Driver only trains - safe??

[CaleyDave]

Coming to this purely from an IT perspective I think the comment about eventually needing guards more than drivers is spot on.

I think we *know* enough to build driverless trains that would be safer than any human driver. We don't yet know how to build it, test it and deploy it cheaply enough except in very controlled environments. (Underground for example because there are less freaky things to deal with). At the moment our processes for producing very safe, very reliable highly tested computer code are effective, but they are incredibly expensive.

We can't replace guards with machines yet. We couldn't even build a robo guard that could walk the length of a crowded HST at 125mph stepping over baggage and dealing with questions.

It turns out people are hard. If we wanted today we could build a supermarket that robot self restocked, had full automated payment systems and was even largely self maintaining. It would be awesome, efficient and reliable, but the moment a bunch of drunks run in and try and steal all the cider it would be screwed.

So it turns out the most important rôle for staff in a future supermarket is probably security.

It's often not the obvious bits of a job that are hard to automate.

Alan

Disagree with the statement about Guards. The day of the Traditional Train Guard is numbered However the future of the lower skilled, not safety critical Revenue protection office is guaranteed despite all the fear about trains only having one member of staff.

Someone is still needed to sell and enforce tickets (How else can the make money!). Not every station can be manned or fitted with barriers so someone is still needed.
Give them basic train safety and With credit cards and contact-less payment they don't even need to be trained or trusted to handle money in areas where walk-on tickets are available.

CCTV recognition software, door edge detection and a range of other sensors could all eliminate the  need for a human pair of eyes to watch the doors be it the driver or the guard. What should be controversial is rather than force operators to prove they have a new system in place (or force them to implement one)  to safeguard the train and passengers instead any danger no mater how unlikely is simply written off.
(Doesn't matter who closes the doors I am of the opinion if there isn't a drop down window for the guard to look out off there is always the risk of people getting hurt.)

As for the driver, newer signally systems could well see the computer taking more control.
20-30-40 years from now the Driver could be replaced with a minder with nothing more than a start and emergency stop button if we haven't made that leap of faith to trust the computer completely.

Automation is coming, we are on the edge of a new industrial revolution. A wide range of jobs from all backgrounds are set to be deskilled or eliminated completely and these disputes will appear quaint and simple to those who witness it.
And as the Skilled Jobs which remain require more and more Training and Education we will be presented with a choice;
Fight for Training opportunities and the retention of jobs like Ticket inspectors which have a social worth and value over the cost-savings of a machine.
Let it overwhelm us and face becoming confined to the scrapheap chasing race to the bottom jobs whilst the new industrialists profit greatly.
Or Reject it all, limit progress and force a future generation to face the hard decisions for we can not un-invent it.

[Bealman]

I thought that all modern airliner crew were just minders already?

[Snowwolflair]

I thought that all modern airliner crew were just minders already?

Yes

[Hailstone]

I have looked at the comments on this thread and would like to put forward my own tuppence worth for your consideration.
some people have pointed out that other lines already operate driver only trains the former western region for example, my answer is that you cannot compare a line whose local services are more spread using at most 9 car units on almost dead straight platforms to the Southern whose platforms often at curved in more than one direction using up to 12 car trains especially in the rush hour with the suicidal attitudes of modern commuters trying to save that last second (anyone doubting this can see a perfect example any weekday at Stratford on the Jubilee line or waterloo in the evening, I have no doubt that it is any different anywhere else).
modern management is obsessed with the one size fits all solution even where common sense deems it dangerous, and of course the people who formulate these dangerous ideas rarely if ever stand to take the blame for the frequently inevitable consequences, preferring to hide behind PR people when things go wrong.
The obviously one sided reporting by the media helps no one at all, most of the angry commuters only think in one direction until their viewpoint is challenged with a more logical argument - believe me I have hav a few pointed conversations on platforms, and as soon as the facts are pointed out, the most vociferous amongst them go quiet while they realise that the last bastions of safety protecting them are going to be removed by people whose only loyalty is to the pound note or the bottom line.
For those who point to the DLR, I would remind them that the longest units currently in use are 4 cars long, which is not much longer than a 3 car unit on the proper railways and the train captains close the doors and step out to see that all is ok before getting back in to send that train on its way.
finally I have to say that my personal observations come from 40 years travelling on rail, tube and DLR

Regards,

Alex

[geoffc]

Back in the days of Wessex Trains I was coming back from Portsmouth Harbour to Bristol, when the train arrived at Southampton we all had to detrain. We then went by bus to Romsey and boarded the same train! I asked the guard why this had happened, his reply was that the train had to be diverted and although there was a pilotman up front he had not signed for that route and there was no signed guard available, thus they could not carry passengers. If that was the case then have the rules and standards of safety been changed now to appease the mighty god of profit. Is this yet another idea dreamed up by people who do not live in the real world and have never worked at the coal face, rather like the use of the hard shoulder on motorways as a running lane to save costs at the expense of safety.

Geoff

[Byegad]

I've been keeping an eye on this one for a while and the below reply is the best reason why OMO trains are a bad idea.

On a personal note.

Some 30+ years ago on an Edinburgh-London train a rather drunk Scotsman took exception to everyone and everything English. He was very drunk (At 10 am) and his behaviour was very worrying as he was plainly looking for someone to fight him. Luckily the guard came through the carriage while he was launching a tirade at one poor guy who was wearing an England Football shirt. The guard not only managed to cool him down, but also called the Police who escorted the guy off the train at the next stop. With One Man Operation this had the potential to turn very bad very quickly!

