T&W Metro - Sam Fender and Pink Concerts

[Kryten2340]

Looks like T&W Metro staff are getting griefed on social media due to their operation for tonight and advising people to walk over to Gateshead if you're heading south of the river after the Sam Fender concert at St James Park but really what else are they meant to do?
Personaly I think it's ludicrous to have two major music concerts on the same night less than 15 miles apart.

 

[ModernRailways]

Looks like T&W Metro staff are getting griefed on social media due to their operation for tonight and advising people to walk over to Gateshead if you're heading south of the river after the Sam Fender concert at St James Park but really what else are they meant to do?
Personaly I think it's ludicrous to have two major music concerts on the same night less than 15 miles apart.

Total shower of , and lack of planning.

Plenty of ways this could have been managed fairly effectively, Nexus, as usual chose the easy option.

Whoever is running the Twitter feed needs reminding of customer service. Telling people who have just arrived into the city of a train only to find no metros then be told walk half way up the city towards Monument for a bus to Gateshead, or to ‘just walk to Gateshead’ for a metro is abysmal. I am aware of at least one disabled passenger being told the same, which is a breach of the disability regs.

Total mixture of reasons for them not wanting to do anything, mainly it’s staffing. Managing the crowds in both cities would not be doable on a Saturday without giving staff an incentive to come in and help out. Office based staff have volunteered, but even that’s not been in any significant numbers.

This has nothing to do with Local Authorities/Police granting the permission for both concerts. The Metro can and should have coped with them perfectly fine. All of these threads are becoming silly about Metro now, but I’ve said it previously, this is a mass transport system that when it comes to the mass part just said ‘shut it down, too busy we can’t deal with it’.

Nexus, and more specifically Metro management really need to be sacked with proper railway / metro style management brought in. Too many managers at Metro have got there not from merit but from other means and it really shows, especially on nights like tonight…

 

[Paul_10]

For someone who pays your wage, you do really slag your employer's off quite frequently on these threads I've noticed. If I've worked for that company, I would definitely limit my opinions more than you are on a public forum.

I do feel there shouldn't be a situation where Monument is partially closed. They have cited safety reasons but this is probably another example of the nanny state. Close Haymarket and Central if needs must but not the main city centre station. As for your complaint on the twitter response, how would you of handled the request?

All that said, looking at the Sort out the metro Facebook page which is known for petty complaints, it would seem in general things have went well and there has been no significant issues from what I can see yet reading your post, it sounds like it was the great north run farce of 2015 again.

 

[telstarbox]

Personaly I think it's ludicrous to have two major music concerts on the same night less than 15 miles apart.

This is a fair point in one of the UK's smaller big cities. But who has the power to prevent two simultaneous events if both venues have the planning permission etc to host them? I know the police can and do intervene where football fixtures present a clash, but that is based on more specific law relating to Sports Grounds.

 

[DanNCL]

Whoever is running the Twitter feed needs reminding of customer service. Telling people who have just arrived into the city of a train only to find no metros then be told walk half way up the city towards Monument for a bus to Gateshead, or to ‘just walk to Gateshead’ for a metro is abysmal. I am aware of at least one disabled passenger being told the same, which is a breach of the disability regs.

I seem to recall it's ran at weekends by control rather than customer service staff. From a look at the twitter replies last night, clearly whoever was running it couldn't care less.

Nexus, and more specifically Metro management really need to be sacked with proper railway / metro style management brought in. Too many managers at Metro have got there not from merit but from other means and it really shows, especially on nights like tonight…

There's one manager who, from a third party perspective, seems to sort-of know what they're doing but is held back by the rest. The rest are useless, clearly only there for the pay packet and the prestige of having a management role rather than actually being suitable for the job.

I saw two of them on the mainline concourse at Newcastle Central last week during what would in most places be considered working hours for management, seemingly observing the movement of some passengers and indeed some LNER staff. It was rather disconcerting to say the least.

For someone who pays your wage, you do really slag your employer's off quite frequently on these threads I've noticed. If I've worked for that company, I would definitely limit my opinions more than you are on a public forum.

If Nexus sacked everyone that publicly slagged them off they'd have virtually no one left!

I do feel there shouldn't be a situation where Monument is partially closed. They have cited safety reasons but this is probably another example of the nanny state. Close Haymarket and Central if needs must but not the main city centre station. As for your complaint on the twitter response, how would you of handled the request?

It's entirely the staffing. Monument was open with a queuing system in place for Sam Fender's concert on Friday. It seems that, through Nexus' failure to get their act to together, they've only had enough staff on shift to manage the crowds for one concert on Saturday and they chose to prioritise the Pink concert in Sunderland.

 

[Tetchytyke]

Plenty of ways this could have been managed fairly effectively, Nexus, as usual chose the easy option.

