The London Passenger Transport Board of had a complex structure. A small proportion of its stock was held by the London county council and other local authorities by way of payment for their tramway networks.
But most of its stock was held by private shareholders and traded on the stock exchange. While the underground did receive some government financial assistance in the s and s with the guaranteeing of loans to finance new construction, it received no subsidies at all, let alone "lavish" ones. Early this century, three American-financed tubes were built. The Underground expanded rapidly between the wars, reaching Ealing Broadway in , Edgware in and Morden in The Metropolitan reached Watford in and Stanmore in A single authority, never officially but always popularly known as London Transport, was set up in and immediately began formulating plans to expand the Underground further both by building new extensions and by incorporating existing suburban lines.
However the war intervened, and eight km five miles of tunnel on the uncompleted eastern extension of the Central line even became an underground aircraft component factory.
Many tube stations were used as shelters during bombing raids. After the war, the Central line scheme was completed, with the new tunnels to Newbury Park opening in , and the extensions to West Ruislip and Epping opening in and respectively. The first new tube line in central London since , the Victoria Line, was opened in , with the southern extension to Brixton following in In December an extension of the Piccadilly line beyond Hounslow West to Heathrow Airport was opened, and a further single-track loop to serve the airport's new Terminal 4 opened in The Jubilee line was opened in The extension was completed in Design and layout There are two distinct types of train, known as surface and tube.
Steam locomotives fitted with special equipment hauled the earliest surface trains, which condensed much of the spent steam back into water. Electric trains first appeared on surface lines in the early s.
Steam locomotive-hauled trains were obviously out of the question on the deep-level tube lines and electric locomotives hauled the early trains on these lines. In the Central purchased motor cars, which had a driving cab and a compartment behind the cab housing the motors. This design became standard on tube lines for the next 35 years, but from London Transport introduced trains with the motors and other electrical equipment below the floor, thereby increasing seating capacity.
Trains built between and for the Central and Piccadilly Lines had unpainted aluminium bodies, and those built in for the new Victoria line were also equipped for automatic operation. On the earliest tube trains, passenger entry and exit was by way of mesh gates at the end of each car.
The gates were opened and closed by gatemen. Air-operated doors, usually under the control of a guard, were introduced on tube trains from Steam-hauled trains on the surface lines originally had compartments, but when electric trains were introduced early this century access was passenger-operated sliding doors rather than gates, and by air-operated doors from the mids.
The latest surface and tube cars have passenger-operated doors with push-button control, ensuring that on open-air sections of the Underground over half the system, despite its name only those doors though which passengers wish to alight or board are opened, conserving train heating in cold weather. In the first significant use of the Private Finance Initiative PFI for funding major public transport projects, Alstom has provided new trains for the Northern Line.
It has also significantly contributed to the rise in reported accidents, as standing passengers are particularly vulnerable when trains break or accelerate quickly, leading to a doubling of injuries in the last six years.
The government's main financial advisors estimate that private operators can deliver major savings, despite lacking experience in running an underground rail network. This raises concerns over the vulnerability of the terms and conditions of 6. The break-up of a hitherto integrated transport network raises serious safety concerns. With a system spanning kilometres of track, stations and 12 different lines, there is also the complex issue of who will be responsible for shared lines or interchange stations.
The system envisaged under PPP is so unwieldy that the legal documents dealing with this are said to fill 14 filling cabinets, giving an indication as to how problematic it would be to decide who was responsible for poor maintenance or in cases of criminal negligence. Even the bidding process for PPP is compromised. One of the members of the panel determining to whom the contracts will be awarded has links with two of the bidders: Malcolm Bates was formerly a non-executive member of BICC, a holding company for consortium member Balfour Beatty.
Bates was also a deputy managing director at GEC, the former parent company of Alstom, another contender. During an earlier period of outsourcing on LU, the company was responsible for the provision of rolling stock on the Northern Line and later for the Jubilee Line Extension.
With the government's Tube privatisation plans in shambles, even its most loyal supporters in the media have urged it to drop them. After Hatfield and the Railtrack meltdown, it was in ruins as a recent Mori poll shows. Even if PPP is the best technical solution, politically it is a dead duck. Carrying on as if nothing has changed is unthinkable madness. Livingstone has made it crystal clear that he has no intention of opposing Labour's core agenda. His proposal to introduce a bond scheme for financing the London Underground is merely a variant of the government's PPP initiative.
His main preoccupation has been to win the endorsement of the big business. In order to drum up support from this quarter he appointed Robert Kiley as his Commissioner for Transport. Kiley, a former CIA operative, oversaw the implementation of a bond scheme on the New York subway between and In the mid-eighties he introduced a contract for new employees that only paid 70 percent of union rates instead of 75 percent previously during their probation period, which was also extended from 30 to 36 months.
Under his management accidents rose and so did fatalities. After preliminary discussions with his financial advisers, the new Commissioner for Transport has unveiled his proposals to finance the London Underground. While it would remain as a unified structure, large amounts of work—an estimated percent of the capital programme—would be outsourced to the private sector.
This involves issuing bonds secured against the future revenues of LU. Whilst this is relatively unknown in the UK, it is widely practised in the US. It means that financiers have first claim on future income, without actual ownership of the assets of the company. Should income fall below the level needed to service the bond e. Thus the bondholders, without having the burden of managing the business, will reap all the benefits and will be in a position to dictate public policy.
Future revenues generated by passenger usage, even on the basis of the most optimistic forecast, are not enough to offer the necessary returns.
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