|
|
Post by liverpoollou on Apr 26, 2013 11:37:19 GMT
www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-22306918Three Bridges SCC was evacuated due to fire alarms being activated, this brings me on to my question. With most lines on LU now having a Service Control Centre are LU flying by the seat of there pants if something catastrophic happened to the SCC or as happened at Three Bridges. I know there are Emergency Local Control Panels (ELCP) on modernised lines so local control can be passed over if need be but this involves the SCC being manned and operable. If the service continues to run without any problems occurring then all is good but what if a signal failure occurs or there's a PUT or something worse? The Central Line has an emergency CC at NHG which is about as much use as a chocolate Tea Pot, what about other lines, do they have one? Is the failure of the SCC truly 'fail safe'?
|
|
|
|
Post by railtechnician on Apr 26, 2013 15:48:16 GMT
www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-22306918Three Bridges SCC was evacuated due to fire alarms being activated, this brings me on to my question. With most lines on LU now having a Service Control Centre are LU flying by the seat of there pants if something catastrophic happened to the SCC or as happened at Three Bridges. I know there are Emergency Local Control Panels (ELCP) on modernised lines so local control can be passed over if need be but this involves the SCC being manned and operable. If the service continues to run without any problems occurring then all is good but what if a signal failure occurs or there's a PUT or something worse? The Central Line has an emergency CC at NHG which is about as much use as a chocolate Tea Pot, what about other lines, do they have one? Is the failure of the SCC truly 'fail safe'? Interesting, I recall the Central line backup CC being at Oxford Circus House, like most backup CCs at the time the facilities were limited to train radio and telephone communications. I expect these days the controllers require in an emergency/backup CC identical facilities to those installed in the operational CC. Nowadays I see no reason whatever why such a backup CC could not be provided almost anywhere by porting all the systems over the intranet or via other dedicated communications link. The software to do exactly that was available at least 10 years ago. |
|
|
|
Post by GentlemanJim on Apr 26, 2013 19:55:14 GMT
www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-22306918Three Bridges SCC was evacuated due to fire alarms being activated, this brings me on to my question. With most lines on LU now having a Service Control Centre are LU flying by the seat of there pants if something catastrophic happened to the SCC or as happened at Three Bridges. I know there are Emergency Local Control Panels (ELCP) on modernised lines so local control can be passed over if need be but this involves the SCC being manned and operable. If the service continues to run without any problems occurring then all is good but what if a signal failure occurs or there's a PUT or something worse? The Central Line has an emergency CC at NHG which is about as much use as a chocolate Tea Pot, what about other lines, do they have one? Is the failure of the SCC truly 'fail safe'? Interesting, I recall the Central line backup CC being at Oxford Circus House, like most backup CCs at the time the facilities were limited to train radio and telephone communications. I expect these days the controllers require in an emergency/backup CC identical facilities to those installed in the operational CC. Nowadays I see no reason whatever why such a backup CC could not be provided almost anywhere by porting all the systems over the intranet or via other dedicated communications link. The software to do exactly that was available at least 10 years ago. The Emergency Control Room is at Notting Hill Gate and you're right, it's very limited in what functions are available, there's no signal control from there in any way shape or form. It's probably the daftest place to put it as it could take a long time to get there if you had to go by road. I was involved in a project to create 'Desk 13' (there are 12 at Wood Lane) and North Acton Cabin was identified as ideal as it's easy to get to and secure. The plan was to have full comms and signalling function from 3 work stations with a line over view, the whole thing running as independently from Wood Lane as possible........ it never happened. Unless things have changed with the Northern and Jubilee line upgrades I think Liverpoollou is spot on.... LU flying by the seat of there pants. |
|
|
|
Post by railtechnician on Apr 26, 2013 21:13:55 GMT
It was almost 25 years ago that the emergency CC was at Oxford Circus House. It was literally one office desk with a telephone and a train radio interface, which I only became aware of when I was called to a train radio failure there on a Friday afternoon. The train radio failed during a live test of the facility but I soon had it working again.
Realistically a controller needs a timetable, a logbook and a phone, those have been the tools of the trade from the earliest days, everything else is a bonus.
A control centre can be anything from the basic desk and service controller to a room full of technology with signal operators, information assistant, signal & comms technical officer(s) and train technician(s). What a CC comprises is somewhat dependent upon what it is expected to achieve. In my time as a CR technical officer I had occasion to look into ways of providing emergency facilities at one or more remote locations. Unfortunately each line has its own concept of the requirements thus for example on the Bakerloo line we provided train radio on the signal operator desks with an intention for the signal operators to routinely use train radio to communicate with train operators except in emergencies when train radio would be switched back to the controller although AFAIR this was never more than experimental.
