London Underground Limited - One Person Operation (OPO)
- Jan 06, 2020
- Rail
All trains on the London Underground are single-manned. On one-man operated passenger trains the driver must be able to see the whole train to make sure that all the doors are safe for departure. On curved platforms a CCTV system, mirror or station dispatch staff are required
Introduction
All trains on the London Underground are single-manned. Conversion to one-man operation began in 1984 and was completed in 2000. On one-man operated passenger trains the driver must be able to see the whole train to make sure that all the doors are safe for departure. On curved platforms a CCTV system, mirror or station dispatch staff are required
An upgrade to London Underground Limited’s (LUL) One Person Operation (OPO) system was delivered in 2011 on the Bakerloo Line between Harrow & Wealdstone and Queen’s Park stations, including Kenton, South Kenton, Harlesden and Stonebridge Park. A number of platforms at these stations were not fully upgraded with latest visual and telecoms technology and continued to use a combination of mirrors and/or monitors to assist drivers.
Requirement
L.B. Foster Telecoms was commissioned by LUL to produce detailed designs to upgrade the OPO system platforms at Kenton, South Kenton, Harlesden and Stonebridge Park previously omitted from the 2011 OPO project. Our brief also included providing a solution for the removal of all redundant OPO assets left in situ as part of the 2011 upgrade project.
Our Solution
Due to the system being a Safety Critical asset L.B. Foster Telecoms Worked closely with LUL and SWIP to mitigate any issues and design risks, our expert team drew on its experience of working on similar OPO schemes in the rail sector to produce informed OPO designs.
We challenged the scope of the project, attending and generating discussions regarding design elements with LUL due to station signage obstructing camera images and civil issues with construction of the MDA bases. This resulted in a number of potential major issues being avoided at the preliminary stage. Our innovative engineering solutions effected savings both on cost and delays.
Once commissioned, our systems interfaced with existing London Overground OPO systems.
throughout the project, L.B. Foster Telecoms worked tirelessly and to a high standard. The project encountered some issues due to a previous supplier’s poor design, however, L.B. Foster TEW Plus were able to highlight this during constructability checks and highlight them back to us before they were impacted and provide a workable solution quickly and cost-effectively.
