Times of Hammersmith & City Line Trains from platform 3 at Barking Station

This photo shows the poster at the top of the stairs to platform 6 at Barking Station. It explains that most H&C trains depart from platform 6 and gives the exceptions that depart from platform 3 (44 of them on weekdays).
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Here is a transcription which you may like to copy and file fro reference:

Mo-Fr:

0611 0628 0650 0709 0748 0806 0828 0845 0857 0917 0925 0934 0946 0957 1005

1545 1555 1605 1617 1626 1637 1645 1656 1706 1716 1725 1735 1746 1755 1805 1814 1826 1835 1846 1856 1906 1915 1925 1935 1945 2344 2354 0005

Sat: 0606 0630 2345

Sun: 0641 - 0735 plat 6
0745 onwards plat 3

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What the poster doesn't show is the times of District Line trains from platform 3 - I have seen someone making her way to platform 3 to catch what I assume she thought was an H&C. It was the wrong type of train for the H&C line, but a lot of people don't know the difference, and anyway the District line will soon be operated by S-stock trains like the H&C, so the train's appearance will be no indication.

The "changes" were, I've been told, caused by the introduction of the new S-stock trains.  It's bad practice that this poster is undated (at least as displayed) and it would be useful if it were available on line. I have yet to check whether the other locations that showed the previous version of this poster have this one, which I assume to be the latest.

TfL say that they do intend to add platform numbers to their journey planner, but this is a long way down the line. In the mean time, if you really want to know full details, you can plough through the working timetables at http://www.tfl.gov.uk/corporate/publications-and-reports/working-timetables.


The information provided about Sunday is not terribly helpful, as it doesn't give the times of departures from platform 3, so we still don't know whether to set off down there or not.

If/when the Barking & Gospel Oak Line service is extended onto the Tilbury loop, it will use platforms 7/8. This would free up platform 1, which could conceivably be used for Underground services terminating at Barking.

Even so, what we need is a proper train describer just like the c2c, B&GO and other Underground platforms have, giving dynamic information.

Times of Hammersmith & City Line Trains from Barking Platform 6

Attached is a photo of the poster in the ticket hall which lists the times of these trains. It is undated, so I can only assume it is current, and I haven't checked whether the details are different from the last time I posted similarly.

Hammersmith and City Line Departures from platform 6 at Barking

Most H&C trains use platform 3 at Barking (the "bay road" further west than all the other platform faces). There's a poster on the bridge listing which departures are from platform . I haven't been able to find this poster on the web, so I took a photo of it. I have also updated the Wikipedia article about Barking Station with the info from the poster.

The information is a bit ambiguous, because it isn't clear whether there are departures from platform 3 intermingled with these. Some are so close together that it seems unlikely, but others are more spaced apart.

If you're planning a journey this information could help - the TfL journey planner doesn't currently tell you which platform to use.

If c2c get their act together they will start to integrate dynamic LUL train information with their own. It would be extremely useful to know the departure times from platform 3 from information displayed near the steps from the bridge.

District Line and S stock

I had my first experience of the new and long overdue dot-matrix train describer at Barking station, platform 6, last Sunday. The trains (or more correctly, services) were all described as 'District Line'. I thought, Ok, maybe it's not a good idea to describe them as Ealing Broadway, Richmond or Wimbledon as the correct thing to do is to get the first train and change where appropriate (typically Earl's Court). However, the first train along was a C stock train bound for Hammersmith via Edgware Road.

Admittedly such trains do run on the District Line Wimbledon / Edgware Road Branch, but this was clearly a Hammersmith & City Line Train.

When the new S stock trains entirely take over, the platform and train descriptions will become more important as the type of train stock will not give a clue to its route. The trains on the Metropolitan line will be 8 coaches  long, and those on the District, Circle and H&C will be 7 coaches long. As things currently stand the Met doesn't come to Barking, so even that hard to spot difference won't help.

I say as things currently stand, because there is talk of returning the Met to Barking and running the Ham & City out of Aldgate. This is all rather academic, because all these lines are joined together and all the trains can run any route, in theory. When the trains are all S stock they can run Upminster to Uxbridge if they want.  As they run on largely the same tracks they use largely the same platforms, so changing is dead easy. All they must avoid is service patterns that confuse the customer.

Teacup service replaces Circle Line

From December, instead of just running round the Circle, Circle Line trains will run from Hammersmith, through Edgware Road, right round the Circle to Edgware Road again to terminate and reverse.

This will enable trains to be near their depot at Hammersmith more frequently to receive routine maintenance and therefore be less likely to be taken out of service with faults.

The concern is what it will say on the front of the train that isn't at best uninformative and at worst confusing to people who might set off to Hammersmith in the wrong direction.

Barking and east London hit hard by weekend tube/railclosures

This weekend there is no District line between Upminster and Embankment, no Jubilee line beween Green Park and Stratford until 1230 No Barking & Gospel Oak line and no Circle line. The Hammersmith and City line, which runs on the same tracks as the District between Barking & Aldgate East, a is running.

I know the work's got to be done, but it is taking a long time. The District line east of Barking seems to be closed weekend after weekend. Last weekend when it was only closed east of Dagenham East I thought the end was in sight.

As to the B and GO, we had a 4 week closure in September and we now have works pretty much every weekend until September. We welcome improvements of course.

Train Service Disruption- c2c and Underground

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/7437086.stm

The piece below is written by c2c from their perspective, lightly edited by me.


Thursday 5 and Friday 6 June 2008

As you may he aware, earlier this week an unexploded wartime bomb was unearthed on a construction site near the train line between West Ham and Barking. [In fact it's near Bromley by Bow]

For safety reasons, the Police and M.O.D have requested that we close our railway lines between Barking and Limehouse between 9pm on Thursday 5 and 8am on Friday 6 June whilst they work to remove the device. LUL's District & Hammersmith lines will also be closed in this area.

Below are details of the impact this will have on our train services between the affected times:

Thursday 5 June 2008

From 8.50pm there will be no c2c services from Fenchurch Street: a limited service will operate from Liverpool Street, which may also require a change at Barking for services to Grays and "Tilbury Loop" stations.

Customers arc advised, where possible, to commence their journey from London before 20.30.

Friday 6 June 2008

There will be an extremely limited c2c service operating during the morning [?peak], and subject to the railway line being cleared for safe operation, a limited service will continue for the rest of the morning but [it] is expected to be exceptionally busy and travel should he avoided wherever possible.

National Express East Anglia will accept c2c tickets; however London Underground District and Hammersmith & City Lines and other transport services will also be affected by the operation.

Customers are advised where possible to avoid travelling during the morning.
As you may appreciate this particular incident is outside of our control but we will do all we can to minimise the impact on your journey.

Please listen to local radio, contact National Rail Enquires on 084577 48 49 50 or visit our ww http://www.c2c-online.co.uk/ for further information and details of our actual train service during the affected times.

I am very sorry for any delay or inconvenience you may experience due to this particular incident.

Julian Drury
Managing Director
c2c Rail