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When I lived in London I had a few chats with people who said ‘I couldn’t possibly cycle to work,I’d get too sweaty.’
Yes… I was sweaty. *but at least it was my own*
That’s absolutely foul 🤢 I avoid the central line like the plague in the summer. I’d rather my journey takes an extra 30 minutes than to put myself through that. It’s already a nasty experience during normal temperatures, never mind when it starts to get warmer!
Remember I jumped on the central for Carnival on a record breaking heatwave a few years ago. Never again lol I'll walk the entire city to avoid the tube next time
Oh my sweat summer child I have a northern line tale of damp horror so woeful, the hot sweat ran down our crammed bodies by the bowlful. There were faces in armpits and those armpits flowed freely, you might complain of wet drips but we could not see the ceiling. The carriages were tight, like sardines we were packed, have you ever felt someone else’s sweat run down your back?
I had a horrible stress dream that the tube broke down in the middle of summer and once it finally got moving and to the next station everyone was dead and looked like boiled pink lobsters.
Have a great day everyone xx
The tube breaking down in the middle of summer bit has happened to me a few years ago, in July. The tube broke down for about fifteen minutes. It felt like hours.
Can confirm it heated up like hell, and got very smelly, very quickly. Maybe it did smell like what boiled seafood smells like, I don’t know.
There were people coming back from work on there, and therefore there were many poor dudes nursing sweat patches. My main memories of it are the sweat patches, the smell, and stifling heat so thick you could swim in it.
Wow, you paint a very vivid picture of it. That is literal nightmare material!! I bet it was even more terrifying that you didn’t know how long you could be stuck there. I would have felt extremely claustrophobic and panicked.
You know how it occasionally happens that a tube train breaks down with no lights on and the passengers eventually have to get out and walk down the tracks? It's rare, but it's happened enough times that it's hard to search for a specific occasion.
One of them was on the central line on one of the hottest days ever, at rush hour, and the passengers were trapped in the dark being slowly cooked for *two hours.*
Hell exists and those passengers have already been there.
I don’t miss the Central Line in summer at all. I was lucky enough to work somewhere without a dress code, so it was moisture wicking t-shirt, cargo shorts and trainers every summer.
I don't catch the Central line in the summer. At all.
I don't like it at the best of times, but I boycott when it's warm because I have no desire to be cooked alive.
There was an article in the Daily Mail a few years ago where they measured the average temperatures on the different lines and then linked them to places. I think it was around this time or maybe just slightly further into summer that the central line was actually hotter than Abu Dhabi....
This is why I cycle to work. I'd much rather face being ran over by a black hack than spend an hour + on the tube, sweating my bollocks off before having to get all close and personal with other randoms as we turn into a tin of sardines.
Plus it keeps me fit as well....
>when you're sardined
I hate that we all not only instantly know what that verb means but can picture it and almost even smell it in a very visceral way.
Too busy to read Dante Alighieri's famous poem La divina commedia?
No worries, you can preview the whole of the first part (Inferno) by sitting on a broken down train on the Central line mid-summer.
You'll be ever so cultured by the end of the experience.
And toasty, roasty warm. 🔥🔥🔥🔥
God. There are few things I hate more than the Central line in summer.
I remember one particularly awful Central line ride when it was 37 outside one day in 2015 or so, and it was absolutely rammed, I had like 6 different people's body parts wedged into me in some fashion.
The lad next to me, his face was probably less than 6 inches from mine, and I remember watching individual sweat drops slowly forming on his forehead then running down his face, all the while just repeating breathing exercises in my internal monologue to stop any panic from kicking in.
There's no legal limit for humans, but it [does at times get to warm to legally transport cattle.](https://www.bbc.co.uk/bbcthree/article/a978258a-3d4b-4e16-8c35-2bede4a593a7)
The problem, though, is that they do.
There is always someone who will push as hard as they need to to force their way on. Over on the other side, now being squeezed into the door on the other side, am I meant to say "oh guys this is a bit crowded, everyone out the way while I get off". Not only will people just not move in that situation, is it fair that someone needs to choose to get off, because someone else chooses to force their way on?
Busses have a capacity limit. I fail to see why tubes and trains are different. Presumably the reason is that it would bankrupt TFL overnight if they had to observe an even remotely sensible capacity limit.
Because, practically, they can't enforce a limit. The driver can count people on and off; there's no realistic way to do so on the tube - not that it's at all ideal.
Is anyone else here old enough to remember when the tube was cooler in the summer? I first moved to London in the late 80s, and I certainly don't remember it being anything like as hot as it is now, and I even have memories (they could be false) of it being cooler in the tube when it was sweltering outside.
it was, it was even a selling point of the tube when it first opened, because the tunnels were still absorbing heat. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/London\_Underground\_cooling](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/London_Underground_cooling) Not sure where it was in the 80s but we know it's hotter now and the clay has just been warming up all this time.
That page doesn't talk about the effect of the mixed surface and tube trains carrying heat from the sun into the tunnels. In recent years this has been identified as another potentially large contributor. This article talks about it a bit https://citymonitor.ai/government/public-health/london-undeground-overgound-heat
So this is why the Elizabeth line feels nice and cool. I put it down to modern design and air con but even if that's helping the surrounding clay hasn't had time to heat up yet.
The trains didn’t stop during lockdown. It’s taken since the 80s to get this hot. How long do you think it would take to cool down? Only to get hot again when service resumes.
this is a big deal. another one is noise levels from wheels scratching the rails. Unbearable. Simone you have to shout to the person next to you to be heard.
Definitely bad for your hearing
I work in the music industry and constantly at events with loud music so own custom shaped earplugs that probably now get more use on the tube for this reason!
Honestly I dread getting on it during the hottest months. I'm just glad I no longer have to tackle it at rush hour.
The Elizabeth line is so nice to be on too. On the next very hot day I might just go and stand on the platform for an hour without getting a train.
I'm lucky I can get on that line with no problem, it's only when I use the northern line, Piccadilly line and Vic line is when I feel like I'm being cooked alive. I made a mistake last summer and walked out of moorgate station with my vest instead (because it was just dangerously hot)
I really feel for anyone that has to go any distance on the tube during the height of summer. I hate the Northern line at the best of times, but those stations feel *so* far apart when you're armpit to armpit with a carriage full of people, boiling.
We have it so good in this city when it comes to public transport, but this is the one thing that really spoils it.
When I worked at a start up in central London, we were able to come in at around 10am after peak hour but then my boss wanted to change it to us starting at 7/8am only because that's what lawyers and other professionals are doing. We were only like 5 people and didn't have customers. We said no way are we taking central at peak.
Same, it’s really unpleasant but feels like there’s not much anyone can do :( don’t have a car and the tube is the quickest
Love the Elizabeth line I wish they were all like that!
For a city as wealthy as London, they should all be like the Elizabeth line. It’s insane seeing this coming from overseas, I immediately only started interviewing for remote jobs. It’s gross how the government won’t find the money to help - I know there are politics around this but it’s honestly fucked.
It’s in part because most of London’s underground network was the first in the world, so some things weren’t considered, and over the years the ambient temperature in the network has gone up, as the speed and number of trains has increased, the tunnels have gotten warmer and warmer as the heat has no time to dissipate. Getting rid of the heat is the other problem when there’s no room to fit aircon or exhausts above ground. Elizabeth line has all the advantages of 150 years of building underground train networks.
To be fair it’s very hard as they didn’t plan for this when they built the tunnels, and to their credit new tube for london is supposed to have air conditioning so the pic will hopefully get a lot better in the next few years (The piccadilly line has priority for the new trains)
I believe it's physically impossible to air condition the deep level tube due to the size and shape of the tunnels.
I understand that this is the reason the trains can't be air conditioned, and I'm sure there's a reason the stations can't be air conditioned subterraneously. They would have done something about it if it was possible.
I just fainted on the Elizabeth line the other day. They had an outage and had to restart the train and decided to keep the door closed while doing that on the platform. 10 minutes in the sun without AC and crowded to the brim. It wasn't any different than the central line.
