Unlikely I know but I've just had an odd experience on the Baker loo line, wondering if any mners can back me up

[StealthPolarBear]

I got on the bakerloo line northbound at Waterloo. Needed to change at Oxford circus. All fine until the stop before (picaddilly circus?) then at the next stop the automated announcement said

"the next stop will be Waterloo"
I tuned in but assumed I must have misheard. She then went onto say

"change here for...." and listed all the lines at Waterloo - I was following them on the sign.

I then panicked and assumed I'd done something stupid, even though logically I could see that even if I'd got on going in the wrong direction I couldnt be BACK in Waterloo.

I felt as if I was in the twilight zone until we pulled into... Oxford circus.

I was the only one who seemed bothered. I know what I heard but these announcements are automated and presumably are difficult to get wrong!

This would freak me out too op. I have often known train announcements to be wrong but tube ones, no.
Everything’s going to pot. Brexit is my explanation

Another thing I noticed today. They don't always say mind the gap. When they do its a really big gap. When they don't, no gap.
How do they know?!

Imagining the driver looking out of his window and pressing the "include the mind the gap" option :o
Actually they're on tracks. So how come the gaps are ever different?its not like my parallel parking. There should be no room for error.

sometime this panics me - usually when i have run for a tube on autopilot and jump on only to hear its going northbound. its not.....its just confused! i get it on the Victoria line.

I've never noticed it be wrong before. Maybe I usually tune it out

I'm just disappointed it wasn't a properly spooky story - it's getting to that woo time of year. I saw a programme a while who about hauntings on the London Underground - it was very good

Me too. Although if I had been in Waterloo I'd have missed the three o clock train!

It's a poltergeist trying to confuse people by causing computer glitches. All that pent up energy from commuters.

I’ve been on buses before where the announcements have been for a completely different route. Which was very disorienting.

It's no big deal, the tube lines and stops are idiot proof.*

It's not all that helpful if you're blind and rely on these announcements tho

Saying that, I've used the underground for donkeys and never ever heard them get mixed up

I’ve had this before. Nearly shit myself, couldn’t work out how I’d done it, wondered if I’d had a seizure (I have epilepsy that makes me act strangely at times).... and then all was fine! it’s verg surreal!

I used to live in London and commute on the tube. The announcements are sometimes wrong or out of sync.

It happened to me last week, said Oxford Circus was closed when I got on at King's Cross, started mentally planning an alternative route but it was fine, no other mention. There had been a previous issue but was resolved before the automated announcements were updated.

Back in the seventies, there were no announcements, we JUST LOOKED OUT the WINDOW!
And the odd blind guy I met, (one was very drunk) simply asked to be sure (before staggering off in the last guy's case.)
The station name is clearly marked, there are tube maps in all carriages, all you have to do is the count the stops people! Stop relying on faulty modern tech, use your own brains!

I do do all that. But as a northerner who comes from a place where we have abojt three buses a day I also like the friendly lady's reassurance. Plus presumably its also there for blind and partially sighted people. And northerners. And partially sighted northerners.
Does moira Stuart need any additional cash? She'd make a brilliant tube lady

StealthPolarbear, the wide gaps occur when the station platform is not straight. As the line is curved, and the carriage is a straight thing between two bogies, it is only close to a curved platform at each end. Between the two there will be a gap. There could only not be a gap if the carriages were continuously bendy and could follow the tracks exactly.

StealthPolarBear, I am from Hull where it is so flat to learn how to do a hill start when learning to drive you have to find a hump-back bridge! I then moved to Bath where the hills are insanely steep, for the UK.
Horses for courses! You learn to adapt. Is Moira Stuart still alive? Was she the lady who read the news with the lovely sexy low voice? If so, right on!

Thank you for the gap explanation, that makes sense. You're a train geek aren't you?
I didn't know Hull was particularly flat. You learn something new every day.

I’m a central line driver, on our stock we enter in a code number for the destination. The other day I was distracted by a customer banging on the door at the terminus and I didn’t change the number when I was supposed to. Train announcer said I was going to Northolt but in fact I was an Ealing Broadway. Luckily I noticed further down the line but felt pretty bad. Sometimes the codes get stuck and you can’t change them. The Bakerloo line is 1973 stick trains so I’m sure they go wrong.

Ooh you need to do an ama
Thank you :)

The Mind the Gap and other particular announcements are transmitted by a track to train link from each platform, this also allows the doors to only be opened by the driver on the correct side.

Ahhh, the gross disappointment of realising there's no choice but to take Bakerloo. At rush hour. In the middle of summer.

Bakerloo: The Heartsink Line.

I had the opposite experience recently, in that I was running for a train and jumped on just as the doors were about to close. Assumed it was the correct one. Next station is announced and I presume it's wrong, then it's announced in Irish (Dublin train) and again assume it's wrong. Next thing we're pulling into a station that's not in my way home and I had to panic pack up all my belongings and make a dash for the doors just as they were closing.
Now I'm now careful about paying attention to which train I get on!