A postgraduate student at UCL is carrying out a survey of people's feelings towards using public transport during the coronavirus pandemic and afterwards
A minister in the Department for Transport has given the go-head for the next stage of work on the possible devolution of Great Northern Inner Suburban rail services to Transport for London.
New restrictions on free travel for older people will come into force on 15th June and will apply to the morning peak only. Touching in is to be reintroduced across all bus routes. The maximum number of passengers per bus will be 20 (double deck), 10 (larger single deck), or 6 (smaller single deck). All passengers are reminded to only use public transport if absolutely essential and maintain two metres social distancing wherever possible.
Work on the tunnels between Drayton Park and Moorgate has now been completed and all services on the Hertford Loop via Palmers Green now start or end at Moorgate.
Great Northern Rail has announced that from Saturday 14 December 2019 until an undisclosed date in summer 2020 the line between Finsbury Park and Moorgate will be closed on most weekday evenings from 21.40 and on most weekends. On these days trains will run to and from Kings Cross (at a slightly reduced frequency on weekdays).
The managing director of Thameslink & Great Northern Railways has written to London Assembly Member Joanne McCartney apologising for poor service and disruption to her constituents and assuring her that 'there is a great deal of focus by our operations teams on reliability and punctuality'. Meanwhile, in the Twittersphere arguments have been raging about whether or not the new trains are better than the old units
In response to a flood of tweets from angry and frustrated rail passengers, Enfield Southgate MP Bambos Charalambous has written to the managing director of Govia Thameslink Railway to complain about the continuing high incidence of cancellations due to driver unavailability on routes serving stations in his constituency.
Palmers Green is one of a long list of railway stations where money for improvements is being made available from Govia Thameslink Railway's passenger benefit fund, which has been set up to provide some sort of compensation to people whose journeys were severely disrupted by the chaotic introduction of new timetables in May 2018. Palmers Green station is in Tier 1 and £80,000 is being allocated.
But are GTR yet capable of delivering the most important passenger benefit - a reliable train service? If not, is it high time that the Moorgate services were transferred to Transport for London?
