Trains, planes and automobiles.

re: Trains, planes and automobiles.

Ryan Coates — Sat, 21 Jul 2007 21:37:44 GMT

James

I had a very similar experience yesterday

Nowhere near the length of time you managed to stay calm mind,

I was stuck at Wimbledon station waiting for my delayed thameslink train, delays I can deal with, in yesterdays weather it’s understandable

But to wait an hour to THEN be told 'oh yeah, the train is fast all the way to the other side of London' is a tad unforgivable

I'm sure they knew THAT was going to happen way ahead of time!

I guess we will always be at the whim of the transport networks :)

London to Paris flight

UK Traveller — Sun, 22 Jul 2007 07:43:16 GMT

Taking Eurostar spews less carbon into the atmosphere than flying from London to Paris.

re: Trains, planes and automobiles.

Faith — Mon, 23 Jul 2007 12:16:07 GMT

What a non-trip! You'd think customer service will be albe to cope with the unpredictable, beautiful British weather. Do not worry you were not the only one whose day was turned upside down because of the weather someone I know was stuck in traffic for 9hrs and they were only going from Reading to Bracknell!

re: Trains, planes and automobiles.

Ben — Mon, 23 Jul 2007 13:05:35 GMT

James,

Sadly, most of us were impacted by the bad weather last week; my Friday involved my normal one hour commute taking eleven hours... but that didn't mean I wanted to hit anybody!!

I'm really not sure what's worse - you wanting to punch somebody from BA or you using your work blog to tell us all the detail of your aggressive fantasy! Get a stress ball!!

re: Trains, planes and automobiles.

jamesone — Tue, 24 Jul 2007 09:31:52 GMT

"UK Traveller".

If the plane to Paris still flies it doesn't change the carbon emissions if there a seat is full or empty. It needs Thousands of people per year not to use the service for BA to cut back the flight.

"Ben"

Sorry if you're upset by my "aggressive fantasy". It seems you got to your destination. I left home at 1PM, and got home at 11:30 PM having made no journey whatsoever. I think that the way the dismal (people unready) IT systems of American Excuse and BA brought me to a rage which was unique in my adult life IS worthy of a mention here. If you don't, no-one's making your read it.

re: Trains, planes and automobiles.

Ben — Tue, 24 Jul 2007 10:29:32 GMT

Hi James

Frankly, I think it's pretty disgusting that you (ab)use your work blog to brag about fighting and the detail your recent violent fantasy of punching a member of BA staff and taking on the Police single handed. It makes me think you have been watching Die-Hard 2 just a few too many times (stuck at the airport, bad weather, etc etc).

Sorry, but I'm reading your blog because I am anticipating "Windows Platform for starters, Virtualization, Real Time Collaboration and Photography to follow, served with a side order of philosophical attitude"; I am not expecting that philosphical attitude to be the thoughts of a member of Fight Club, just because (gasp) a BA staff didn't give you a 'proper answer'.

I'm sure there is a blog out there catering for thugs if I needed a daily dose of violence. You know, I went to hospital the other day and I was saddended to see that they now have to have signs stating that they do not tolerate verbal or physical abuse to their staff; I guess I can see why now. Talk about Microsoft having 'impact'. Yippie-ki-yay!

re: Trains, planes and automobiles.

Ben — Tue, 24 Jul 2007 12:22:03 GMT

Sorry James, I still can't believe this blog post! I can't believe you are so happy to post to the world how just a few hours delay causes you to want 'most in the world' to commit a violent criminal offence (assault) against a member of BA's staff just because he doesn't give you what you consider to be 'proper answer' AND then go on to defy armed police! I don't see how ANY kind of 'dysmal systems' can be used as an excuse to try and justify your thumping a BA employee. If we all thought like that, I imagine they'd be a few black eyes at Microsoft from folks who didn't get a 'proper answer' from 'Clippy' the Office Assistant.

