well said, appetite.

Many thanks. A very useful document. Particularly the map at the end.
Hopefully this will help to put pressure on Network Rail to provide an additional exit in the Perry Vale car park for the millions of people using the train.

I don't have the link, but BBC London News last night listed Forest Hill as one of the five or six busiest, most overcrowded rail stations in London.

I think the list was:

Tottenham Hale
Ealing Broadway
FOREST HILL
East Croydon

There were a few others, but I can't remember them now.

Angel - I believe one of the platforms is more or less in the same place, I only used it once when I first came to London. You can still see the old exit around the corner from the current station, on the City Road.

And yes, the station was packed!

Latest information on the Perry Vale exit from Southern Railways sent to me and Cllr John Paschoud:

Really quite typically pathetic of the railway industry, but at least we have got them to reopen the gate while nothing is happening.

Well done Michael. How right you are that we are so often badly served locally by the railway industry. Let's hope things improve when TfL take over in September.

Referring to the news article mentioned above by Elizabeth, I was amazed when I looked on the Office of the Rail Regulator's website to see the high number of passengers using our local rail stations. ORR figures are from June 2007 and are based on the number of people entering and leaving each station p.a.:

Forest Hill 3,014,902
Sydenham 2,139,553
HOP 1,582,305
Brockley 2,019,575

In other words there are over 8 million passenger journeys to and from our local rail stations each year and yet the facilities at those stations are often crude and inadequate. In comparison Swindon, as an example, has 2.5m passenger journeys p.a. (less than FH) but incomparably better facilities for those passengers.

We need to see huge improvements locally - and we certainly don't need to find that station entrances and exits are blocked to passengers by totally unacceptable planning of building works.

Totally agree and well done for getting that gate reopened. There has almost been fisticuffs getting up those stairs in rush hour, especially when it's raining...

Michael, thank you for your work on getting the Perry Vale exit re-opened.

I am concerned that safety issues at the station are continuing to mount. The trudge up the stairs was always tedious but on Wednesday night at about 8.15 I had to do it in the dark. The whole platform lighting system seemed to have failed leaving the throng to negotiate the bridge by the light of the street lamps outside. The following night the lights went out while I was half way across the bridge getting off the last but one train at just gone midnight. I haven't had to travel since but has anyone else noticed this problem recurring?

See Power Cuts thread.

Can I just add to this discussion that there IS a plan for an additional stairless exit from Platform 2 in the pipeline.
I did mention this on another thread, I believe the PV thread.

Funding is/has been sought, and now comes the design and concept of it. But just to put minds at rest, there is a plan.

I believe the idea is for the far end of platform 2 to exit straight into the PV car park, allowing disabled and car commuter access.

Would be great if correct.
One problem would be for the railway company personing all the exits.
If they are using the ticket machines has to be a member of staff there.

Surely "if they are using the ticket machines" (I think you mean barriers) there has to be a people there! Why can't we just talk about staff rather than "personing"!

Pretty sure thats been taken into account, but will give more info if I get any.

Andrew, that would require the use of the phrase "manning", how sexist lol.

Serious though, I thought the idea of electronic exits was to reduce the requirement for manpower. Im sure 1 person being there would be sufficiant. And cost effective too.

andrewr - be easy on the old boy - he's not as young as he used to be... these new 'ticket machine' technologies are quite a lot to get your head around

Seriously - I think that on the Underground they have to staff the barriers if they are in use. This is to deal with tickets that don't work, let through people with luggage and to open the barriers in an emergency. One person per set of barriers is sufficient.

The problem at Forest Hill is that we already have (or soon will have) two sets of barriers, one off each platform and now we have a suggestion of a further set onto the car park. That's three people just to look after the barriers. Prior to the barriers there would often have been no one checking tickets at all, and maybe no one selling tickets.

I've noticed that at remote Underground stations at quiet times, the barriers are left open and unstaffed, unpersoned, unmanned and even unwomaned. Whether there is someone lurking in some corner of the station I don't know. All I do know is that TfL stated that our stations would be staffed whenever the trains were stopping once they took over - which isn't the case at the moment.

Snazy,
Although there are plans for the opening up of the Perry Vale car park as a new exit I am not aware that Network Rail, TfL, or Southern have agreed to implement such a plan.

Lewisham council and the Forest Hill Society continue to raise this with the railway companies at every available opportunity as it would be relatively simple and cheap to accomplish. There area few obstacles to this being an entrance to the station. Lewisham council are sorting out the steepness of the slope to the car park and making it more pedestrian friendly. The two remaining issues I have heard about are possibly blocking the driver's view of the platform and a sub-station close to that part of the car park. I am sure that both of these issues can be fixed, but as yet I am not aware of a definite plan to open this as an exit.

michael, sorry for any misunderstanding. My comments merely reflect on the intention and funding side of things from Lewisham, and nothing to do with the railways themselves.

I will hold my tongue on this now to avoid confusion.

Good Morning,

i have recently stumbled across your forum after noticing that one of my colleagues in the Streatham Hill area has been posting on a forum similar to yours.

i am a duty station manager for the London Bridge area and stations such as Honor Oak Park, Forest Hill, Sydenham, Penge West and Anerley fall under my control.

Southerns motto is to "think like a passenger" and me and my team aim to deliever proactive positive customer service (although id accept this isnt always the case - but we are getting better) as part of offering improved customer service i have decided to join this forum with the aim of offering you updated information and answering any questions you may have about your stations. i not here to be abused but will endeavour to answer any questions you may have. this will all be done in my own time so you may need to bare with me at times.

Hope this helps, look forward to hearing from some of you.

DSMDUNCAN

Due to a localised power fault forest hill ticket office is currently closed. Both ticket vending machines are in full operational order and revenue protection officers are on site to assist with ticket sales.

DSMDUNCAN