Great Western Coffee Shop

From my journey today ...

(http://www.wellho.net/pix/trainloadindicator.jpg)

I wonder how that works: presumably some sort of infrared sensors, or could it possibly be sensing weight on the floor? And what sort of train was this? And, as far as you could tell, was it accurate?

It looks from the colours that it's the Cl 700 Desiro City for Thameslink.    IIRC the load sensing is patched off the normal self adjusting suspension.

A few years ago it was explained to me that all the Desiros on SWT have load sensing to a rough level of accuracy, but a subset of the fleet also have IR counters above the doors.   The latter trains are used to accurately measure and record loadings as they are rotated round the different diagrams.

Paul

Educated guess that it's based on weight of passengers. Class 700. From what I could see, I would have made the same judgement about each coach; yes, it was accurate.

From what I've read, we can probably expect similar displays in the 800 series trains. The particular device I was on was inbound to London in the late afternoon, so no orange or red (the two other display alternatives shown on the key). Once we dropped off most passengers at St Pancras, this display (which was one of a series) dropped from the series, and I got off at Farringdon to transfer to the tube, as Farringdon has a much shorter walk from inbound Thameslink to westbound Hammersmith!

I would love to see these on the trains that come through here at Oldfield Park. They could show how many square inches each passenger is able to take up!  >:(

And given the thread title, will our trains be telling us how much they understand how uncomfortable it is to be squashed together.  ;D

A useful display would also be an indicator of how many seats are available in each carriage.  Weight or pressure sensors could be fitted to the seats, similar to the seatbelt warnings in some cars.

... unless they are sensitive enough to detect occupation by bags, coats, feet, ... or babies?

Not a true indication of loadings but the CIS screens at Euston now show the level of reservations in a given coach.

(http://www.mbob.co.uk/rforum/euscis.jpg)

I'd not seen that at Euston before.  Very useful information.

They've been doing this on the Virgin Trains services for well over a year now

The photo is from December. Just not got round to posting it until now!  ;D

Chiltern's 168s all have a sensor built into the vestibule door entrance that counts pax passing through an (infra-eed I think) beam

You may have spotted that Hitachi's list of UK suppliers for the IEPs includes "Passenger Counting System - Petards (Gateshead, Tyne & Wear)". Neither that list nor the longer one for EU suppliers mentions CCTV, whether for DOO (required in the specification) or other purposes.

Petards' web site refers to "vertical infra-red sensors" above the doors, but the passenger counting product is shown as part if its eyeTrain range of TV products. So maybe they will also provide the other TV systems required: Forwards-facing, pantograph, OHL, and saloon. And there are hints that TV analysis might contribute to the passenger counting too.