At first glance, it would seem that ‘transport’ and ‘information’ should be a common compound term. A key determinant about most forms of transport is about when it will leave, the route, and when it will arrive; oh, of course and the Byzantium fares structure is also fairly information intensive. Curious then how the relationship between ‘transport’ and ‘information’ actually seems to work. 

Yes, I know this is really boring and it’s amazing how the revolution of web 2.0 has turned all into Victor Meldrew, in fact ‘Victor Meldrew’ would be good Cockney rhyming slang for web 2.0.

Today, is again a case in point. The east coast mainline train has turned customer services into a form of severe mental annoyance. This isn’t customer service at all - it’s about how many greasy sandwiches they can sell between Edinburgh and Kings Cross. The 09:00 from Newcastle this morning made long announcements after every station about the safety instructions, keep  your bags with you, check your bags, there is a full buffet car…serving full English breakfast…the name of the chef is…also a selection of hot and cold drinks blah blah blah. This is all delivered over a broken tannoy system so the endless talking is accompanied by feedback that Jimi Hendrix would have been proud of. So much for the quite coach. 

The short train journey from Liverpool Street to Romford was blissful in the silent way the driver managed to say nothing. What a treat. 

On the way to Oxford I decided to zip into Diwana’s and get a house special thali. I’m sure they have a new chef because the quality of the food has improved and it’s impossible to not eat the whole lot. Great I thought, stepping out into the cold London air. Except Euston Square tube was closed ‘due to overcrowding at Kings Cross’. Cue angry man demanding to see the station manager because he’d just walked from Kings Cross where he was told the station was closed due to overcrowding but he’d be able to get on at Euston Square. Up until that point, everyone at Euston Square had been told to walk to Great Portland Street where they would be able to get on the tube. I presume at Great Portland Street people were being told to walk to Baker Street …and so on. Eventually everyone would just walk from one tube station to another until they got home. 

Isn’t strange that it’s not possible to give some indication of when the overcrowding would ease up? It was 7pm and it must be possible to assess how many people are getting on the trains at key points. But not an iota of information was forthcoming. So I crossed the Euston Road and jumped on a number 18 bus. In the minute I did this, the crowd of people at the entrance to Euston Square disappeared underground like water down the bath plug hole. So in the space of 60 seconds, the situation had changed from ‘no idea when the congestion will ease’ to one where it was obviously now ok. 

I have rarely been on the 18 bus. I can remember getting stuck in it once on the Harrow Road during the Notting Hill Carnival and being 2  hours late for a dinner. I was mentally trying to work out whether it would go past Paddington and scanned the entire interior of the bus for any clues. This is a long bendy bus and the driver was done the other end about 70 metres away from me. Despite the endless strangely disembodied voice telling the passengers where we were (Tottenham Court Road, Goodge Street and so on) there were no messages telling us the route - now I would have found that more useful. Neither are there any maps inside the bus to show the route.

I jumped off at Great Portland Street expecting to be told to walk back to Euston Square. The station was empty and within a minute an almost empty circle line train appeared. Congestion? Information?