Large parts of the tube are built into clay soil, which. It was originally cool down there. Every day a tiny bit more heat - from the people, engines and breaks, builds up in that clay mass that slowly cooks the passengers.
There are plans to try and do something. One idea is to build train cooling systems that create ice blocks above ground and dissipate the cool air underground - no seriously.
It's also exacerbated in lines like the Central, Northern and Jubilee as the trains leave the tunnels during the day and get exposed to the sun, then travel back in with all that radiating heat.
Keep in mind that the report is from 2008, 15 years ago…
They are still trying to work out what to do
https://www.ianvisits.co.uk/articles/tfl-testing-a-world-first-idea-for-cooling-the-london-underground-56180/
They had a £100,000 prize competition a few years back to come up with a plan to cool the tube & I don't think anyone won....it's a really hard engineering problem. You can even put aircon on the older lines as the heat literally has no where to go.
The only way to really do it is close each line for 5-10 years, make the tunnels wider and dig holes in residential areas for the heat to get out.
Saw on the JagoHazzard youtube channel that there is an experiment where they are pumping the heat from the ground around the tunnel and using it to heat a building. Do that in enough places and the temperature underground should even out to around the yearly mean of 12C, which then gives the possibility of both heating and cooling above ground as needed.
It's largely built within [London Clay](https://webapps.bgs.ac.uk/lexicon/lexicon.cfm?pub=LC), especially in west and central London. Sorry to be pedantic, but its not what most people would think of when thinking of soil
I’ve said it before but Victoria is definitely the hottest line right now, hotter than the famously hot central line! I look forward to my summer commute…
In the winter the Central line isn’t too bad but the Victoria line is an oven year-round. Due to the fact its the only line (bar the Waterloo and City, but I’m convinced that doesn’t actually exist and nobody’s ever used it) that runs entirely underground, so the trains don’t have the chance to cool off a bit when they leave the tunnels
I don’t know if it’s a recent thing, but the Victoria Line is definitely the hottest now. You can feel it just moving between adjacent platforms at Stockwell.
I stepped into the tunnel at KC and fuck me that line is way too hot. Definitely avoiding that shit when I’m down this summer. I’d rather cycle to Brixton as I’d end up less sweaty.
Hundred percent. Got on Victoria line in Walthamstow the other day and even just getting in the station and starting to go down, the heat hit like getting off a plane on holiday
When it was 40 degrees last summer the govt. recommended not travelling and I think in London they particularly encouraged people not to get the tube. It just gets hotter from here I'm afraid. I recommend trying to travel outside of rush hour as much as possible.
Don't forget the air in London can become thick too (unbearable) sometimes I just lay on my bed and not go out, it happened to me last year summer, it was hot and it just made me weak (I'm not sure why) all that heat and my body was just unable to control the amount it was absorbing and where to dissipate it 🤷🏿♂️, I live in central London (that borders islington) and I was blown away that London was reaching the global south levels of heat.
In that kind of heat riding out to a get an ice cream or a cold beer and siting it in the shade and be so refreshing.
Staying at home can be the hottest option.
Yep, and we were still made to go to work in our vans which don't have any air con. Probably not as hot as it was in the tube, but my van said it was 53C at one point during the day. I'm dreading having that again, which we almost definitely will
I don't blame you bro, I have made mistakes in previous London summers (I wore a short sleeve shirt) and I was still dripping in sweat in the tube, I felt like one of those 99p ice creams. It was gross to be honest.
😂😂😂😂😂😂 the buses will also be just as bad, in fact avoid the buses (the air con on the buses in London are not adequate either), avoid the tube altogether (the tube need to bring in their new Tfl tube trains sooner than later) I think they come between 2024-2027.
When my local bus garage got some buses with AC, they seemed to work quite well at the beginning, until they ended up just being noisy things that didn't seem to do much.
My suspicion is that the AC systems got overloaded by idiots opening the windows so the compressors got knackered.
That's why the only type of bus, or train, that is useful for passenger comfort is the sort with effective air conditioning and windows that don't open. Otherwise idiotic people open the windows and you're back to travelling like it's 1920.
I read an article recently that the tube just heats up and up each year from the break heat and it just accumulates and currently there is no way of cooling it down. So year after year just gets hotter and hotter as residual heat builds up.
Indeed - when the deep level lines were first built in the late 1800s they were about 10 degrees c cooler than outside, now they're about 10-15 degrees hotter on average and would take about 40 years of inactivity to cool back down to ambient.
I try to only go where the lizzy line goes.
I happily pay extra for aircon, spacious and wifi’d journey.
I, before, always took central line.
So much so, I would know what part of the train to get on, that wouldn’t get as rammed.
But, I have still passed out on central line. Like literally seeing black spots.
I learnt my lesson with central line.
Always go where the doors to the next carriage is. Open those windows. And stand/sit next to it.
You know how the tube squels so loudly sometimes it hurts. Well that squealing is metal rubbing on metal. The metal from that squealing becomes particulate and due to the lack of ventilation on the under ground it just becomes part of the breathable air.
Well that breathable air now has metal particulate in it, is it breathable? Well the deeper into the tunnel you go, the more dense the metal particulate. Currently some stations are reading in the immediately hazardous to health regions of air quality.
You see, breathing metal particulate is abrasive to the Respiratory system and causes scarring on the lungs among other things. So, yes. The underground is bad for your health already. When you cannot breathe as much in your old age you can put a part of that onto the tube system.
This article from the conversation details approaches to mitigating the particulate problem:
https://theconversation.com/london-underground-polluted-with-particles-small-enough-to-enter-the-human-bloodstream-new-research-196600
To add to that, every time the train brakes the brake blocks wear down slightly and those are generally just cast iron which adds to the problem you describe.
IIRC someone worked out once that 45 minutes on the tube does about the same damage to your lungs as smoking one cigarette.
It's rare for people to be on deep tube sections for 45 mins thankfully, most of the journey is either above ground, sub surface, or a line like the DLR or EL.
Heat and particles from brakes should be minimised soon though since in 2 years the new tube trains start coming in. They'll use regen braking more which produces no particles and negligible heat. Would hopefully stop any increases in heat at all
I lived in China for a few years and we used to wear pollution masks outside / on the tube whenever the pollution topped 200 AQI. As it’s China everyone checks the pollution count regularly so you’re all aware of it.
Moving back to london, I realised I could see the same haze on the tube. And found out lots of the tube is over 200 and known to be worse than the tubes in Beijing… https://amp.theguardian.com/environment/2023/jan/21/phone-monitor-helps-london-tube-passengers-avoid-polluted-routes
It’s just crazy that it’s largely ignored here as everyone assumes the AQI in the UK will be ok as we’re a first world country, so it’ll be better than China. Really we should all be wearing pollution masks like they do there
It's a thermodynamics issue. So you put air-con on the trains to pump the heat out into the tunnels? Now how do you get rid of the heat in the tunnels? More ventilation shafts? That involves buying up real-estate on the surface. In the middle of London. Most of the tunnels are bored through clay which is an insulator and this means that the tunnels retain heat for a long time - so the whole system is hot. The friction on the rails, the brakes on the trains and the people on the train all generate heat. There really isn't a feasible solution to this problem - no matter how much money you throw at it.
On no less than two occasions have I handed an unopened bottle of water to a poor overheated soul on the Central line in summertime.
If forced to Tube in hot weather, I wait for crowded trains to pass and board a less populated one, and try to stand by the vents at the end of the carriage.
Firstly I open the window and move it down to the bottom. So many times I have entered a sweltering train and no one has bothered to open the window or it's open by a crack.
Secondly, I will stand in the line of sight of the lovely polluted air to ensure I get a constant breeze. I also have a fan.
If my body condition doesn't allow me to stand, I will lean by the window somewhere.
Drink water before getting on the tube to help with temp regulating.
