Ticket office closures: deadline imminent

Ely station, where the staff pride themselves on making their own announcements for the trains, rather than relying on an automated system.  20th May, 2014.

A reminder that tomorrow, September 1st, is the deadline for submissions to the consultation on the proposed closure of virtually every ticket office in England.  If any readers feel even a tenth as strongly as I do that this should not happen, I urge you to fill in the consultation here: https://www.transportfocus.org.uk/ticket-office-consultation/.

I wrote about my own objections in this post, but they are put far more eloquently by my Irish friend Maolsheachlann, who comments:

I have delayed reading this post until now because the subject upsets me so much. There’s always an assumption, or at least a hope, in the back of my mind that there will be SOME end to the dehumanization of daily life. Then something like this happens, or is threatened to happen, and makes me think “no worst, there is none”.

The fact that there is a terrible outcry gives me SOME hope, but it also makes me wonder are the powers that be just behaving strategically, Propose something much worse than they have in mind, and people will feel gratified when it’s modified.

A similar situation occurred in Ireland recently when Allied Irish Banks announced they would be withdrawing cash services from many of their branches. They stepped back from this after a public outcry, but are they always just softening us up?

For once, I strongly agree with the Guardian. Indeed, this is a subject on which right and left can unite.

https://www.independent.ie/irish-news/aib-climbs-down-over-plans-to-remove-cash-services-from-70-branches-due-to-public-unease/41859301.html

I use the various apps to navigate public transport here, and although it’s better to have them than not, I find them extremely stressful and confusing, especially under pressure. A human face with expertise is so much more welcome.

This is happening everywhere. Cinemas are closing box offices and selling tickets at the popcorn stand. Post offices are shutting down. Banks are shunting everybody to the website. In my own university, the library is getting more and more queries for the whole campus because we are one of the few human points of contact.

I hope to God they reconsider and scrap this plan completely. 

He adds,

Once, when I was riding the train through England, I got off at the wrong station for my connecting journey. I remember feeling very panicked and upset, because I didn’t have much money and I couldn’t afford to buy another ticket. The station master was a big fat man with a red face and a gentle voice. He reassured me and printed me off a ticket for another train.

It was actually a lovely moment. The station was very quiet, it was just me and the station master. It was a warm summer’s day. If all I’d been left with was a smartphone, I would have been clean out of luck. And we all know that these other staff supposedly patrolling the station floor are only a bait; they will be gone very soon, if they materialize at all, and the process will be fully automated.