News editor
Yesterday’s strike on the London Underground led Jason to muse on whether it’s time for a fully-automated service
It’s Friday with many looking forward to the weekend break and I’m sitting here with a pain in the derriere brought about by the fence I’m sitting on.
This discomfort has been caused by the overwhelming inconvenience witnessed in London yesterday when the entire underground rail network was brought to a halt by 24-hour strike action.
Roughly 66 per cent of people travelling in London choose to do so by walking, cycling, or using public transport. London itself has a population of around 8.6 million and Transport for London estimate that 1.27 billion people use the underground per annum.
As you can imagine, there were grumbles aplenty yesterday morning as employees at Centaur Towers traipsed in a little later than usual, and stories were being told this morning of brawls breaking out between cyclists and the many people trying to squeeze onto too few buses.
Undignified scenes are one thing, but the industrial action is estimated to have cost the London economy as much as £300m.
Here’s the rub of the fence I’m on: union members have the right to strike and stand up to employers who seem hell bent on heaping more responsibility on staff for little or no reward. On the face it, however, its looking increasingly difficult to see what train drivers on London Underground have to complain about given their generous T&Cs of employment.
This type of industrial action brings out the usual call for removing humans from the loop. After all, Docklands Light Railway is automated, and trains on the Victoria, Jubilee and Central Tube lines have certain semi-automatic systems, although they still have drivers on board. Line 1 of the Paris Metro has an automatic control system with driverless trains introduced at the rate of two trains per month from 2012.
Plans are in place to introduce the driverless train onto the London Underground network, although the exact timeline of this roll out on the Piccadilly, Central, Waterloo & City and Bakerloo lines is open to interpretation. The new trains will be operational by 2022 but they won’t be fully autonomous at first and will likely always carry a so-called Train Captain to oversee safe operations.
Speaking to the Evening Standard in September 2014, Finn Brennan, ASLEF, said: “Even under the most optimistic proposals, it would be at least another 14 years before new trains on the Piccadilly line could be operated automatically.”
Furthermore, the simple fact remains that industrial action won’t be prevented with the introduction of driverless trains. Stations will always need staff for a range of jobs and strikes can be called for a myriad of reasons, such as the closure of ticket offices.
Full – or close to full – autonomy is moving ahead, as witnessed on the road, in the air and on the rails. We can’t, however, guarantee that such technological advances will help to deliver you to your destination every time because that would require removing humans from the process. Now we wouldn’t want that, would we? Let us know your opinions below.
Its economics really, tube drivers are paid too much given most of us lowly paid engineers would jump at the chance to take an easier job for more money.
Plenty of time then in the evening or daytime to tinker in the sheds we would buy with our surplus wages.
Its only going to take 14 years to replace drivers because of the management hurdles.
Best short term plan is to train and employ more drivers. Supply and demand.
Its the same old unions causing the same old problems, put the offer to the Divers concerned and tell us at the same time.
That way we will see where the problem lies.
Just another way of causing agro for the present government!!
I have little occasion to use the underground system : but can offer another concept of ‘driverless’ trains! In the NHS for many years the internal laundry in most hospitals was a constant source of trouble: hospitals could not ‘operate’ (no pun intended) without a regular supply of sterile ‘linen (it was actually cotton!) and the laundry staff knew that: and played-up as often as they needed to maintain their salary differentials. As the MD of one of my non-woven/disposable fabric suppliers said: “each time there is a strike, we get the order to replace traditional textiles with disposables, and the number of in-house laundry staff reduces” They have almost gone now!
You can’t train and employ more drivers, it’s restricted by the union.
Personally I think we’ve tolerated them long enough. It’s time for a change.
How about everyone gets the right to an independant review of a grievance/pay and conditions, but strikes are banned?
In 1932 the then Southern Railway decided that a Second Man was not needed in their new electric trains and entered into talks with the Rail Unions on the subject. Southern Region of British Rail finally managed to get rid of the Second Man in 1962! Admittedly there was an altercation with a certain Adolf during that period but thirty years! Basically we are dealing with dinosaurs for whom the inconvenience of the general public is a strike weapon. Many of their members simply strike because their unions tell them to without any detailed knowledge of what is on offer!