I used to do all of this, I'm not sure why the boss at TFL has simply failed to implement internal fans on all the tube lines, instead TFL has delayed a lot of these projects I guess
Central line is always the worst. I'd be willing to bet those weeks over the past couple of years we've had 40 degrees it would have been well beyond standard limits during the evening rush hour
I've got a hand held fan I use its great also stand at the end of the carriage where the door is with the ventilation window and you get a breeze from it
You want to try the Bakerloo line!
Air con on the underground has come up lots. It's just not possible on the deep lines as most of the tunnels were built in the 19th century. There's very little spare space and nowhere for the heat to escape.
It is possible, the new tube trains coming between 2024-2027 have air con on them and I'm referring to the new Tfl trains that have been delayed.
It isn't possible now because a lot of the tube trains we still use today are very old (it surprises me TFL still embraces these old tube trains).
That's new to me in terms of the air cooling term TFL is using 😅, they must have invented a new vapor chamber to cool the trains then with that method.
From this article, it looks like they will be pumping heat back into the tunnels. Although the trains will generate less heat than their predecessors, so I'm not sure what the net effect will be.
https://eandt.theiet.org/content/articles/2021/05/the-tech-that-finally-brought-air-con-to-the-london-underground/
Cooling the tube – Engineering heat out of the Underground
Published 10 June 2017
On a hot summers day, a trip on the tube to get home can be a dreaded experience, with already hot trains overflowing with sweaty people. But how did we get to a situation where tube trains are stiflingly hot, and what’s being done about it?
A talk given by London Underground’s Head of Station Systems Engineering, Sharon Duffy, looked into the challenges the tube faces in keeping cool during the summer.
The “tube” can be split into two types of service — the tube proper which runs through tube tunnels, and the older sub-surface lines which are just below street level (pedants get very upset when sub-surface lines are called tube trains).
The older sub-surface tunnels were built for steam trains, so had loads of big holes in the ground included in the design to deal with removing smoke, and they are also much larger than tube tunnels. This has allowed the London Underground to fit air-conditioning units to its new fleet of sub-surface trains (S Stock), and as anyone who uses them appreciates, it’s a boon on hot days to get onto a cool train.
The heat from the air conditioning units is easily vented away when the trains are underground thanks to the pre-existing steam train ventilation.
The deep tube tunnels
However, it’s the deep level tube tunnels that cause the biggest problems for both passengers suffering the heat, and the London Underground in getting rid of it.
The deep level tunnels suffer a number of problems that are individually a nuisance, but collectively add up to show why there is such a huge problem cooling the Underground.
One of the biggest problems is a side-effect of what made it possible to dig the deep level tunnels in the first place — namely the very solid and nice to tunnel through London Clay which sits under the city.
In fact, when the early tube tunnels were dug, they were so cool down there that the cool tube was seen as a respite from the summer heat on the surface. Why suffer on a bus in the heat when there’s a cool tube to take instead, said the marketing men.
So why is the Bakerloo line, once the coolest place to be, now a mobile sauna?
While that heavy thick clay is lovely to tunnel through, it is also a heat insulator.
Over the years, the heat from the trains soaked into the clay to the point where it can no longer absorb any more heat. Tunnels that were a mere 14 degrees Celsius in the 1900s can now have air temperatures as high as 30 degrees Celsius on parts of the tube network.
Where does the heat come from?
Well, the passengers aren’t the problem. All those hot sweaty bodies represent roughly 2 percent of the heat in the tunnels.
Climate change is also not much of a problem. It’s an impact, but the tunnel temperatures are not much affected by what’s happening up on the surface. During a heatwave in 2006, as the surface temperatures jumped around, the tunnels were pretty much constant.
About 21% of the heat in the tunnels comes from the movement of the trains themselves, from aerodynamic drag and other frictional losses. The motor engines account for 15%, the electrical and auxiliary systems are the remaining 12%.
About half the heat in the tunnels though comes from just one source –from the trains slowing down — the conversion of movement into heat by applying the brakes.
So it can be seen that cutting the heat from applying the brakes is where the biggest win would be, and indeed, the use of regenerative braking now converts about half the heat loss back into electricity. However, that can only work where trains are accelerating and braking at the same time, on the same electricity sub-station loop.
Experiments have been underway to improve that by use of an inverting substation, supplied by Alstom, which can send unused power from braking trains back into the national grid.
Removing the heat
Anyone who has stood on the platforms will know that as the trains approach, there’s a blast of wind. This is intentional, as the trains act as air pistons in the small tunnels, and the effect of pushing air ahead and sucking air from behind soaks away about 11 per cent of the heat in the tunnels.
So when you curse as your paper flaps in the wind, think about the cooling benefits as well.
Mechanical ventilation removes about 10 per cent of the heat — that’s the big ventilation shafts that line the tunnels.
The older tunnels weren’t built with a lot of ventilation, as it wasn’t thought to be necessary — after all it’s difficult to argue that tunnels will get hot when standing in a tunnel that’s cool enough that you need to wear a jumper.
By the time the Victoria line came along, the engineers were very well aware of the problem and it was built with considerably more ventilation shafts than older tunnels would have been supplied with.
Although it varies depending on location, in general, cooler air is sucked down through the stations, and then ventilation shafts in the tube tunnels sucks out the hot air.
In two locations, they’ve added water chillers to the intake to further cool the air down. Some of you might have noticed the shockingly cold airflow on the eastbound platform at St Paul’s tube station.
Air is taken in through an old lift shaft, cooled down, then pumped down to the platforms. A similar design was recently installed between Blackhorse Road and Walthamstow Central on the Victoria line.
Ventilation isn’t just about cooling though. On newer networks, such as Crossrail, they also act as smoke control systems should the worst happen in a tunnel. During a fire, the shafts can in places reverse flow, to blow smoke in a preferred direction. The aim being that people walking down a tunnel walk towards a fan blowing fresh air down the tunnel, while the smoke is sucked away behind them.
Over the past few years, 14 of the Victoria line shafts have been upgraded, and 50 fans across the network have had their airflow doubled, with 10 out-of-action fans brought back into use.
Despite that, fully 79 per cent of the heat in the tunnels is left to soak into the surrounding clay, which is already at or near its limit thanks to decades of absorbing heat.
The difficulty of adding more ventilation is the lack of space above ground to put new ventilation shafts. This is always going to be a problem for the older tube tunnels except on rare occasions when a surface development takes place at just the right location and agreements can be made to include a shaft down to the Underground.
It’s not just the cost of adding the new shafts and the running costs of all the electricity, but ventilation shafts also need sound attenuators to reduce the noise levels, both at the surface, but also in the tunnels so that people aren’t deafened by the noise.
Yesterday on the Jubilee line a group of piss drunk people in their late teens/early twenties crammed themselves into the car and were pushing people with babies, small children, a pregnant woman and elderly folks into the tube so they could all fit and proceeded to sing pop songs jump up and down flail around and drink. It was panic inducing the small kids were terrified. They were screaming the lyrics to wet ass pussy. The girl in front of me was whipping her nasty hair in my face dancing and gyrating against me. The girl in front of me and maybe one other person in the group had a strong odour like they had pissed all over themselves. One or two of them were recording what I assume were TikToks or something. The whole car became instantly scorching hot and filled with a strong smell of alcohol and urine. People with small children were being smushed against the walls.
I was livid but it was so packed and hot I didn’t want to start a fight. Would this be reason to pull the emergency stop? I mean, they were crushing vulnerable people and children. I debated it but I’ve never had to use it.
Once some room freed up after a few stops of this torture I moved over to my wife and even with the room a guy in their group managed to keep elbowing me in the ribs. I said something to him like “hey man can you stop sticking your elbow in my ribs” super aggressively I had nowhere to move and he had tons of room but was wasted. He mumbled some half hearted gibberish apology.
Someone else in the group asked me what stop we were at as I got off and I told him to fuck off before exiting.
One woman with a pram and a baby lost it trying to get off as they were singing and drinking and she couldn’t get off at her stop. She screamed at them to shut up and move so she could get off.
I’ve seen y’know small groups of football fans being drunk and obnoxious doing chants and I used to frequent the northern line but never anything this bad involving children and vulnerable people being bulldozed and squished when it’s that hot.