On the District & Picc we looked at ways of porting the existing tunnel telephone system to anywhere else by interfacing the controls to a multiplex system. Switching auto phones, radio, PA and CCTV between locations is not that difficult but signalling controls are another matter. At the end of the day what is achievable is down to money and the £millions required for ideal state of the art facilities which would enable multiple control sites to be easily set up anywhere with a comms link some display screens and a handful of PCs is simply not available. The basic problem being the types of older technologies needing to be 'front ended' if not completely replaced. Resignalling of lines with new incompatible signalling systems does not lend itself to economy so expect emergency facilities to continue to be basic at best until a level of standardisation of systems at least at component level is achieved across all lines.
|
|
|
|
Post by GentlemanJim on Apr 26, 2013 21:47:44 GMT
It was almost 25 years ago that the emergency CC was at Oxford Circus House. It was literally one office desk with a telephone and a train radio interface, which I only became aware of when I was called to a train radio failure there on a Friday afternoon. The train radio failed during a live test of the facility but I soon had it working again. Realistically a controller needs a timetable, a logbook and a phone, those have been the tools of the trade from the earliest days, everything else is a bonus. A control centre can be anything from the basic desk and service controller to a room full of technology with signal operators, information assistant, signal & comms technical officer(s) and train technician(s). What a CC comprises is somewhat dependent upon what it is expected to achieve. In my time as a CR technical officer I had occasion to look into ways of providing emergency facilities at one or more remote locations. Unfortunately each line has its own concept of the requirements thus for example on the Bakerloo line we provided train radio on the signal operator desks with an intention for the signal operators to routinely use train radio to communicate with train operators except in emergencies when train radio would be switched back to the controller although AFAIR this was never more than experimental. On the District & Picc we looked at ways of porting the existing tunnel telephone system to anywhere else by interfacing the controls to a multiplex system. Switching auto phones, radio, PA and CCTV between locations is not that difficult but signalling controls are another matter. At the end of the day what is achievable is down to money and the £millions required for ideal state of the art facilities which would enable multiple control sites to be easily set up anywhere with a comms link some display screens and a handful of PCs is simply not available. The basic problem being the types of older technologies needing to be 'front ended' if not completely replaced. Resignalling of lines with new incompatible signalling systems does not lend itself to economy so expect emergency facilities to continue to be basic at best until a level of standardisation of systems at least at component level is achieved across all lines. Under the Central Line upgrade the SCC was planned for Oxford Circus House but this was abandoned due to security concerns. The emergency CC is most definitely at Notting Hill Gate as I was taken there on my induction to the SCC in 1995, that's not to say it was never at OXO. The Controllers of old were based at Baker St. and armed with a telephone and WTT unfortunately 99% of present day controllers would soon fall over if that's all they had to work with, that's not got anything to do with there ability but what they are given to work with in todays technological age. I find it incredible that what was once a very integrated system (rolling stock and signalling) that as each line is upgraded there is no possibility of inter line cooperation especially on the tube lines. Rolling stock could be cascaded from one tube line to another with relative ease in the past, not so these days. Anyway, I've digressed slightly away from the original post which does pose an interesting scenario. |
|
|
|
Post by railtechnician on Apr 27, 2013 10:08:52 GMT
All offices it seems are security concerns but there was/is plenty of room beneath Oxford Circus House and also Western House to locate secure SCC suites. I knew these sites well as I ran the connecting comms link cable between them shortly after Oxford Circus House was refurbished at the end of the 1980s.
I have not disputed that the present day emergency CC is at Notting Hill Gate, no doubt that was done under CLP at a time when the idea of dissemminating information throughout LU was changing to a NTK basis.
While many may think that devolution of lines was a good idea I believe it was unnecessary and divisive in a way that the current corporate image can never hide. Today's LU I believe is more a hotch potch of related interests than an integrated efficient organisation and thus is a greater burden on financial resources than it might have been and much less advanced or efficient than it could have been.
I recall the two previous Central line Controls Rooms to the present one, having worked in both of them from 1979, the older of those being little different (basically a desk more akin to a switchboard with more modern telephone kit) to a 1928 image of the Earls Court DR control room that appears in "Handling London's Underground Traffic" by JP Thomas.
The old LT organisation was never as efficient as it might have been (like all UK nationalised industries) but an opportunity to turn it into a much more efficient LU fit for the 21st century was simply thrown away along with a lot of £taxpayers. I have held that opinion ever since the late 1980s, through the 10 years of stagnation between devolution and the PPP and ever since I retired even though all I know about the present organisation is what I read online.
Thus I do not find it incredible that today's LU presents a very fragmented image behind a somewhat tarnished corporate image. As you say we have digressed but both history and perception are in my opinion key to what does and does not exist today. There seems to be no overall vision of the future though many ideas are kicked around in the public arena and that is without doubt a result of both national and internal politicking.
In an ideal world one might expect to see a single SCC complex controlling the entire network from a central point much like the old integrated Transad House complex but in a much more secure location, with multiple backup CCs, the key to which is communications based everything. The concept was pioneered to some extent on the Picc in the early 1980s stage 1 resignalling and the 1990 Central resignalling was another step in the right direction, despite its many issues, following trials of another kind with the new Bakerloo CC in the late 1980s.
