Over on the RMT London Calling website, I have posted a detailed guide to the directions and guidance recently published by the PPP Arbiter. This is an important document, which may turn out to be a staging post in the collapse of Tube Lines and – following 2007’s similar collapse of Metronet – of the Public-Private Partnership (PPP) itself.

Click the link to read the guide in full, or click 'read more' below to read extracts of particular concerns to station staff.

Work in the Second Review Period

Stations

Tube Lines now has to carry out barely a third of the station refurbishments in RP2 [the second review period, running for 7½ years, starting on 1 July 2010] that it originally had to. The Restated Terms halved the number, from 100 to 50, and now the figure stands at only 38 (para 7.32).

Just four stations will have the staff accommodation refurbished (papa 7.31).

Why? The Arbiter revealed that “stations work was underpriced by all bidders” (para 2.10). Because the private companies under-stated the cost of their work in order to get their contract, Underground passengers and staff must continue to put up with 62 shabby stations which should have been refurbished.

Escalators

Tube Lines’ approach is based on replacing key components but leaving the existing escalator truss in place (para 7.40), whereas London Underground advocates replacing escalators (para 7.42).

London Underground refers to plans for 14 “machine-room-less escalators” (para 7.41), lacking the room which all escalators currently have, from which staff access the physical workings of the escalator. Union representatives for both station and engineering staff are concerned about how workers can safely operate and maintain escalators without a machine room.

Tube Lines and London Underground have jointly submitted that the notional asset life of the Jubilee Line Extension’s escalators should be extended from 25 to 40 years, and the “major intervention cycle” to 14 years (para 7.42). This could see escalators kept in service rather than replaced when they are aged and unreliable.

Closures

To get its work done, an Infraco needs London Underground to sometimes close lines, sections of lines, stations, parts of stations, lifts and escalators. An Infraco would want the maximum access to work sites and therefore a high allocation of closures, whereas London Underground should want to minimise disruption to passengers and therefore to limit closures. The extent of closures is measured in Lost Customer Hours (LCH). London Underground suggested 15.5 million LCH for Minor Closures and 6.1 million LCH for Lifts and Escalator Closures, but Tube Lines wanted more – 35.6 million LCH for Minor Closures and 9.4 million LCH for Lifts and Escalator Closures (table 11.2).

The Arbiter decided that a Notional Infraco would learn from international practice and therefore need fewer closures for the Piccadilly line upgrade than for the Jubilee and Northern upgrades (para 2.53). Metro de Madrid and Metro de Paris both introduced major signalling upgrades with significantly lower amounts of access than similar projects in London (para 11.19), and although London’s requirements are more onerous and access more restrictive (para 11.22), these examples are still relevant (para 11.21).

The Arbiter concluded that Tube Lines should be allocated 21.5 million LCH for Minor Closures and 7.8 million LCH for Lifts and Escalator Closures (table 11.2), significantly less than Tube Lines wanted.

Tube Lines has referred its dispute over Base Allocation of Minor Closures to external adjudication (para 5.17).