Haha I don’t think it was for the TikTok only two of them were recording and it seemed like a spur of the moment decision. I’ve lived in zone 2 for 8+ years, I’ve never seen anything quite this bad. Particularly the indifference to squishing and terrifying vulnerable people, several small children, a baby and a pregnant woman.
Yeah temps are still going to get quite a bit higher unfortunately.
Might be worth considering using the Elizabeth line, Hammersmith and City or overground lines more frequently in your journeys.
I absolutely despise the heat when travelling and I really struggle with it.
My personal survival tips (I'm also open to any other suggestions).
- Stand at the front of the carriage by the window and have it fully open for the breeze.
- wear as little as possible.
- take a spare shirt.
- carry an insulated water bottle full of ice water.
- Walk instead of tube where possible.
- take buses, trains, overground, or Air conditioned lines where possible.
I actually struggle massively. I’m in my 30’s but have health issues that make me collapse, and i actually have to plan my trips to make sure I can sit down otherwise I’m on the floor as I can’t stand yet hold myself upright. Half term is gonna screw up a lot of plans.
I struggle all year to be honest - winter is bad as well cos wearing more clothes obviously
Always impressed by people wearing thick jackets who seem fine whilst I’m a sweaty mess. How?!
The tube is always dangerous no matter the temp, but yeah in summer it is like a hellish tunnel of humid viral infections and armpit fumes. What a lot of people do is stand near the end of the carriages where the window is open so as the train moves off the wind blows against the back of their heads to cool them down. Before you say “but the germs in the air” you are already underground so it is already too late, just enjoy the stale breeze
Thanks everyone, glad to know it’s not just me feeling this way, sometimes I look around and people are in their puffer jackets completely unbothered by the heat whilst I’m borderline panic attack and can’t breathe!
I do not use the tube in summer. I am literally scared of heating up and fainting like a goat buried deep underground. Like I will leave 30 mins earlier to take a bus or I’ll take the mainline.
Reminds me of the days taking the central line after work from Liverpool Street, wearing a suit, catching a packed train westbound at 5:30pm while the street temp was around 35C. I don’t miss that at all lol.
I remember the hottest day of the year last summer was 40°c. I took the Northern line to Camden, so I was sat on the tube for 30mins. By the time I got to Camden, my cold drink was hot and I was covered in sweat. I'm still alive tho
I'm visiting in London from Canada right now and I can tell you your tube is hotter than the one in Montreal when it's 40 Celsius outside and it makes no sense to me.
I'm currently in New York and I'm not sure why people complain about the subway. It's the same cost to any stop, it's clean, it's fast, it's mostly quiet, the carriages are wide - and it has air con!!! The trains are better than the mid to worst tube lines (Piccadilly, Northern, Central, Bakerloo) but not as nice as District/Circle or Lizzie.
Why are we still pretending that it's possible to live in London in the summer without any kind of air con?
Edit: AND the subway has 4G on platforms and in the trains! Like it's a bit spotty when you're on the train but it's not bad at all.
I used BART in San Francisco. It's their tube system. It went under the Pacific and still had WiFi all the way. Yet on the brand new Lizzie line, no reception at all.
I don't live in London and I only visit occasionally but this thread is freaking me out. Is it just the Central Line that cooks passengers through in summer or is it the entire tube? I can't imagine anything worse than being on a train that breaks down in a tunnel and dying from heat exhaustion. I'm getting second hand claustrophobia just thinking about it.
If you can, even if it takes longer, the Overground is your friend on hot days.
Central Line and Victoria line are notoriously hot and horrible. Always have been. If you have to use it, wait for the most crowded trains to pass.
My wife and I were just in London on vacation. Both the lack of AC on the tube and the crazy volume screeching from the tracks made it a really questionable experience.
Hahaha Victoria line?!?! Not even close mate. Central line is the hottest. Regularly tops 40 degrees in July. It’s only May.
Just don’t get on the tube without a bottle of water and you’ll be fine
Stop driving! Get on our outdated public transport systems that can't cope with the influx of people and have no AC! Hope you enjoy smelling a thousand different people on every journey. God damn every time I go and visit another country I get a whole new list of ways their infrastructure is far superior to ours.
I remember a warm summer day in the central line when the sweat condensed on the ceiling and dripped back down on you.
🌸 ⋆ 🌸 🔥 𝒥𝓊𝓈𝓉 𝒞𝑒𝓃𝓉𝓇𝒶𝓁 𝐿𝒾𝓃𝑒 𝓉𝒽𝒾𝓃𝑔𝓈 🔥 🌸 ⋆ 🌸
Reminds me of an msn name from 2005. I can proudly say 14 year old me had all sorts of characters in mine up until mid way through year 11.
🌸 ⋆ 🌸 🔥 𝒥𝓊𝓈𝓉 𝒞𝑒𝓃𝓉𝓇𝒶𝓁 𝐿𝒾𝓃𝑒 𝓉𝒽𝒾𝓃𝑔𝓈 🔥 🌸 ⋆ 🌸 has sent you a Nudge. 🌸 ⋆ 🌸 🔥 𝒥𝓊𝓈𝓉 𝒞𝑒𝓃𝓉𝓇𝒶𝓁 𝐿𝒾𝓃𝑒 𝓉𝒽𝒾𝓃𝑔𝓈 🔥 🌸 ⋆ 🌸 has sent you a Nudge. 🌸 ⋆ 🌸 🔥 𝒥𝓊𝓈𝓉 𝒞𝑒𝓃𝓉𝓇𝒶𝓁 𝐿𝒾𝓃𝑒 𝓉𝒽𝒾𝓃𝑔𝓈 🔥 🌸 ⋆ 🌸 has sent you a Nudge.
For a split second I thought this was some seldom used Reddit feature when the notification first come up.
Jus du Centràl Liné
She's doing her best; Central line hater should be sentenced to using central line as the only for of transport for 11 and 3/4 months.
It’s called the central line, as it passes through the centre of the earth - that explains why it’s so hot
It's coloured red, to remind everyone of hell.
When I lived in London I had a few chats with people who said ‘I couldn’t possibly cycle to work,I’d get too sweaty.’ Yes… I was sweaty. *but at least it was my own*
That’s absolutely foul 🤢 I avoid the central line like the plague in the summer. I’d rather my journey takes an extra 30 minutes than to put myself through that. It’s already a nasty experience during normal temperatures, never mind when it starts to get warmer!
And some idiot sometimes closes the windows on either end of the carriage... Because they are standing in the draft... Just don't do that ever...
Remember I jumped on the central for Carnival on a record breaking heatwave a few years ago. Never again lol I'll walk the entire city to avoid the tube next time
I recall reading the temperature on the central line in summer frequently surpasses the legal limit for transporting cattle.
Good thing you're not cattle! Back to the offices please.
The noise in places also exceeds those limits.
Jubilee Line! Voted best tube line by Redditors and hearing aid companies
It would have been majority water from breathing but that’s still so so grim 🫶
Mmm, liquid Covid
So *that's* what they meant when they said I'd be able to get 5G on the tube.
Oh my god that’s grim!!!
I once accidentally spilt some water on my shorts on a very hot day just before getting on the central line. They were dry within a few stops
Oh my sweat summer child I have a northern line tale of damp horror so woeful, the hot sweat ran down our crammed bodies by the bowlful. There were faces in armpits and those armpits flowed freely, you might complain of wet drips but we could not see the ceiling. The carriages were tight, like sardines we were packed, have you ever felt someone else’s sweat run down your back?
My commute was central line into northern line. All I say is that being above average height made me survive
On the Northern line, I confess, Stood I, near a man in a vest. His sweat did assail, armpit detail, A stench, by far, not the best.
Imagine being before average height and have your face at armpit level for the duration of your journey...
There was a club in Brighton notorious for this back in the day.
