Down The Tube (1997)

Panorama goes down the tube, looking at how drastically under funded the system was, not long after Labour had gained power in the UK in 1997. Here, problems such as signal failures, train failures and station overcrowding are an everyday occurance. Lots of "Old" London Underground trains here, 1967 stock on the Victoria Line, unrefurbished D stock on the District Line, A stock on the Metropolitan Line, and of course, 1959 and the reletively camera shy 1972mk1 stock on the Northern Line!

[@gnnascarfan2410]

Fast forward to 2015, and the Northern Line was the most punctual line on the whole network. It's come a long way in the 25 years since this program!

[@billyh88uk]

This was a big transitionary era - it's looking a hell of a lot better here than it did in the late 1980s/early 1990s, but still with extremely worn-out trains dating back to the 1950s (as seen at 9:49 ) and still using the ancient Lots Road power station. The years 1998 to 2000 would see a huge amount of change with the JLE, new tube stock, ticket barriers and machines introduced on a wide basis, and further improvements have followed since. Despite continuing, seemingly never-ending weekend closures, it's definitely much more reliable now than it was back then.

[@oludotunjohnshowemimo434]

Back when the Northern line was called the Misery line for its poor services. It has improved a lot since then, it has been upgraded to automatic train operation and the 1995 stock has been updated and upgraded.

[@alexander92179]

Paved the way for engineering works at weekends

[@PC-lu3zf]

Tottenham court road is nice today large spaces to move as this guy dreamed off.

[@gnnascarfan2410]

With the Elizabeth Line now open that guy is probably giddy on his retirement couch and jealous lol

[@PC-lu3zf]

23 years on such crowded stations are dangerous

[@jonnyross2697]

Anyone who knows about waiting on the Northbound Piccadilly line platform at Finsbury Park. If this happened 20 years ago they would never handle this!

[@dudea729]

The Victoria line platforms at Victoria are too small and will still be so even after millions have been spent on upgrading Victoria!

[@communistjesus]

Welcome to the U.K. er under er Cameron.. !!!CAMERON!!!.. The Spice Girls inside 10 Downing Street 2016.. !!!TWENTY SIXTEEN!!!.. Or sooner to glovelessly clean the 5hit filled toilets , the sooner the better, because those toilets are NOT GOING TO CLEAN THEMSELVES...."Tell me what you want, what you really want??"

[@Sawrattan]

So does this mean after 1997 there was a huge renovation (eg. extending escalators to the platform)?

[@JGravesend]

Sawrattan A new entrance to the Victoria Line was commissioned in early 2017 at “Cardinal Place”, along with additional escalators from the Main Entrance as a form of congestion relief.

[@Sawrattan]

@@JGravesend thanks!

[@alexander92179]

London back then was a lot better than it is now.

[@ajs41]

In what ways? I think I first visited London in about 1985 when I was 6 years old to visit places like the Tower of London and the Science Museum. But we came by car, and didn't use the tube. Always lived in the Midlands.

[@chantelcooney4422]

Well for starters, try going by car now mayor khan is charging £20 odd quid to drive through!!

[@skyline-sm8kx]

The labour goverment has changed London to get more votes...

[@alexander92179]

@GN it felt more like London..

[@trainrover]

fuckingly, London's a l w a y s been Corporateria's capital...Londoners're merely witnessing kleptoparasites' emergence which signifies their n a s t y suicide: just do not! get washed into their engineered and fatal whirlpool, all right?

[@PC-lu3zf]

It’s not the misery line today Northern is good it’s central I hate.

[@silver760]

I read that situations such as those seen at the beginning of this programme are nowhere near as common today or as bad as they used to be,though this is not due to any improvements by the underground.The reason for far fewer incidents of overcrowding are due entirely to the vastly reduced number of passengers using the underground. Obviously things got so bad people left in droves,no doubt out of fear of losing their jobs for being consistently late,and have never gone back.I would also suspect that privatisation and ever increasing fares had allot to do with the greatly reduced number of passengers also. I'd like to know how a system that struggles to meet expectation,due to claimed inadequacy in it's capacity,can have 50 plus stations that have been closed for decades.

[@agent_605]

They have done a lot to upgrade it. The JLE, new Jubilee Line trains, refurbished Northern Line, upgraded Victoria line, New Trains on the Met, District, Circle and H&C. Also, the Underground is still in public hands, unlike the rest of the UK. There are a lot more people using it nowadays, it's just been greatly upgraded

[@riverhuntingdon6659]

What's with all this "customers" crap? I think he means "passengers" ! This all came in with the tories. Not that labour's any better, and as for Prescott, the less said the better. PPP? I don't think so.

[@richardsingh5827]

It was better in 2019 when I used it

[@toffeelatte6042]

Wait, the tube is still fucking awful though. But at least the actual carriages are mostly clean and air conditioned. Ya get wifi now too. It's so fucking weird seeing barriers without an oyster card reader though.

[@BVEfan]

The only trains on the tube that are air conditioned are on the Metropolitan, Hammersmith & City, Circle and District Lines because they are the Sub-Surface Tube Lines, not Deep Level Tube Lines because the trains on the Bakerloo, Piccadilly, Central, Waterloo & City, Northern, Jubilee and Victoria Lines are not air conditioned. The good news is the the New trains on the Piccadilly Line that will be built by Siemens in Krefeld in Germany and Goole in Yorkshire UK will have air conditioning on board and the first deep level tube line to have an open Gangway so everyone can walk through the entire train.

[@normanusrex7910]

7:01 It's very important to mistrust hospitals, schools and public transportation. They're all greedy vultures! - Seriously, who was this guy? I hope he's not still in charge somewhere today...

[@thomascook578]

That was John Prescott Labour MP, thankfully he's long gone

[@Toby_the_Glen]

Awful. You wouldn't be allowed to transport animals like that? And you have to pay for it?

[@PC-lu3zf]

Have a yawn lol