Travelled by train last week for the first time in years - really wish I hadn't

[coffeerevelsrock]

What a depressing eye-opener. I wanted to do the right thing and use the car less and also going to a few different parts of London is obviously easier by public transport.

I was taken aback by the lack of mask wearing on the trains. Despite posters everywhere saying please wear them, pretty much all staff wearing them and announcements encouraging their use, only a handful of people in packed trains had them on. Even on the tubes it was a minority who had them on. Last time I went in the summer (travelled by car that time but used tfl once there) it was compulsory and almost 100% take up. Now that seems to have fizzled out.

Then, on the way home, the train was cancelled and our connection was packed as three earlier trains had also been cancelled. On the packed train, I asked someone to move a bag off a seat so ds or I could sit down and the woman glared and huffed and puffed before doing so. Just so rude. In the seat across the aisle I then had to ask a young lad to move over so one of us could use the empty seat he was next to. He did without the rudeness but tbh I don't know why he didn't just move anyway - he could see how packed t was. Then a woman opposite had bags on the seat, headphones in and was looking fixedly at her book. She blatantly ignored me when I asked her to move for my other ds/someone else. WTF? You're sitting on a packed train with a bag on the seat and you pretend not to notice people are going to have to stand for 40 mins + so your bag can have a seat or so you don't have to sit next to someone??

The whole experience made me think people in this country are fucking selfish. This was on a Sunday evening - god knows what it's like commuting.

Is it always this bad and why do we have such an issue with masks here?

Mask wearing doesn’t do anything

Even the briefest of Google searches will show you that this is rubbish, there are umpteen studies out there showing that masks do reduce transmission.

@coffeerevelsrock

It seems odd that you spotted such an amount of seat-hogging in a small area of the train, which makes me think it was not as 'packed' as you think. Were the aisles full of standing people? Could you move easily between carriages? Did you check the whole carriage for empty double seats or check another carriage?

Yes, it was weird! There were only 2 or 3 carriages and I arrived at a point with 3 spare seats near each other all blocked by bags/bodies and I couldn't move either forwards or backwards. at that point. I succeeded in freeing 2 of the seats but ds1 and several other people had to stand for the duration. I couldn't have gone looking elsewhere as the carriage was rammed as far as I could see - not surprising as there were 4 trains' worth of people on it. I guess we were lucky there were any seats.

I used to travel by train regularly and would always place my bag next to me and keep it there with eyes down at every stop! However, if it reached a point where there were clearly more people than seats then I would move it without being asked because, well, I'm not a total arsehole!

Originally I voted YABU because I used to block the seat next to me with a bag when I took the train in the past due to my health condition BUT I should have voted YANBU as I absolutely agree about the mask situation.

[quote lescompagnonsdeloue]@UsedUpUsername I guess you don't think covid exists either... Or else you don't mind coming across as not all that bright...[/quote]
Going straight for the ad hominems, aren’t we?

Not a lot of great evidence masks work though, and has it actually worked to stop or slow any waves in any of the countries that mandated it?

At best, you’d need N95s and the public won’t tolerate it. It’s not worth it esp. when you have vaccines and boosters available.

But sure, believe some porous cloth works. It’s the duck and cover of our age. The feeling that ‘we’re doing something!!!?!!’

@Clocktopus

Mask wearing doesn’t do anything

Even the briefest of Google searches will show you that this is rubbish, there are umpteen studies out there showing that masks do reduce transmission.

RCT studies show no effects or very weak effects. Observational and lab studies are junk. Sorry.

OP I have a simple solution if you are unhappy at the lack of mask wearing. Stay at home. Don't come to London. Clutch your pearls and read your daily fail whilst you listen to the shite spouted by mainstream media. That way there will be plenty of spare seats for those of us that have bigger worries than whether someone else is wearing a mask

@Davina69

OP I have a simple solution if you are unhappy at the lack of mask wearing. Stay at home. Don't come to London. Clutch your pearls and read your daily fail whilst you listen to the shite spouted by mainstream media. That way there will be plenty of spare seats for those of us that have bigger worries than whether someone else is wearing a mask

And another nutter.