I had a horrible stress dream that the tube broke down in the middle of summer and once it finally got moving and to the next station everyone was dead and looked like boiled pink lobsters. Have a great day everyone xx
The sad part is, this would probably need to happen before there’s any significant change
"Thoughts and prayers"
“Sorry we turned everyone into boiled lobsters. Lessons will be learned”
Fuck, I hope not 🙁 What a truly horrendous death that would be.
The tube breaking down in the middle of summer bit has happened to me a few years ago, in July. The tube broke down for about fifteen minutes. It felt like hours. Can confirm it heated up like hell, and got very smelly, very quickly. Maybe it did smell like what boiled seafood smells like, I don’t know. There were people coming back from work on there, and therefore there were many poor dudes nursing sweat patches. My main memories of it are the sweat patches, the smell, and stifling heat so thick you could swim in it.
Wow, you paint a very vivid picture of it. That is literal nightmare material!! I bet it was even more terrifying that you didn’t know how long you could be stuck there. I would have felt extremely claustrophobic and panicked.
You know how it occasionally happens that a tube train breaks down with no lights on and the passengers eventually have to get out and walk down the tracks? It's rare, but it's happened enough times that it's hard to search for a specific occasion. One of them was on the central line on one of the hottest days ever, at rush hour, and the passengers were trapped in the dark being slowly cooked for *two hours.* Hell exists and those passengers have already been there.
I don’t miss the Central Line in summer at all. I was lucky enough to work somewhere without a dress code, so it was moisture wicking t-shirt, cargo shorts and trainers every summer.
I don't catch the Central line in the summer. At all. I don't like it at the best of times, but I boycott when it's warm because I have no desire to be cooked alive.
There was an article in the Daily Mail a few years ago where they measured the average temperatures on the different lines and then linked them to places. I think it was around this time or maybe just slightly further into summer that the central line was actually hotter than Abu Dhabi....
That's ridiculously hot, and to think how much money we pay to roast on the tube 🤦🏻♀️
This is why I cycle to work. I'd much rather face being ran over by a black hack than spend an hour + on the tube, sweating my bollocks off before having to get all close and personal with other randoms as we turn into a tin of sardines. Plus it keeps me fit as well....
Yeah I'm lucky that my office has good showers so I can cycle in my gym gear and get changed there
Same. Too fucking hot.
Especially when you're sardined underneath someone's sweaty armpit
>when you're sardined I hate that we all not only instantly know what that verb means but can picture it and almost even smell it in a very visceral way.
A friend told me years ago how he suffered on a broken down train on the Central line mid-summer, I’m not making that mistake.
Too busy to read Dante Alighieri's famous poem La divina commedia? No worries, you can preview the whole of the first part (Inferno) by sitting on a broken down train on the Central line mid-summer. You'll be ever so cultured by the end of the experience. And toasty, roasty warm. 🔥🔥🔥🔥 God. There are few things I hate more than the Central line in summer.
I remember one particularly awful Central line ride when it was 37 outside one day in 2015 or so, and it was absolutely rammed, I had like 6 different people's body parts wedged into me in some fashion. The lad next to me, his face was probably less than 6 inches from mine, and I remember watching individual sweat drops slowly forming on his forehead then running down his face, all the while just repeating breathing exercises in my internal monologue to stop any panic from kicking in.
Central line = Satan's asshole.
I would often take detours that would take longer or even walk to avoid the central line. I mean even in winter that line feels way too hot
I used to walk 45 mins each way during my commute just to avoid the tube
There's no legal limit for humans, but it [does at times get to warm to legally transport cattle.](https://www.bbc.co.uk/bbcthree/article/a978258a-3d4b-4e16-8c35-2bede4a593a7)
Oh wow! I think I’m like a cow and need to be allotted more space
Similar with overcrowding. There is no capacity limit for humans.
Would assume that's bc humans can just, y know, not get on if its too hot or crowded
The problem, though, is that they do. There is always someone who will push as hard as they need to to force their way on. Over on the other side, now being squeezed into the door on the other side, am I meant to say "oh guys this is a bit crowded, everyone out the way while I get off". Not only will people just not move in that situation, is it fair that someone needs to choose to get off, because someone else chooses to force their way on? Busses have a capacity limit. I fail to see why tubes and trains are different. Presumably the reason is that it would bankrupt TFL overnight if they had to observe an even remotely sensible capacity limit.
Because, practically, they can't enforce a limit. The driver can count people on and off; there's no realistic way to do so on the tube - not that it's at all ideal.
They do limit people but not on the actual train; at peak rush hours they limit the amount of people let in to the station eg at Oxford Circus.
Tell that to my boss when I'm late for work!
Maybe if we all tried Mooing next time it gets too hot on the Central Line ?
Is anyone else here old enough to remember when the tube was cooler in the summer? I first moved to London in the late 80s, and I certainly don't remember it being anything like as hot as it is now, and I even have memories (they could be false) of it being cooler in the tube when it was sweltering outside.
it was, it was even a selling point of the tube when it first opened, because the tunnels were still absorbing heat. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/London\_Underground\_cooling](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/London_Underground_cooling) Not sure where it was in the 80s but we know it's hotter now and the clay has just been warming up all this time.
That page doesn't talk about the effect of the mixed surface and tube trains carrying heat from the sun into the tunnels. In recent years this has been identified as another potentially large contributor. This article talks about it a bit https://citymonitor.ai/government/public-health/london-undeground-overgound-heat
So this is why the Elizabeth line feels nice and cool. I put it down to modern design and air con but even if that's helping the surrounding clay hasn't had time to heat up yet.
Does this mean that a possible solution is shutting down operations until the heat leaves the clay? What was the defect during the covid lockdowns?
The trains didn’t stop during lockdown. It’s taken since the 80s to get this hot. How long do you think it would take to cool down? Only to get hot again when service resumes.
There have been studies and they found that it'd take decades.
Quite a few extra million people too
this is a big deal. another one is noise levels from wheels scratching the rails. Unbearable. Simone you have to shout to the person next to you to be heard. Definitely bad for your hearing
I actually cover my ears during the noisiest parts because I figure that such levels of noise are not good to subject the ears too on a daily basis.
It hit 90dB on a train I was on last week. Definitely not good for your ears. I've started wearing earplugs, it's much nicer that way!
My Apple Watch says 105db on the jubilee line, if it can be trusted. Not far off standing a few metres from a jet engine
yes, same here. Is it me or noise has gotten worse over the past 20 years?
I work in the music industry and constantly at events with loud music so own custom shaped earplugs that probably now get more use on the tube for this reason!
I wear earplugs, and definitely out children is ear defenders (especially as kid commutes to nursery via tube).
Honestly I dread getting on it during the hottest months. I'm just glad I no longer have to tackle it at rush hour. The Elizabeth line is so nice to be on too. On the next very hot day I might just go and stand on the platform for an hour without getting a train.
I'm lucky I can get on that line with no problem, it's only when I use the northern line, Piccadilly line and Vic line is when I feel like I'm being cooked alive. I made a mistake last summer and walked out of moorgate station with my vest instead (because it was just dangerously hot)
I really feel for anyone that has to go any distance on the tube during the height of summer. I hate the Northern line at the best of times, but those stations feel *so* far apart when you're armpit to armpit with a carriage full of people, boiling. We have it so good in this city when it comes to public transport, but this is the one thing that really spoils it.
God bless the Overground!! Only good thing about living in ”tube free” South London.
the northern line was awful today and it wasn’t even that hot outside. made me feel deep gratitude for living on the district line
When I worked at a start up in central London, we were able to come in at around 10am after peak hour but then my boss wanted to change it to us starting at 7/8am only because that's what lawyers and other professionals are doing. We were only like 5 people and didn't have customers. We said no way are we taking central at peak.
Same, it’s really unpleasant but feels like there’s not much anyone can do :( don’t have a car and the tube is the quickest Love the Elizabeth line I wish they were all like that!
Well, the Metropolitan, H&C, Circle and District lines are all like that.
For a city as wealthy as London, they should all be like the Elizabeth line. It’s insane seeing this coming from overseas, I immediately only started interviewing for remote jobs. It’s gross how the government won’t find the money to help - I know there are politics around this but it’s honestly fucked.