I am writing here as a retired Guard/Train Manager who worked for BR, Thames Trains and FGW on everything from loco and coaches, HSTs to 166 DMUs, along with various Southern electric EMUs both in Guard and Driver Only operation and my opinion is a firm no DOO is not 'safe'.

I feel that the railway/Department for Transport is only considering the operational side of the 'argument' - but that is only one aspect.

I feel on any train where passengers are carried there must be a member of staff who can be contacted in order to deal with the everyday questions e.g. "Where do I change for Oxford?" to lost property, passengers behaving badly (loud music or other anti social behaviour) to even threatening others (one of my last trains before retirement was carrying a man with a knife threatening other passengers; he was arrested but had a Guard not been there to alert the police?).

I believe that there are many points which are simply not being taken into account - the Guard on a passenger train does much more than close doors and goes back to his newspaper which, from the reports I'm reading, seems to be what some sections seem to think.

[JasonBz]

Whether you agree with them or not is probably down to how much you know about Railways and how people interact when on them.

On a board that tries to be apolitical, that's an extremely provocative statement! If I'm reading your comment right (and correct me if I'm not) then you seem to be suggesting that anyone who agrees with Southern that driver-only operation is safe "doesn't know anything" about railways.

There are argument both ways in terms of driver-only operation. It isn't a simple as choosing between "cheaper" and "more safe". There are costs involved in making trains driver-only operated, and conversely, there hasn't been any measurable decrease in safety where driver-only operated trains already operate.

Even if it was about simply saving money, if services are too expensive to run, they get withdrawn, so the costs of running a train service have to be considered when balancing risks against expense.

I'd direct forum members to this excellent and balanced review at Rail Magazine, here:

http://www.railmagazine.com/trains/current-trains/the-pros-and-cons-of-driver-only-operation

Cheers, NeMo

Nothing political there, just that having spent the best part of 15 years working on trains as a Guard/Conductor/Train Manager gives me a much better view (and opinion) of what on-board life will be like for the passengers when there is no person with authority there to keep order.

The Guard is in charge of the train - period.
There is no supervisor or "higher authority", if the Guard tells you to behave, or leave the train, that is what you do. OR be arrested/taken away at the next available point.
BTP won't argue the case, they will carry out the Guard's request.

I simply do not believe that some "on board staff" will have that authority - or they would be "guards", and it is that authority that keeps a general sense of order on the huge majority of train services.

[Cypherus]

Having been at both ends of a train, Starting as a Guard and ending my Railway days as a Driver I can see both sides of this discussion.

From a Guards point of view, his training places him in total charge of the train and it's safe and correct operation but only initially in an oversight capacity, Only when something needs to be done or safety is compromised do their duties compel them to act so as long as nothing in the above takes place they are essentially along for the ride.

Not wishing to detract from the import of the Guards duties, The Driver, on the other hand being at the sharp end has the duty of enacting all required rules regulations and actions involved in moving a train from point to point in good order.

In the past when onboard communications was not available, Long promised but never provided, a lot of what took place followed set methods that required two or more individuals to work in unison, Station and yard operations being only two areas, Now with the introduction of technology Platform operations can be conducted by the Driver alone and to some extent interior oversight can be achieved but the loss of the second person on some passenger trains does present risks not only to the safe operation of the train but to the passengers an crew.

Open line operation becomes far simpler as the Driver need not leave the cab except in exceptional circumstances so main line movements between locations can be made without a second person aboard as long as nothing goes wrong.

To the layman, Rail operations can be a mystery, how things happen and in what order even reading the rule book and operating manual can leave them with more questions than answers, To the staff however once trained and that includes a period of acclimatisation will be able to fill in the gaps.

Long gone is the equipment I had to use, voice-activated telephones in dank spider filled wooden boxes talking to a signalman many miles away, a wind up watch and train consist sheets written out by hand and calculated often in the dark of an unlit siding in mid-winter. Overall the job has got a lot simpler but has lost something along the way.

In the end, it's the tech that will make Driver only operations work, driven by shareholders dividends, not sure the travelling public will really note a difference as long as they get there in one piece and about on time, I just wish that the train operating companies learned something that BR new all about decades ago, that joined up thinking works.

[Ian Bowden]

Operating companies are there to make profits. As in Victorian times the rush to save money and any safety issues that result will only be curbed by regulations unfortunately introduced after some disaster. As someone said every screw saved is more profit.

[njee20]

Avoided this thread, because it's the most infernal and pointless discussion ever! However, surely discussions about profit are entirely moot because of how the Southern franchise is operated. GTR don't care if they make profit, they hand it straight to the government. There's no incentive to Southern to even run a train, let alone cut costs.

JasonBz - you're not disinterested, you can be as vocal as you like, but you're arguing for your own livelihood! Few people would put their hand up and say they're entirely superfluous.

Either way, it seems to have settled down, Southern are performing well at the moment (from my first hand experience on the Arun Valley line). The OBSs are making pointed announcements starting "this is your OBS", where they never used to say "this is your guard", but they've also started checking tickets, which didn't happen once to me in the whole of the second half of last year. So they obviously feel they can come out of hiding now, which is nice. I'd sooner have a visible OBS than an invisible guard.

Miraculously the camera reliability has markedly improved on 377s too, and there are far fewer cancellations!

Personally, I feel the situation is fine. The only element where I think DOO is genuinely an issue is with disabled passengers at unmanned stations. I've yet to see a good explanation of how that'll be handled without staff. There's far too much hand-wringing going on about how dangerous this is. If you believe the hyperbole you'd think that people were losing arms on a daily basis. IMO the defence that "trains are long and crowded, and platforms are curved" is totally invalid; a guard cannot see down a packed, curved, rush hour platform any more than the driver can.