Anyone in the know knows where to look to find out the platform before it's "sanctioned for the public to be informed about it".
And no, there isn't always time to stroll to the train, I've seen some really, really late announcements. Couple this with very large countdown timers that they actually added recently to each platform and you can see exactly why people feel stressed and rush.
> They delay platform announcements because they believe that a platform crammed full of waiting passengers will become a crush risk when the arriving passengers start to disembark.
The alternative is forcing them all to wait in the same cramped concourse area (with most space lost to retail units). During disruption, it gets genuinely difficult to move through this area. It has felt unpleasant in normal use for a while, but when there are cancellations and delays it feels positively dangerous. I am not exaggerating when I say that it feels very much like it's only a matter of time before something happens and someone gets crushed or trampled.
There's none of this nonsense at some other London termini, and Birmingham New Street manages to let people wait on the platforms. Why can't Euston?
> Anyone in the know knows where to look to find out the platform...
And for anyone who isn't in the know, that's Realtime Trains[1]. It isn't correct 100% of the time; it uses the public record of train movements (TRUST) to predict which platform a train will arrive at, but is prevented by National Rail Enquiries from using the live status and delay data which official departure boards show (Darwin). That means that if the platform is changed at the last minute it is not certain that Realtime Trains will be able to detect the change.
Those will show a copy of the train describer data, which is the same thing that the actual signallers use to keep track of which train runs to which timetable, so they (or the computer, where available) can route it accordingly.
When there’s a little delay you often find that a trian leaving at say :30 will be advertised at :26 with big warnings about platforms closing 2 minutes early, so everyone panics and 400 people try to get to platform 4 in 120 seconds, which is of course impossible.
And no, there isn't always time to stroll to the train, I've seen some really, really late announcements. Couple this with very large countdown timers that they actually added recently to each platform and you can see exactly why people feel stressed and rush.
> They delay platform announcements because they believe that a platform crammed full of waiting passengers will become a crush risk when the arriving passengers start to disembark.
The alternative is forcing them all to wait in the same cramped concourse area (with most space lost to retail units). During disruption, it gets genuinely difficult to move through this area. It has felt unpleasant in normal use for a while, but when there are cancellations and delays it feels positively dangerous. I am not exaggerating when I say that it feels very much like it's only a matter of time before something happens and someone gets crushed or trampled.
There's none of this nonsense at some other London termini, and Birmingham New Street manages to let people wait on the platforms. Why can't Euston?