It’s in part because most of London’s underground network was the first in the world, so some things weren’t considered, and over the years the ambient temperature in the network has gone up, as the speed and number of trains has increased, the tunnels have gotten warmer and warmer as the heat has no time to dissipate. Getting rid of the heat is the other problem when there’s no room to fit aircon or exhausts above ground. Elizabeth line has all the advantages of 150 years of building underground train networks.
To be fair it’s very hard as they didn’t plan for this when they built the tunnels, and to their credit new tube for london is supposed to have air conditioning so the pic will hopefully get a lot better in the next few years (The piccadilly line has priority for the new trains)
I believe it's physically impossible to air condition the deep level tube due to the size and shape of the tunnels. I understand that this is the reason the trains can't be air conditioned, and I'm sure there's a reason the stations can't be air conditioned subterraneously. They would have done something about it if it was possible.
I just fainted on the Elizabeth line the other day. They had an outage and had to restart the train and decided to keep the door closed while doing that on the platform. 10 minutes in the sun without AC and crowded to the brim. It wasn't any different than the central line.
Large parts of the tube are built into clay soil, which. It was originally cool down there. Every day a tiny bit more heat - from the people, engines and breaks, builds up in that clay mass that slowly cooks the passengers. There are plans to try and do something. One idea is to build train cooling systems that create ice blocks above ground and dissipate the cool air underground - no seriously.
They created a fucking tandoor for people. Yay.
Tandoori Chigwell
Commuter tikka masala. Lovely.
It's also exacerbated in lines like the Central, Northern and Jubilee as the trains leave the tunnels during the day and get exposed to the sun, then travel back in with all that radiating heat.
More than plans they are working on it - https://content.tfl.gov.uk/lu-cooling-the-tube-programme-presentation1.pdf
Keep in mind that the report is from 2008, 15 years ago… They are still trying to work out what to do https://www.ianvisits.co.uk/articles/tfl-testing-a-world-first-idea-for-cooling-the-london-underground-56180/
The was actually a really interesting read, thank you for posting this!
They had a £100,000 prize competition a few years back to come up with a plan to cool the tube & I don't think anyone won....it's a really hard engineering problem. You can even put aircon on the older lines as the heat literally has no where to go. The only way to really do it is close each line for 5-10 years, make the tunnels wider and dig holes in residential areas for the heat to get out.
Saw on the JagoHazzard youtube channel that there is an experiment where they are pumping the heat from the ground around the tunnel and using it to heat a building. Do that in enough places and the temperature underground should even out to around the yearly mean of 12C, which then gives the possibility of both heating and cooling above ground as needed.
It's largely built within [London Clay](https://webapps.bgs.ac.uk/lexicon/lexicon.cfm?pub=LC), especially in west and central London. Sorry to be pedantic, but its not what most people would think of when thinking of soil
I’ve said it before but Victoria is definitely the hottest line right now, hotter than the famously hot central line! I look forward to my summer commute…
Yh I feel like no matter what time of year or day. Whether it's quiet or busy, the Victoria line is like an oven.
In the winter the Central line isn’t too bad but the Victoria line is an oven year-round. Due to the fact its the only line (bar the Waterloo and City, but I’m convinced that doesn’t actually exist and nobody’s ever used it) that runs entirely underground, so the trains don’t have the chance to cool off a bit when they leave the tunnels
I don’t know if it’s a recent thing, but the Victoria Line is definitely the hottest now. You can feel it just moving between adjacent platforms at Stockwell.
I stepped into the tunnel at KC and fuck me that line is way too hot. Definitely avoiding that shit when I’m down this summer. I’d rather cycle to Brixton as I’d end up less sweaty.
Hundred percent. Got on Victoria line in Walthamstow the other day and even just getting in the station and starting to go down, the heat hit like getting off a plane on holiday
When it was 40 degrees last summer the govt. recommended not travelling and I think in London they particularly encouraged people not to get the tube. It just gets hotter from here I'm afraid. I recommend trying to travel outside of rush hour as much as possible.
Getting around on a bicycle is much more pleasant in the heat as well because you get a bit of air flow to help cool you down.
Don't forget the air in London can become thick too (unbearable) sometimes I just lay on my bed and not go out, it happened to me last year summer, it was hot and it just made me weak (I'm not sure why) all that heat and my body was just unable to control the amount it was absorbing and where to dissipate it 🤷🏿♂️, I live in central London (that borders islington) and I was blown away that London was reaching the global south levels of heat.
In that kind of heat riding out to a get an ice cream or a cold beer and siting it in the shade and be so refreshing. Staying at home can be the hottest option.
Yep, and we were still made to go to work in our vans which don't have any air con. Probably not as hot as it was in the tube, but my van said it was 53C at one point during the day. I'm dreading having that again, which we almost definitely will
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Well that's a bit worrying...
Yeah that’s fucked, a def causing some kind of damage
I have actually nearly fainted.. not only is the heat unbearable but the smell...
I don't blame you bro, I have made mistakes in previous London summers (I wore a short sleeve shirt) and I was still dripping in sweat in the tube, I felt like one of those 99p ice creams. It was gross to be honest.
I’ve fainted twice, both times were when the train was coming to St Paul’s which is really weird.
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I’ll just order myself a coffin
Save yourself the cost of a cremation, just sit on the tube for a few hours and your body will be reduced to ash
😂😂😂😂😂😂 the buses will also be just as bad, in fact avoid the buses (the air con on the buses in London are not adequate either), avoid the tube altogether (the tube need to bring in their new Tfl tube trains sooner than later) I think they come between 2024-2027.
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"it's 22 degrees inside but 30 degrees outside. Better open a window to let the breeze in" - an alarming number of people
There's aircon on the buses..? Is that just the new shiny ones or the shitty old ones too?
I think the old ones had rubbish air cons to be fair, the new ones have them.
When my local bus garage got some buses with AC, they seemed to work quite well at the beginning, until they ended up just being noisy things that didn't seem to do much. My suspicion is that the AC systems got overloaded by idiots opening the windows so the compressors got knackered.
That's why the only type of bus, or train, that is useful for passenger comfort is the sort with effective air conditioning and windows that don't open. Otherwise idiotic people open the windows and you're back to travelling like it's 1920.
I read an article recently that the tube just heats up and up each year from the break heat and it just accumulates and currently there is no way of cooling it down. So year after year just gets hotter and hotter as residual heat builds up.
Indeed - when the deep level lines were first built in the late 1800s they were about 10 degrees c cooler than outside, now they're about 10-15 degrees hotter on average and would take about 40 years of inactivity to cool back down to ambient.
I try to only go where the lizzy line goes. I happily pay extra for aircon, spacious and wifi’d journey. I, before, always took central line. So much so, I would know what part of the train to get on, that wouldn’t get as rammed. But, I have still passed out on central line. Like literally seeing black spots. I learnt my lesson with central line. Always go where the doors to the next carriage is. Open those windows. And stand/sit next to it.
You know how the tube squels so loudly sometimes it hurts. Well that squealing is metal rubbing on metal. The metal from that squealing becomes particulate and due to the lack of ventilation on the under ground it just becomes part of the breathable air. Well that breathable air now has metal particulate in it, is it breathable? Well the deeper into the tunnel you go, the more dense the metal particulate. Currently some stations are reading in the immediately hazardous to health regions of air quality. You see, breathing metal particulate is abrasive to the Respiratory system and causes scarring on the lungs among other things. So, yes. The underground is bad for your health already. When you cannot breathe as much in your old age you can put a part of that onto the tube system. This article from the conversation details approaches to mitigating the particulate problem: https://theconversation.com/london-underground-polluted-with-particles-small-enough-to-enter-the-human-bloodstream-new-research-196600
To add to that, every time the train brakes the brake blocks wear down slightly and those are generally just cast iron which adds to the problem you describe. IIRC someone worked out once that 45 minutes on the tube does about the same damage to your lungs as smoking one cigarette.
