QUICK question: which of the following have PSDs installed from opening? A) the two stations on LU’s Northern Line Battersea extension (opened September 2021); B) the new Northern Line southbound platform at Bank (due to open Q2 2022) or C) all stations underground on Crossrail/Elizabeth Line (due to open Q2 2022). Surprisingly, if you said ‘all three’ you’d be incorrect, but if you’d gone for just C) you’d be spot on.
In June 2019, Caroline Pidgeon, chairman of the London Assembly’s Transport Committee and Oversight Committee, posed a question to the London Mayor, Sadiq Khan. She asked whether it was possible to install ‘platform edge doors’ at specific stations on the London Underground, as is the case on the Jubilee Line Extension (JLE), constructed in late 1990s. PSDs were installed along all deep tunnel platforms between Westminster and North Greenwich. Representing an imposing and radical additional piece of infrastructure, at the time they cost more than £1 million per platform.
WHY WERE PSDS INSTALLED?
Numerous reasons have been suggested why PSDs were installed along the Jubilee Line. Online, there are reports that they assist with ventilation, also preventing human hair and dust from contaminating both stations and tunnels and there is a generally accepted belief that PSDs can prevent suicides. However, when the JLE was being designed, there was much discussion whether PSDs should be installed at all. Primarily this was because they are normally used in extreme climates, allowing