It’s inevitable really. The more costly in becomes to employ staff, the bigger the incentive to invest in greater automation. I have never felt uncomfortable riding in ‘driverless’ trains so it’s unlikely that a ‘customer preference’ argument would delay the introduction of such. From a corporate perspective, any machine that can operate three shifts a day with no time off for holidays, sickness or any other cause, can effectively replace four staff members – automation is coming to a workplace near you – and probably sooner than most of us care to expect.
Mike your in-house laundry staff only speeded up the inevitable, as will the tube drivers
As regards ‘salary differentials’ who’s worth more to society;
The doctor who treats the typhoid patient,
The chemist who makes the drugs,
or the sewage worker who prevents it in the first place ???
Jason, your fundamental point is correct and it is a point missed by many as they apply the inconvenience to themselves first and others second.
Any transport system, or other service, which has humans somewhere in the chain is vulnerable to those humans wishes and aspirations.
Consider the possibility of a transport system automated to the point of having one individual (human) in control of the ON/OFF switch. How likely is it that you would have exactly the same problem you have just experienced should that person felt put-out for some reason or offended by his paymaster.
Work place relations have for many years needed people with REAL people and negotiation skills, not what we see now at management level; that is were the real failing is 😉
“After all, Docklands Light Railway is automated”
Automated doesn’t mean immune to strikes, in January when RMT members on the DLR voted to strike TfL warned that there would be no trains running.
“trains on the Victoria, Jubilee and Central Tube lines have certain semi-automatic systems, although they still have drivers on board”
It’s called Automatic Train Operation and the Northern Line has it as well. The Circle. District, H&C and Metropolitan Lines were meant to have it by 2018 but Bombardier’s Cityflo system couldn’t cope with the three way junctions at Earl’s Court and Aldgate. Thales were announced as the new contractors a few weeks ago and the completion date has now been put back to 2023.
“Plans are in place to introduce the driverless train onto ……the Piccadilly, Central, Waterloo & City and Bakerloo lines”.
It won’t be until Thales finish the work on the Sub Surface Lines, the first driverless train might appear on the Piccadilly Line around 2025 but until all the 1973 stock has been replaced– about two years at the rate of one train per week – and platform edge doors fitted they will need to be driven manually, not by a “train captain” but by a driver.
The whole project won’t be completed until the mid-2030s and will still leave 70% of trains needing a driver in the cab. Unless LU close down the lines for a years then the introduction of driverless trains will need union support, something they achieved by neogitation in Paris when converting Ligne 1.
“industrial action won’t be prevented with the introduction of driverless trains. Stations will always need staff for a range of jobs and strikes can be called for a myriad of reasons, such as the closure of ticket offices.”
The current strike involves around 20000 staff of which only 3500 are train drivers, along with station staff (a legal requirement in the sub-surface stations after the King’s Cross fire) the control room operators, signallers, power supply controllers, signals, track and train technicians, even some junior managers are all in dispute with LU.
Seems to me that a mixed bag would work. Difficult lines, like Piccadilly could continue to work with “humans”, less difficult should be automated.
I know that a lot of the drivers are concerned about their jobs, but an introduction of automated trains by 2022 will happen, they can either embrace the changes and work with the system and develop their role or they can oppose it and perish. I would expect that a lot of the opposition is simply tradition (we have always done it like this) and politics.
There were in fact engineers in the same unions (myself included) who also went on strike. Personally I do not believe the strike was justified but having voted accordingly I then felt obliged to accept the consensus. It may also be worth emphasising that most of the people involved in the strike are not drivers, and do not earn nearly as much, such as station staff, many of whom are also being made redundant, and myself.
UG train system seems ideal for automation, hopefully
Crossrail has incorporated the design. London has too much to lose without a reliable UG, better trains help workers need to play heir part in modernisation.
Interesting, the Melbourne, Australia train drivers must have got the same idea as the ones in London. They are threatening strike action next week, the first time in many years.
Legislation is in hand to make sure that enough of the members vote, to make the issue representative. Which would have been advisable for some other (national) votes in the last year or two.
And, regarding two of the entries above, I really hope that the essential Cleaners will include, looking & cleaning under stairs and the like among their tasks.