Anyway, if I was from BA, I wouldn't let you near an airplane again; imagine what might happen if they can't give you a proper answer about the inflight movie, where your tomato juice got to or what the weather is like at your destination.

Kiosk PCs are not secure - Blimey, that was close!

Steve Lamb's Blog — Thu, 26 Jul 2007 02:14:47 GMT

As James mentioned in his excellent post detailing his travel misery we're at an internal ("TechReady

The Teleporter would dramatically reduce global warming

Steve Lamb's Blog — Thu, 26 Jul 2007 02:38:25 GMT

As every geek/sci-fi fan knows there's always a place for a teleporter/transporter. I'm luckly that I

re: Trains, planes and automobiles.

jamesone — Thu, 26 Jul 2007 18:09:20 GMT

Ben. As per your previous attempts to engage me I think your engaged in a deliberate attempt to miss the point.

I'm not a violent person. I never said violence would have been justified; understanding what causes a non violent person to want to violent no more makes it right than an aircrash investigation report makes the crash desirable.

You say you come here for various things in my tag line including "a side-order of philosophical attitude". That's the heading this post comes under.

I think I need to tell you now, and in public that I will not approve any more posts from you. If you want to engage in a dialog with me you can see my contact details. I'd like to say it's been nice knowing you, but it hasn't. However for the avoidance of doubt I've never felt even the most minute inclination to do anything remotely violent to you.

re: Trains, planes and automobiles.

AdamV — Thu, 26 Jul 2007 19:47:36 GMT

I understand the levels of frustration this can cause. Recently travelling with my wife and (then) nine-month-old son I was really annoyed. We made a point of asking at the check-in desk if there were any delays caused by the bad weather (snow showers across the Pennines).

"No, there are no delays to flights that we know about."

We had to pretty much go straight through to the gate, all the screens told us we should go through security. This of course means giving up on all spare drinks and baby food (anything we take through including sealed formula milk cartons and food jars have to be opened and tasted as this "proves" they are not poisons or bomb components. It also reduces their shelf-life from months to hours).

No gate announced. All amenities closed. Little 'un so annoyed at being an hour after his bedtime that he is crying and annoying everyone else. After a minor vomiting incident he calms down slightly.

A plane eventually turns up and we go down to the gate. After a few minutes in a comfortable chair while we try to get the sprog to sleep (now two hours past his bedtime) a stewardess asks us and two other couples with infants to come to the desk so we can get on first as we will be boarding in about five to ten minutes. Nearly an hour later we actually board the plane, having all now been standing or sitting on the floor by the desk all this time because they keep saying it will be only a few more minutes. Two of the children are in tears (not ours, thank goodness) and two of the parents look close too.

The problem leading to our three hour delay was partly the weather, partly rules about crews' working hours. Perhaps unavoidable, perhaps just badly managed in the first place.

The reason this delay really annoyed us was the total lack of useful or reliable information. The flight could not possibly leave on time - while we were asking at check-in, the plane was actually at the wrong airport 80 miles away, having been diverted to refuel. Someone, somewhere must have known this, the pilot did not just do it on a whim.

We could have been much more comfortable, not had to rush through security to an area with nothing open and been generally much happier customers if only we had been better informed.

Last night my wife flew with our (now) 13-month old son and a similar thing happened. At check-in they specifically got people for her destination to come to the front of the queue as they were worried they could not get them through "in time", and she was advised to go straight through security. Again this meant no spare food for him (other than dry snacks - apparently it's impossible to conceal plastic explosive in a rusk) and no drink for her.

This time someone was sensible enough to give out vouchers after the first hour's delay so she could spend the princely sum of £3 on something to eat and drink. After a second hour they finally took off. We still don't know why there was any holdup at all.

The one hope against the database state.

James O'Neill's blog — Fri, 02 Nov 2007 21:12:48 GMT

I blogged yesterday about the database stated and referred to No2ID including their example of International