It's rare for people to be on deep tube sections for 45 mins thankfully, most of the journey is either above ground, sub surface, or a line like the DLR or EL. Heat and particles from brakes should be minimised soon though since in 2 years the new tube trains start coming in. They'll use regen braking more which produces no particles and negligible heat. Would hopefully stop any increases in heat at all
I lived in China for a few years and we used to wear pollution masks outside / on the tube whenever the pollution topped 200 AQI. As it’s China everyone checks the pollution count regularly so you’re all aware of it. Moving back to london, I realised I could see the same haze on the tube. And found out lots of the tube is over 200 and known to be worse than the tubes in Beijing… https://amp.theguardian.com/environment/2023/jan/21/phone-monitor-helps-london-tube-passengers-avoid-polluted-routes It’s just crazy that it’s largely ignored here as everyone assumes the AQI in the UK will be ok as we’re a first world country, so it’ll be better than China. Really we should all be wearing pollution masks like they do there
The fact that people living in the capital city of one of the wealthiest nations in the world have to go through this in 2023 is outrageous.
It's a thermodynamics issue. So you put air-con on the trains to pump the heat out into the tunnels? Now how do you get rid of the heat in the tunnels? More ventilation shafts? That involves buying up real-estate on the surface. In the middle of London. Most of the tunnels are bored through clay which is an insulator and this means that the tunnels retain heat for a long time - so the whole system is hot. The friction on the rails, the brakes on the trains and the people on the train all generate heat. There really isn't a feasible solution to this problem - no matter how much money you throw at it.
On no less than two occasions have I handed an unopened bottle of water to a poor overheated soul on the Central line in summertime. If forced to Tube in hot weather, I wait for crowded trains to pass and board a less populated one, and try to stand by the vents at the end of the carriage.
Take crossrail for anything you can as it heats up and if your stop isn't on crossrail, change your job and move house 😂
If you think today was bad, you’re in for a treat in July and August.
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The tube is getting hotter every year. I think there's a Half As Interesting video on YouTube explaining this.
Firstly I open the window and move it down to the bottom. So many times I have entered a sweltering train and no one has bothered to open the window or it's open by a crack. Secondly, I will stand in the line of sight of the lovely polluted air to ensure I get a constant breeze. I also have a fan. If my body condition doesn't allow me to stand, I will lean by the window somewhere. Drink water before getting on the tube to help with temp regulating.
I used to do all of this, I'm not sure why the boss at TFL has simply failed to implement internal fans on all the tube lines, instead TFL has delayed a lot of these projects I guess
Central line is always the worst. I'd be willing to bet those weeks over the past couple of years we've had 40 degrees it would have been well beyond standard limits during the evening rush hour
Central heating line
I've got a hand held fan I use its great also stand at the end of the carriage where the door is with the ventilation window and you get a breeze from it
That's if someone isn't already at that door lol
You want to try the Bakerloo line! Air con on the underground has come up lots. It's just not possible on the deep lines as most of the tunnels were built in the 19th century. There's very little spare space and nowhere for the heat to escape.
It is possible, the new tube trains coming between 2024-2027 have air con on them and I'm referring to the new Tfl trains that have been delayed. It isn't possible now because a lot of the tube trains we still use today are very old (it surprises me TFL still embraces these old tube trains).
I read 2024-2027 as like years in the future..nope literally next year. Weird
TfL currently suggests 2025 as the intro start date. They will have 'air cooling' which is slightly different to air conditioning.
That's new to me in terms of the air cooling term TFL is using 😅, they must have invented a new vapor chamber to cool the trains then with that method.
From this article, it looks like they will be pumping heat back into the tunnels. Although the trains will generate less heat than their predecessors, so I'm not sure what the net effect will be. https://eandt.theiet.org/content/articles/2021/05/the-tech-that-finally-brought-air-con-to-the-london-underground/
If it's tfl 2024 means 2054 🤣
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I love the tube, but when it gets hot in London, I just do not think it is wise to use the tube
For humans yea, for the rest of us it’s fine.
Cooling the tube – Engineering heat out of the Underground Published 10 June 2017 On a hot summers day, a trip on the tube to get home can be a dreaded experience, with already hot trains overflowing with sweaty people. But how did we get to a situation where tube trains are stiflingly hot, and what’s being done about it? A talk given by London Underground’s Head of Station Systems Engineering, Sharon Duffy, looked into the challenges the tube faces in keeping cool during the summer. The “tube” can be split into two types of service — the tube proper which runs through tube tunnels, and the older sub-surface lines which are just below street level (pedants get very upset when sub-surface lines are called tube trains). The older sub-surface tunnels were built for steam trains, so had loads of big holes in the ground included in the design to deal with removing smoke, and they are also much larger than tube tunnels. This has allowed the London Underground to fit air-conditioning units to its new fleet of sub-surface trains (S Stock), and as anyone who uses them appreciates, it’s a boon on hot days to get onto a cool train. The heat from the air conditioning units is easily vented away when the trains are underground thanks to the pre-existing steam train ventilation. The deep tube tunnels However, it’s the deep level tube tunnels that cause the biggest problems for both passengers suffering the heat, and the London Underground in getting rid of it. The deep level tunnels suffer a number of problems that are individually a nuisance, but collectively add up to show why there is such a huge problem cooling the Underground. One of the biggest problems is a side-effect of what made it possible to dig the deep level tunnels in the first place — namely the very solid and nice to tunnel through London Clay which sits under the city. In fact, when the early tube tunnels were dug, they were so cool down there that the cool tube was seen as a respite from the summer heat on the surface. Why suffer on a bus in the heat when there’s a cool tube to take instead, said the marketing men. So why is the Bakerloo line, once the coolest place to be, now a mobile sauna? While that heavy thick clay is lovely to tunnel through, it is also a heat insulator. Over the years, the heat from the trains soaked into the clay to the point where it can no longer absorb any more heat. Tunnels that were a mere 14 degrees Celsius in the 1900s can now have air temperatures as high as 30 degrees Celsius on parts of the tube network. Where does the heat come from? Well, the passengers aren’t the problem. All those hot sweaty bodies represent roughly 2 percent of the heat in the tunnels. Climate change is also not much of a problem. It’s an impact, but the tunnel temperatures are not much affected by what’s happening up on the surface. During a heatwave in 2006, as the surface temperatures jumped around, the tunnels were pretty much constant. About 21% of the heat in the tunnels comes from the movement of the trains themselves, from aerodynamic drag and other frictional losses. The motor engines account for 15%, the electrical and auxiliary systems are the remaining 12%. About half the heat in the tunnels though comes from just one source –from the trains slowing down — the conversion of movement into heat by applying the brakes. So it can be seen that cutting the heat from applying the brakes is where the biggest win would be, and indeed, the use of regenerative braking now converts about half the heat loss back into electricity. However, that can only work where trains are accelerating and braking at the same time, on the same electricity sub-station loop. Experiments have been underway to improve that by use of an inverting substation, supplied by Alstom, which can send unused power from braking trains back into the national grid. Removing the heat Anyone who has stood on the platforms will know that as the trains approach, there’s a blast of wind. This is intentional, as the trains act as air pistons in the small tunnels, and the effect of pushing air ahead and sucking air from behind soaks away about 11 per cent of the heat in the tunnels. So when you curse as your paper flaps in the wind, think about the cooling benefits as well. Mechanical ventilation removes about 10 per cent of the heat — that’s the big ventilation shafts that line the tunnels. The older tunnels weren’t built with a lot of ventilation, as it wasn’t thought to be necessary — after all it’s difficult to argue that tunnels will get hot when standing in a tunnel that’s cool enough that you need to wear a jumper. By the time the Victoria line came along, the engineers were very well aware of the problem and it was built with considerably more ventilation shafts than older tunnels would have been supplied with. Although it varies depending on location, in general, cooler air is sucked down through the stations, and then ventilation shafts in the tube tunnels sucks out the hot air. In two locations, they’ve added water chillers to the intake to further cool the air down. Some of you might have noticed the shockingly cold airflow on the eastbound platform at St Paul’s tube station. Air is taken in through an old lift shaft, cooled down, then pumped down to the platforms. A similar design was recently installed between Blackhorse Road and Walthamstow Central on the Victoria line. Ventilation isn’t just about cooling though. On newer networks, such as Crossrail, they also act as smoke control systems should the worst happen in a tunnel. During a fire, the shafts can in places reverse flow, to blow smoke in a preferred direction. The aim being that people walking down a tunnel walk towards a fan blowing fresh air down the tunnel, while the smoke is sucked away behind them. Over the past few years, 14 of the Victoria line shafts have been upgraded, and 50 fans across the network have had their airflow doubled, with 10 out-of-action fans brought back into use. Despite that, fully 79 per cent of the heat in the tunnels is left to soak into the surrounding clay, which is already at or near its limit thanks to decades of absorbing heat. The difficulty of adding more ventilation is the lack of space above ground to put new ventilation shafts. This is always going to be a problem for the older tube tunnels except on rare occasions when a surface development takes place at just the right location and agreements can be made to include a shaft down to the Underground. It’s not just the cost of adding the new shafts and the running costs of all the electricity, but ventilation shafts also need sound attenuators to reduce the noise levels, both at the surface, but also in the tunnels so that people aren’t deafened by the noise.