They could have paid a fortune in overtime to staff and it would have solved the problem, obviously.

Question is: who foots that bill? I’m going out on a limb here, but I’ll eat my hat if the promoters of the two concerts contributed *anything* to the costs of getting their customers home. And if they’re not going to cough up then why should north east taxpayers foot the bill?

 

[ModernRailways]

They could have paid a fortune in overtime to staff and it would have solved the problem, obviously.

Question is: who foots that bill? I’m going out on a limb here, but I’ll eat my hat if the promoters of the two concerts contributed *anything* to the costs of getting their customers home. And if they’re not going to cough up then why should north east taxpayers foot the bill?

Ticket revenue would pay for the additional staffing, but the whole point in public transport is for the public good. How much did paying Go North East and Stagecoach cost? I’m sure that bill will be much higher than just paying their own staff a bonus to come in.

For someone who pays your wage, you do really slag your employer's off quite frequently on these threads I've noticed.

Nexus don’t pay my wage. I don’t think criticising the running of (or lack of) the Metro should be considered slagging off, there are significant issues with the day to day running of the service and it should be discussed.

As for your complaint on the twitter response, how would you have handled the request?

The station shouldn’t have been closed. I think I made that fairly clear.

All that said, looking at the Sort out the metro Facebook page which is known for petty complaints, it would seem in general things have went well and there has been no significant issues from what I can see yet reading your post, it sounds like it was the great north run farce of 2015 again.

Passenger numbers were ridiculously low on Friday night, to the point you’d have thought it might have just been a gig at the arena not a sell out stadium. I imagine similar happened last night, people chose other methods of transport.

I seem to recall it's ran at weekends by control rather than customer service staff. From a look at the twitter replies last night, clearly whoever was running it couldn't care less.

It used to be a dedicated twitter team, but then moved over to the control customer service desk. I’m not sure if it’s switched back again but I don’t believe it has.

 

[Class142sbad]

On Saturday afternoon to Sunderland it was fairly busy but on the tyne loop I only saw one train that was full and that was it. I was honestly expecting it to be busier but It wasn't.

 

[Tetchytyke]

Ticket revenue would pay for the additional staffing, but the whole point in public transport is for the public good.

Clearly it wouldn’t, otherwise they would have done it. And where’s the public good in subsidising the multi-millionaire P!nk?

 

[Paul_10]

Passenger numbers were ridiculously low on Friday night, to the point you’d have thought it might have just been a gig at the arena not a sell out stadium. I imagine similar happened last night, people chose other methods of transport.


It used to be a dedicated twitter team, but then moved over to the control customer service desk. I’m not sure if it’s switched back again but I don’t believe it has.

Yeah I heard that was the case which was interesting, no doubt the station closures played a part in that but maybe they should of been a change of plan given the numbers were lower than expected.

Be interesting if internally there is now regret closing the stations or they think doing that made a potentially tricky night alot more easier.

 

[MetroCar4058]

They could have paid a fortune in overtime to staff and it would have solved the problem, obviously.

Question is: who foots that bill? I’m going out on a limb here, but I’ll eat my hat if the promoters of the two concerts contributed *anything* to the costs of getting their customers home. And if they’re not going to cough up then why should north east taxpayers foot the bill?

I mean, the Metro never has, and never was intended to cover its own operating cost. So by this logic we should just close it.

It’s not all about direct farebox revenue, the wider economic benefits are poorly accounted for or appreciated.

 

[Tetchytyke]

It’s not all about direct farebox revenue, the wider economic benefits are poorly accounted for or appreciated.

To an extent, yes, but equally the promoters of these two events will be making millions from each night. It’s only reasonable to expect them to contribute towards the cost of getting their customers home.

Newcastle United subsidise the Magpie Mover season tickets.

 

[Volvictof]

To an extent, yes, but equally the promoters of these two events will be making millions from each night. It’s only reasonable to expect them to contribute towards the cost of getting their customers home.

Newcastle United subsidise the Magpie Mover season tickets.

I’d argue it’s not really the concern of the concert organisers to cover (even partially) the costs of transport for concertgoers, and if it was, it would only mean the ticket prices would go up to reflect this. A decent city’s public transport system should be able to cope with all the large scale events that happen in a city over the year wether it be concerts, galas, festivals, carnivals etc, transport should be built with that stuff in mind, because that’s part of what a city is; a place where people congregate, and not just during the rush hour commute. That’s why arenas and stadiums are built in citys; because they have the infrastructure to cope with large scale events… or should. If a pop concert was held in a field in the middle of the countryside then id agree it should be up to the organisers help with transport provisions, but they have these events at cities so that they don’t have to worry about that. Plus don’t forget that the transport provider will sell huge amounts of tickets during that even so it’s not like they’re losing out.

 

[ModernRailways]

Clearly it wouldn’t, otherwise they would have done it. And where’s the public good in subsidising the multi-millionaire P!nk?