The way forward as I see it is a move to unmanned but not necessarily driverless trains which requires a CC that in concept contains the service, signalling, information, train remote and incident control and monitoring functions that can exist at multiple locations simultaneously such that a single CC can control one or more lines. By way of additional backup I would have in mind a portable CC in one or two trucks that could be parked anywhere with access to the comms network in an emergency and take operational control of one or more lines immediately. Obviously such a system requires robust and secure communications systems access to all sites from multiple locations and all systems have to be communications based.
Traditionally passenger safety has been assured with interlocking at many levels from the CC right down to track level but modern signalling has removed the lever frame in favour of a computer based local control of one kind or another and such systems lend themselves to multiple control over communications system links whereas all other other systems except trains have had the capability for multiple remote control for many years. I see it as simple progress to automate and remotely control trains even if that means having one or two 'drivers' in CCs to take 'manual' control as and when the need arises.
So yes I can see an interesting scenario or possibly several but somehow I feel that LU will still have a more familiar vision of the future, a somewhat foggy one so far removed from the vision that LT seemed to have.
|
|
|
|
Post by Nortube on Apr 27, 2013 11:28:48 GMT
I suppose it depends on what a backup control centre is wanted for as to its capabilities. If it's to be a full backup, then it probably needs most of what the proper one has. If it's just to be something short ter, such as a fire alert because somebody's burnt the toast or a crafty fag has set off the alarm, then it may need just the basics. It used to be that if a control room had to be evacuated for a fire alert, the programme machines were put in First Come / First Served (I think that was the correct position) and the trains were left to do their own thing until the CC was opened again. I assume that there is a similar thing available with the new signalling systems. Longer term problems could mean that the Regulators worked the individual IMRs (or were present instructing other to operate the levers). This has happened on the Northern line, for example where communication between the IMR and Cobourg St has been lost due to local issues, such as cable damage between the IMR(s) and Cobourg St etc. Obviously, if the CC is evacuated, the Controller will have to be somewhere with at least a telephone or two. Again, requirements depending on how long the evacuation is for. With a short term evacuation, the Controller may hardly have settled in by the time the CC can be reopened. Obviously the ideal (and most expensive) option is for a fully functional back-up CC within easy reach which can be up and running with all the functions of the proper CC within ten minutes. However, that costs money and I assume that, like everything else, decisions are taken as to whether it's worth it for what little use it may have. As has been mentioned elsewhere in the thread, today's technology gives plenty of options as to what can be done in situations like this. Controlling the service remotely from anywhere in the world should be possible if required. Imagine the scenario: Fire alarm goes off. The Controller phones a call centre in India "It's all yours!". Then everyone evacuates the building to the nearest Caffe Nero for an extended tea break. or perhaps a DRM wandering around the line controlling the service from an app on their phone  I don't know how the NR signalling control system works. Accoding to NR: "This morning, severe disruption was caused on parts of the Southern's network due to fire alarms sounding at Three Bridges Signal Box. The signal box was evacuated and train movements were stopped" I don't know if that means that movements were instantly stopped (as in a code red), waited at the next station (as in code amber) or just carried on as far as they could go. |
|
|
|
Post by Rocket Ron on Jun 3, 2013 18:02:26 GMT
www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-22306918Three Bridges SCC was evacuated due to fire alarms being activated, this brings me on to my question. With most lines on LU now having a Service Control Centre are LU flying by the seat of there pants if something catastrophic happened to the SCC or as happened at Three Bridges. I know there are Emergency Local Control Panels (ELCP) on modernised lines so local control can be passed over if need be but this involves the SCC being manned and operable. If the service continues to run without any problems occurring then all is good but what if a signal failure occurs or there's a PUT or something worse? The Central Line has an emergency CC at NHG which is about as much use as a chocolate Tea Pot, what about other lines, do they have one? Is the failure of the SCC truly 'fail safe'? |
|
|
|
Post by hellocontrol on Jun 6, 2013 6:55:34 GMT
www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-22306918Three Bridges SCC was evacuated due to fire alarms being activated, this brings me on to my question. With most lines on LU now having a Service Control Centre are LU flying by the seat of there pants if something catastrophic happened to the SCC or as happened at Three Bridges. I know there are Emergency Local Control Panels (ELCP) on modernised lines so local control can be passed over if need be but this involves the SCC being manned and operable. If the service continues to run without any problems occurring then all is good but what if a signal failure occurs or there's a PUT or something worse? The Central Line has an emergency CC at NHG which is about as much use as a chocolate Tea Pot, what about other lines, do they have one? Is the failure of the SCC truly 'fail safe'? Rocket Ron you don't seem to have said anything? |
|
|
|
Post by class345 on Jun 7, 2013 7:15:22 GMT
Rocket Ron you don't seem to have said anything? Rocket Ron? Now that's a name that rings a few bells  |
|
