London Underground Ticket Office Closures

London Underground plans to close or cut most of its ticket offices, and to reduce station staffing by over 1,000 staff. A number of people have sent me a link to petition that's been set up by Janine Booth to try to stop the closures.


It says: "To provide customer service and safety, London Underground stations need more staff not fewer. Popular opposition stopped planned ticket office closures in 2008; now we need the same popular opposition to stop them again."

From a safety point of view, I don't think it's a great idea to have unmanned or unpersonned stations. A number of old British Rail stations have suffered an increase in assaults etc due to de-staffing.

"Leaked proposals indicate that up to 144 ticket offices will be closed and up to 1,200 jobs will be axed, said the Socialist Party website.

"Already scores of jobs around the combine are left vacant, with no intention by management to fill them. Many outlying stations are regularly left unstaffed, which is a health and safety risk for the travelling public - who are already faced with the costliest transport system in Europe."

This is probably one a few times when I find I'm in support of the RMT! If you'd like to sign the petition it's here.

It's also pretty frustrating to find unstaffed stations when you want to ask a question or the Oyster & ticket machines are broken, giving you the prospect of a tiresome explanation at the other end of your journey. I wonder how many people will also use the lack of station staff as a way of dodging fares?

What are your thoughts?