If you’re to quote me, use the full quote where I have already told you Nexus paid Go North East and Stagecoach for buses (and in turn drivers) instead of paying their own staff an incentive.

The public good is that people have a good experience on metro, people who may not have typically used it day to day, they then choose to make future trips by metro. Having good transportation links brings people to the area, those people then spend money in local businesses and help stimulate the local economy.

All that said, looking at the Sort out the metro Facebook page which is known for petty complaints, it would seem in general things have went well and there has been no significant issues from what I can see yet reading your post, it sounds like it was the great north run farce of 2015 again.

I have gone back to this group and had a look over the comments. People who were in Sunderland for Pink had a fine experience with queuing, standard fare for an event there. People who went to Sam Fender in Newcastle, mostly say they drove, car shared, walked or got taxis instead. That should not be the methods of choice for a gig in the centre of Newcastle.

To an extent, yes, but equally the promoters of these two events will be making millions from each night. It’s only reasonable to expect them to contribute towards the cost of getting their customers home.

How do you propose they do that? Should people arriving in private transport be given cheaper tickets because they aren’t using public transport? These concerts indirectly bring in millions to the local economies. People staying in hotels, eating out at restaurants, spending the weekend here.

It’s also worth noting that very often the promoters do in fact pay towards the public transport operation and that’s in part as to why trains run later than normal. I’m not sure if that’s occurred on this specific occasion but it does (and has) happen(ed)

 

[Mojo]

This is a fair point in one of the UK's smaller big cities. But who has the power to prevent two simultaneous events if both venues have the planning permission etc to host them? I know the police can and do intervene where football fixtures present a clash, but that is based on more specific law relating to Sports Grounds.

I believe local authorities do have the power to withdraw licenses for events, or at least they would receive advice that to go ahead with an event could possibly not be compliant with their licensing conditions - the Coldplay concert on 19 August last year at Wembley Stadium was cancelled at relatively short notice due to a strike on London Underground. Event organisers said that they would not legally be able to go ahead.

 

[XAM2175]

To an extent, yes, but equally the promoters of these two events will be making millions from each night. It’s only reasonable to expect them to contribute towards the cost of getting their customers home.

I’d argue it’s not really the concern of the concert organisers to cover (even partially) the costs of transport for concertgoers, and if it was, it would only mean the ticket prices would go up to reflect this.

I's not uncommon abroad for licensing authorities to charge a transport levy for events that impose a considerably-larger-than-usual burden on transport networks. I view it as quite reasonable - the network should obviously be able to manage normal spikes in demand, but there's no reason for an operator to foot the entire bill for running extra services and putting on extra staff when the event is being organised for the promoter's profit.

After all, how is it any different from event organisers having to contribute to the costs of having the police present at their events?

 

[Snex]

I believe local authorities do have the power to withdraw licenses for events, or at least they would receive advice that to go ahead with an event could possibly not be compliant with their licensing conditions - the Coldplay concert on 19 August last year at Wembley Stadium was cancelled at relatively short notice due to a strike on London Underground. Event organisers said that they would not legally be able to go ahead.

I think the problem up here is who would cancel. Both of them benefit each in their respective cities so neither is going to be open to cancel an event and that's before going into the rivalry which Sam Fender made 10x worse by turning it into a NUFC end of season party and slagging off Sunderland at every chance he could. It would a PR disaster for the local authority who cancelled it.

It's the same reason neither will want to charge levy's as there's a massive chance they might lose a gig in the future to the other city.

The only saving grace was there wasn't a strike this year as it's not the first time it's happened on concert days such as at Coldplay in 2012 - https://www.itv.com/news/tyne-tees/...ravel-plans-at-coldplay-concert-in-sunderland

 

[jkkne]

Sorry but the idea of 2 entirely separate cities not being able to hold concerts that are FOURTEEN miles apart is obscene. The comment around Fender and NUFC is entirely irrelevant.

Manchester coped with Elton John, Arctic Monkeys and Coldplay in one night.

If anything Sunderland's travel plan needs looking at is its really out on a limb. None of the bus operators bothered putting extra services and the whole thing is entirely reliant on Metro getting people in and out. Fender alone put £15m into the city economy

Nexus yet again failed, as it has done for its entire existence. Its social media was shocking and widely derided. The pre-event comms were muddled and unclear.

The whole running of the system isn't fit for purpose but theres zero challenge from the equally inept Martin Gannon and NECA Transport lot - christ can't wait for them to run bus franchising!

Nexus were the only ones coming out of the whole thing looking ridiculous - as they always do - nothing is going to change even with their shiny new trains

 

[chris_in_salop]

Why can't these events be held in the daytime?

 

[John Griffiths]

Because people are at work, school, college, university?

Curse my inability to spot sarcasm!