During Friday’s evening peak for some reason Wood Lane decided that my HAI via NEP should become a HAI via WOO. They called me up as I approached LAG, I changed the destination on the front and all the way through the Pipe SONIA was clearly announcing that this was a HAI via WOO. Between LEY and LES I made a PA repeating the destiantion, adding that anyone going to HAI via NEP should change at the next station and even listed the stations the train would be calling at.

At LES it was utter pandemonium, people got off, got on, got off again and then got back on as I repeated everything once more. When things had finally settled down I closed up but even then a couple made a last gasp dash for the platform and squeezed through the doors. Predictably when we reached SNA there was a file of the lost going back over the stairs to the WB platform.

All of which supports the theory that people do not actually bother listening to PAs or actually read the dot matrix indicators on the front of the train or over the platforms. They see “HAI” and assume that “via NEP” is implied, traversing the Tube by instinct.

I suppose that is why I find the complaints about passengers being treated like cattle rather amusing; sometimes they behave like cattle.