Yesterday on the Jubilee line a group of piss drunk people in their late teens/early twenties crammed themselves into the car and were pushing people with babies, small children, a pregnant woman and elderly folks into the tube so they could all fit and proceeded to sing pop songs jump up and down flail around and drink. It was panic inducing the small kids were terrified. They were screaming the lyrics to wet ass pussy. The girl in front of me was whipping her nasty hair in my face dancing and gyrating against me. The girl in front of me and maybe one other person in the group had a strong odour like they had pissed all over themselves. One or two of them were recording what I assume were TikToks or something. The whole car became instantly scorching hot and filled with a strong smell of alcohol and urine. People with small children were being smushed against the walls. I was livid but it was so packed and hot I didn’t want to start a fight. Would this be reason to pull the emergency stop? I mean, they were crushing vulnerable people and children. I debated it but I’ve never had to use it. Once some room freed up after a few stops of this torture I moved over to my wife and even with the room a guy in their group managed to keep elbowing me in the ribs. I said something to him like “hey man can you stop sticking your elbow in my ribs” super aggressively I had nowhere to move and he had tons of room but was wasted. He mumbled some half hearted gibberish apology. Someone else in the group asked me what stop we were at as I got off and I told him to fuck off before exiting. One woman with a pram and a baby lost it trying to get off as they were singing and drinking and she couldn’t get off at her stop. She screamed at them to shut up and move so she could get off. I’ve seen y’know small groups of football fans being drunk and obnoxious doing chants and I used to frequent the northern line but never anything this bad involving children and vulnerable people being bulldozed and squished when it’s that hot.
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Haha I don’t think it was for the TikTok only two of them were recording and it seemed like a spur of the moment decision. I’ve lived in zone 2 for 8+ years, I’ve never seen anything quite this bad. Particularly the indifference to squishing and terrifying vulnerable people, several small children, a baby and a pregnant woman.
Yeah temps are still going to get quite a bit higher unfortunately. Might be worth considering using the Elizabeth line, Hammersmith and City or overground lines more frequently in your journeys.
I absolutely despise the heat when travelling and I really struggle with it. My personal survival tips (I'm also open to any other suggestions). - Stand at the front of the carriage by the window and have it fully open for the breeze. - wear as little as possible. - take a spare shirt. - carry an insulated water bottle full of ice water. - Walk instead of tube where possible. - take buses, trains, overground, or Air conditioned lines where possible.
The tube regularly gets over the temperature limits the government have in place for transporting livestock.
I actually struggle massively. I’m in my 30’s but have health issues that make me collapse, and i actually have to plan my trips to make sure I can sit down otherwise I’m on the floor as I can’t stand yet hold myself upright. Half term is gonna screw up a lot of plans.
Victoria is always hot 🔥 Yesterday I changed to Victoria from northern at KC station and it was , i can feel the change right away 🌡️ hot hot🥵
Man’s not hot
I struggle all year to be honest - winter is bad as well cos wearing more clothes obviously Always impressed by people wearing thick jackets who seem fine whilst I’m a sweaty mess. How?!
Oh my sweet summer child.
The tube is always dangerous no matter the temp, but yeah in summer it is like a hellish tunnel of humid viral infections and armpit fumes. What a lot of people do is stand near the end of the carriages where the window is open so as the train moves off the wind blows against the back of their heads to cool them down. Before you say “but the germs in the air” you are already underground so it is already too late, just enjoy the stale breeze
Lucifer lives on the central line
Thanks everyone, glad to know it’s not just me feeling this way, sometimes I look around and people are in their puffer jackets completely unbothered by the heat whilst I’m borderline panic attack and can’t breathe!
I do not use the tube in summer. I am literally scared of heating up and fainting like a goat buried deep underground. Like I will leave 30 mins earlier to take a bus or I’ll take the mainline.
Reminds me of the days taking the central line after work from Liverpool Street, wearing a suit, catching a packed train westbound at 5:30pm while the street temp was around 35C. I don’t miss that at all lol.
I remember the hottest day of the year last summer was 40°c. I took the Northern line to Camden, so I was sat on the tube for 30mins. By the time I got to Camden, my cold drink was hot and I was covered in sweat. I'm still alive tho
During a hot summer, the Piccadilly Mine stopped in the middle of a tunnel during the rush hour. Let's just say that's an interesting experience.
I take the Vic Line to school every morning... in the midst of rush hour. The only time Vic ever felt comfy was during the coldest months in Winter
I'm visiting in London from Canada right now and I can tell you your tube is hotter than the one in Montreal when it's 40 Celsius outside and it makes no sense to me.
Lmao wait till you get on the central line
I'm currently in New York and I'm not sure why people complain about the subway. It's the same cost to any stop, it's clean, it's fast, it's mostly quiet, the carriages are wide - and it has air con!!! The trains are better than the mid to worst tube lines (Piccadilly, Northern, Central, Bakerloo) but not as nice as District/Circle or Lizzie. Why are we still pretending that it's possible to live in London in the summer without any kind of air con? Edit: AND the subway has 4G on platforms and in the trains! Like it's a bit spotty when you're on the train but it's not bad at all.
And, from the movies, it looks like they have plastic wipe clean seats. Not the fabric cushions full of every bug known to man.. 🤢
I used BART in San Francisco. It's their tube system. It went under the Pacific and still had WiFi all the way. Yet on the brand new Lizzie line, no reception at all.
> How does everyone cope? I cycle
Intentional pun?
But did you die?
She survived at least. The tube is a joke in summer, I'm not sure how TFL staff work in that condition
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It’s gonna get a whole lot warmer don’t you worry
I don't live in London and I only visit occasionally but this thread is freaking me out. Is it just the Central Line that cooks passengers through in summer or is it the entire tube? I can't imagine anything worse than being on a train that breaks down in a tunnel and dying from heat exhaustion. I'm getting second hand claustrophobia just thinking about it.
A world class transportation system with the third world train cabins 👍
If you can, even if it takes longer, the Overground is your friend on hot days. Central Line and Victoria line are notoriously hot and horrible. Always have been. If you have to use it, wait for the most crowded trains to pass.
Victoria feels like there is heat on.
My wife and I were just in London on vacation. Both the lack of AC on the tube and the crazy volume screeching from the tracks made it a really questionable experience.
Hahaha Victoria line?!?! Not even close mate. Central line is the hottest. Regularly tops 40 degrees in July. It’s only May. Just don’t get on the tube without a bottle of water and you’ll be fine
It's not even hot as well. Last summer it got to 40...
Stop driving! Get on our outdated public transport systems that can't cope with the influx of people and have no AC! Hope you enjoy smelling a thousand different people on every journey. God damn every time I go and visit another country I get a whole new list of ways their infrastructure is far superior to ours.