Going straight for the ad hominems, aren’t we?

Yeah, like it’s worth engaging with people like you in good faith. You ignore the scientific consensus because you’ve seen something on Facebook or YouTube (sorry, ‘doing your own research’).
Ridicule is the only appropriate response to Covid denialism. You’re just Climate Change ‘sceptics’ and 9/11 truthers rebadged.

Lescompagnon, what, so you've never been stuck on a motorway for hours, or moving at a snails pace in a city or the country side?

@JollyAndBright

Pre covid I used trains regularly. I would never put bags on seats and saw it as incredibly annoying even on quiet train.

I have been using the train occasionally post covid,
I’m a mask wearer and have been pleasantly surprise by how many people have continued to wear masks, although it definitely depends on the area.

However, I will not sit next to a stranger, I have been intentionally putting my bag on the seat next to me to ensure nobody chooses to sit there and avoiding travelling at busy times so that it’s not an issue.

I’ve even moved seats if someone has decided to sit in the seats in front or behind me on a quiet train.

If the train was so busy there were no spare seats (well I wouldn’t have gotten on it to begin with, and I would probably choose to get off the train if it became that busy mid journey) but I would prefer to stand rather that have a stranger sit next to me.

Our bus route still have signs up telling people not to sit with people not in their household and that masks are mandatory, so the busses aren’t an issue.

Yeah, I take the train when I know it'll be quiet.

At the weekend I got the train and had a carriage to myself on a journey. A woman with two coughing and noisy kids then proceeds to plonk herself down in the table directly next to me (there was plenty empty behind and in front). Bloody ridiculous, so I moved to the back of the carriage.

When i've been in busy carriages mask wearing has been pretty good, but I avoid them if I can.

@DismantledKing

Going straight for the ad hominems, aren’t we?

Yeah, like it’s worth engaging with people like you in good faith. You ignore the scientific consensus because you’ve seen something on Facebook or YouTube (sorry, ‘doing your own research’).
Ridicule is the only appropriate response to Covid denialism. You’re just Climate Change ‘sceptics’ and 9/11 truthers rebadged.

Just because I have a different opinion to you does not make me a nutter. It's called living in a democracy love

Central London has had some of the lowest case numbers in the country for the last 5 months. It is clearly a bit more complicated than how many are wearing a mask on the tube. Mask wearing seems to be a bit better during the week than at weekends.

If you expect the train to be rammed and can get it for a reasonable price, it’s always worth going first class if it’s available. More room, bigger seat, generally quieter, and usually some food / drink thrown in. I wouldn’t do it every day but on the odd occasion I travel by train I usually splash out, especially for a long journey.

I take the train for my work commute. There is very little mask-wearing (including none by the staff I have encountered). On my train yesterday, of the 6 people seated around me, none was wearing one. Last week there was someone close to me with such an obvious continuous cough (and no mask), that I stepped out and stood in the hallway for an hour, just because I did not feel safe.

I am newly pregnant and have lost every previous pregnancy thus far, so am not keen to throw the complicating factor of Covid into the mix. I don't love wearing a mask (who would?), but appreciate it as a key tool in combatting Covid, and happily put up with it for that purpose. I do appreciate some people are exempt, but surely not 75% of folks in my train carriage.

I wish they would start masked and non-masked compartments, like a PP also suggested, so there is an actual option for those of us who want to keep safe by masking, but rely on public transport for our livelihoods.

SAGE / The government / The press over egged the pudding with their fear mongering far, far too many times.

Those chickens have now come home to roost.

Tbf, a lot of the time I would rather stand then sit next to someone on a train. It feels very intimate in a way that the tube doesn't - probably because of the dear layout being in threes or couples, as opposed to straight lines down the sides. Hate buses and coaches for this reason too.

We went by train yesterday into central London and noticed that most people actually were wearing masks on the underground staff and customers alike, in shops, and even outside. So I don’t understand how one experience is so vastly different to another??

