Amazon on the Underground?

[EddieB]

Local radio is reporting rumours that Amazon are in talks with TfL, that the soon-to-be-unstaffed London Underground ticket offices could be turned into parcels drop-off points.

 

Ignoring the politics of decisions to cut ticket sales staff, it strikes me as rather curious to be thinking of reinstating a parcels service in some way connected to the Underground. 

 

I remember my whole family being surprised to discover, even in the late 'sixties (i.e. several years after the demise of the daily pick-up goods from Temple Mills), that parcel deliveries were still being made to our local Central Line station (Woodford).  In this instance, it was an order placed via a local retailer of records (of the gramophone variety, although that term had by then largely disappeared).  To our skepticism, said parcel duly arrived, complete with our copy of H... A..... & t.. T...... B....'s greatest hits.

 

If the Amazon deal comes off, I wonder what they'll call the service - Red Star?  Who knows, they might even sell Oyster Cards as a sideline...

[SM42]

Let's just hope they haven't bought the Red Star computer.

 

Parcel from Euston to Watford Sir?

 

Of course send it over to Paddington, then Worcester, Birmingham, Derby, Bedford,  St Albans and finally Watford.

 

Andy

[synthnut]

....hmmm, lots of people dropping off parcels in station entrances? I wonder how many security alerts that would cause then?

I did like the concept of the Red Star service through, it made sense, even if the routing was a little unconventional at times!

 

Keep it on track...

Ben

[stewartingram]

It is already a common concept with couriers, using for instance petrol stations. Just an enlargement of the drop off points available, no intention to carry parcels on the Underground! We even have had trouble with our work, suggesting we pop a parcel (spare parts to repair an urgent fault) on to a train at say Waterloo, to be met at A.N.Other station by another engineer who wants the part - a definite no-no from the railway to accomodate this.

 

Stewart

[jjb1970]

I really think rail is missing a trick with this. In a previous job I used to regularly send a member of staff to carry a package to another site, either on the train or in a pool car, or alternatively get a taxi to take it. I once paid for a spare part to be carried from Norwich to Aberdeen in a taxi (I bet the taxi driver thought it was Christmas!). If I could take a package to the local station then call ahead and tell somebody it'll be on the xx.yy arrival from London that'd be a high value service that people would pay for. A niche maybe and hardly a rival to Royal Mail or UPS but definitely a high value niche that should be dooable with minimal costs to the railway.

[colin penfold]

The obvious problems would be security and capacity

 

Nobody watching the parcels en route means they wouldn't reach their destination unless secure cages were installed. Given the lack of space for passengers luggage in modern trains how many designs would be able to accommodate this? You could use the rear driving cab of units but that would rule out providing the service on any routes involving a reversal.

[Foo]

I really think rail is missing a trick with this. In a previous job I used to regularly send a member of staff to carry a package to another site, either on the train or in a pool car, or alternatively get a taxi to take it. I once paid for a spare part to be carried from Norwich to Aberdeen in a taxi (I bet the taxi driver thought it was Christmas!). If I could take a package to the local station then call ahead and tell somebody it'll be on the xx.yy arrival from London that'd be a high value service that people would pay for. A niche maybe and hardly a rival to Royal Mail or UPS but definitely a high value niche that should be dooable with minimal costs to the railway.

My friend is a taxi driver. He had to take a helicopter part from RNAS Culdrose up to scotland. Cost the MOD the best part of a grand that one. ..

[fender]

surely the Amazon deal would just be for the Amazon Lockers, which are already installed in various locations around the country. They are completely automatic. A delivery driver puts the parcels in secure lockers which can only be opened with a security code known (hopefully!) only to the purchaser of the product. It's a really good system actually.

[Fat Controller]

I really think rail is missing a trick with this. In a previous job I used to regularly send a member of staff to carry a package to another site, either on the train or in a pool car, or alternatively get a taxi to take it. I once paid for a spare part to be carried from Norwich to Aberdeen in a taxi (I bet the taxi driver thought it was Christmas!). If I could take a package to the local station then call ahead and tell somebody it'll be on the xx.yy arrival from London that'd be a high value service that people would pay for. A niche maybe and hardly a rival to Royal Mail or UPS but definitely a high value niche that should be dooable with minimal costs to the railway.

As I have previously posted, such a service existed in the dim dark days of non-customer-focussed BR.. It was called 'Red Star', and worked by using spare brake-van space on passenger services; one of the reasons for its disappearance was that, under Sectorisation, the Passenger Sectors demanded a 'market price' for the use of the vans. The figure they asked for, given the vans had to be there anyway, was apparently quite high..

When I first used it, in 1976, it used through trains between main centres, and the timetable for these services was published in a little booklet. I would telephone my opposite number in Blackburn or Aberdeen as soon as my van driver told me which train it was on, and they would make collection arrangements. I found the service very reliable, and even prior to the various TOPS-derived tracking systems, far more reliable than I've found assisited-passenger-tracing under Privatisation. If there was a problem in the early iteration, it was that it only used through services, and if your nearest station wasn't on a through route to your customer, then you had to drive to one that was. Later, this changed, so that a number of key locations exchanged packages between routes, though this removed some of the reliabity from the service.

Van space still exists in many modern trains, though not to the extent of earlier days.

[jjb1970]

Certainly given the costs and patchy reliability of some of the competition I think it could be quite a nice little niche. Unfortunately the diversified nature of the railways today would be a problem. Sad really as there is a good reason people send members of staff on trains as normal passengers with a packet in their bag of pay taxis £££££££'s when something absolutely has to be delivered quickly and reliably.

[Steve O.]

"I remember my whole family being surprised to discover, even in the late 'sixties (i.e. several years after the demise of the daily pick-up goods from Temple Mills), that parcel deliveries were still being made to our local Central Line station (Woodford).  In this instance, it was an order placed via a local retailer of records (of the gramophone variety, although that term had by then largely disappeared).  To our skepticism, said parcel duly arrived, complete with our copy of H... A..... & t.. T...... B....'s greatest hits."

 

You mean....

?

[corneliuslundie]

When I worked in London as a magazine journalist our printer was in St Austell. Everything went up and down overnight by Red Star and it was almost completely reliable. The printer's van driver would be on Paddington platform when the night train came in. This was fine until one day the train came at him sideways - you can work out the date as I am sure someone remembers when the night sleeper derailed in the station throat. The package from St Austell was about two hours late getting to us that day.

[EddieB]

Thanks, but no thanks Steve O - my secret is out!

 

Incidentally, I once used to work with a guy who was a collector of Herp Alpert's paintings, and quite expensive they were too.  I never knew HA was also a dauber, and apparently also a sculptor and philanthropist.

[EddieB]

After leaving college I had a temporary job as a messenger for a market research company.  We frequently used the Red Star service to dispatch parcels of questionnaires from the major London termini.  On the whole it was a good, value-for-mone and reliable service, and certainly the railways lost a trick when it was curtailed.