SBJ-BSW-BMO-LMS-BAN-WCX

That would have the fans bouncing.

SBJ would need new platform to the west, however - since the current one is fenced off. On that note I reckon the train could have stopped at Rowley Regis too, for the same reason - the platform there is quite long.

No one cares about anywhere else.

Kidderminster can knob off. No one cares about that dump.