All Change on the Tube

What do you think this was doing parked on my street all weekend? The interior lights were on and the generator was whirring.

Here’s a (misleading) clue.

TfL and the NHS teamed up to persuade more people to register to be organ donors and my theory is that they commissioned these trucks to be mobile signing-up centres. But now they are using them for something completely different.

By the end of last year all the tube station ticket offices were closed. Now the next stage of TfL’s reorganisation is underway. Every tube station has been put in one of these four categories.

There are six Gateway stations; main entry points to London for visitors, like St Pancras. There are twenty-nine Destination stations; busy, central London stations with high volumes of commuters and tourists. Metro stations are smaller central London stations and Local stations are small suburban ones, like Barons Court.

Barons Court, which hitherto had its own dedicated staff, will be part of a group of three stations: Hammersmith (Metro) and Barons Court and Ravenscourt Park (both Local). Staff will be deployed to man these stations from one team, the idea being to maximise efficiency, minimise overlap and save money. The main difference you may notice, besides strange faces at the ticket barrier at your station, will be that staff will have mini iPads. This is not to play games on, but to help you plan your journey and to report anything that needs to be reported. Tfl have given their staff a top tip which I’m going to try. They say that an iPad charges faster when the Airplane Mode is switched on.

This reorganisation will be fully implemented across the whole tube system by 3rd April. If you’d like to read all the nitty-gritty it is here.

So what was the Transplant truck being used for? My guess is that it is a mobile classroom to train staff, help them get to grips with their new duties and rosters and meet their new colleagues.

Meanwhile, in another part of the forest, tube drivers have accepted a pay deal to drive night tubes. Whatever you think of Boris Johnson (Ruth Davidson, Scottish Conservative leader, described his performance on The Andrew Marr Show as a  “bumble-bluster, kitten smirk, tangent-bombast routine”) he has overcome trade union opposition to deliver a lot of improvements to the bus, tube and bicycle networks in London. I hope Zac Goldsmith gets elected as London mayor to continue this good work. I will be plodding around the streets of Hammersmith on Saturday putting his campaign leaflet through letterboxes.