This was at all times of day too - we travelled from early morning, throughout the day on tube and a bus, and tube during rush hour.

@DismantledKing

Going straight for the ad hominems, aren’t we?

Yeah, like it’s worth engaging with people like you in good faith. You ignore the scientific consensus because you’ve seen something on Facebook or YouTube (sorry, ‘doing your own research’).
Ridicule is the only appropriate response to Covid denialism. You’re just Climate Change ‘sceptics’ and 9/11 truthers rebadged.

Yet here you are.

And it’s not the consensus. Science is not handed down on high from public health authorities. There’s plenty of healthy debate among the experts on COVID. See Great Barrington Declaration, which will ultimately be the way out of COVID (because the vaccines sure as hell haven’t done the job despite very high vaxx rates)

Yup. It fucks me right off. I tell myself that they're just ill informed because the reality that they are selfish arseholes makes me too angry.

To whoever quoted me and told me that England was doing lots more testing than the rest of the world, you have got to be KIDDING?

My app records all the PCRs I have had done since Covid started, and these are all administered by a nurse by the way, and I have had scores of them - at least 60. I was tested at least once a week until recently (it's reduced since our vaccination rates got into the 90s).

I have also been to Greece and France this summer, and they are also making tests easily available to everyone. Why does everyone in England think that they are just getting more tests done than other countries? The tests in England are pretty crap anyway, being self administered. I have friends and family in England who have never even been tested! Baffling.

Furthermore, to get away with not wearing a mask where I live, you'd have to actually have a certificate signed by a doctor and attested. I honestly don't think I've seen anyone not wearing one.

The UK vaccination rates are relatively low now - it's at around 67% which is way lower than most other western countries (and many of those were administered more than 6 months ago, so immunity is waning). So the UK can NOT afford to relax measures.

This thread has made me realise that there are thankfully some sensible and community-minded people left in England, but my god some of the replies have me utterly exasperated at the levels of denial about what a total shit-show it is in England.

By the way, I suspect mask compliance is higher on the tube and train in London because Londoners were already well aware what a germ-fest the Tube can be. Also, black bogies anyone?!

@Lockheart

There's an unspoken etiquette on my commuter train that you don't sit next to anyone, for social distancing purposes. If it's a table of four, you can have two sitting diagonally opposite. So I'm afraid to me it sounds like you were the one committing the faux pas in that case.

I fully agree about the masks, but if you're sensible about masks you should also be sensible about distancing!

This was the case when few were travelling earlier in the year or the train is very quiet but not acceptable anymore when the train is busy and people want to sit down in rush hour.

@catblanket

To whoever quoted me and told me that England was doing lots more testing than the rest of the world, you have got to be KIDDING?

My app records all the PCRs I have had done since Covid started, and these are all administered by a nurse by the way, and I have had scores of them - at least 60. I was tested at least once a week until recently (it's reduced since our vaccination rates got into the 90s).

I have also been to Greece and France this summer, and they are also making tests easily available to everyone. Why does everyone in England think that they are just getting more tests done than other countries? The tests in England are pretty crap anyway, being self administered. I have friends and family in England who have never even been tested! Baffling.

Furthermore, to get away with not wearing a mask where I live, you'd have to actually have a certificate signed by a doctor and attested. I honestly don't think I've seen anyone not wearing one.

The UK vaccination rates are relatively low now - it's at around 67% which is way lower than most other western countries (and many of those were administered more than 6 months ago, so immunity is waning). So the UK can NOT afford to relax measures.

This thread has made me realise that there are thankfully some sensible and community-minded people left in England, but my god some of the replies have me utterly exasperated at the levels of denial about what a total shit-show it is in England.

In answer to your question about why people think the UK is doing more testing just have a look online. Look it up on our world in data and you can see a table of how many tests are being carried out in each country. Only PCR tests and antigen tests are used in the data. The majority of UK self administered tests wont be included since most people don't report the results online and if positive go on to have another PCR test.

I know a lot of people do LFT and don't report them.