BBC2 - World's Busiest Railway

[Not Andy Naylor]

Anyone else been watching this astonishingly banal programme?

So far I've learned that trains in India are extremely and uncomfortably full at busy times, that there are control rooms where people watch the progress of trains on big electronic boards, that sometimes things go wrong and the staff have to try to sort them out, that you can buy tickets in advance as well as on the day, that trains arrive at termini where they get cleaned a bit and then sent back out with different passengers on them. Mechanics fix the brakes and stuff. Cleaning the toilets isn't the greatest job.

In other words, the same as British railways, more or less. But in India.

It all seems new and wondrous to the dullard presenters, but I suppose if they've been given a jolly thanks to the licence fee payers, they're not going to say "Here, hang on - this is pretty well what goes on at Victoria or Three Bridges ...".

 

[Poyningsgull]

Exactly what me and the wife were saying. Looked no different to the English rush hour to us.

 

[Peter Grummit]

Agreed. I watched the first episode and learnt nothing except that Jon Serjeant likes steam trains because they remind him of his youth.

FFS.

PG

 

[Peter Grummit]

I tell a lie. I learnt that 9 people die on Mumbai's railways...












...every day!

Bloody health and safety, why can't our railways have the doors open at all times.

PG

 

[Joe Gatting's Dad]

Having experienced trains in India, I can assure that travelling is nothing like the short trip to Falmer as a Sardine.

Overnight trains are something else and you want to try squatting in their archaic loos at 2 a.m. in the dark rattling from side to side.

Strange men walk down the corridors and will stop and stare at any white woman for about ten minutes without speaking, before moving on.

 

[MattBackHome]

Anyone else been watching this astonishingly banal programme?

Nothing to add to this, except to say that this is an excellent opening line to a post.

 

[Lady Whistledown]

Anyone else been watching this astonishingly banal programme?

So far I've learned that trains in India are extremely and uncomfortably full at busy times, that there are control rooms where people watch the progress of trains on big electronic boards, that sometimes things go wrong and the staff have to try to sort them out, that you can buy tickets in advance as well as on the day, that trains arrive at termini where they get cleaned a bit and then sent back out with different passengers on them. Mechanics fix the brakes and stuff. Cleaning the toilets isn't the greatest job.

In other words, the same as British railways, more or less. But in India.

It all seems new and wondrous to the dullard presenters, but I suppose if they've been given a jolly thanks to the licence fee payers, they're not going to say "Here, hang on - this is pretty well what goes on at Victoria or Three Bridges ...".

Agreed. Started watching it- admittedly more due to lack of other appealing alternatives than anything else- and soon found myself distracted by Candy Crush Soda Saga on my phone.

So Indian trains are busy & somewhat safety-compromised. Having been on one myself between Delhi & Agra, I can't say there were any great revelations on the show.

 

[tinycowboy]

I saw it in the listings, thought that it could potentially be interesting, watched the first 30 seconds and concluded it may actually be a load of twaddle and switched over, a decision vehemently endorsed (or even maybe forced) by my wife.

 

[Codner's Wallop]

Pleased you raised this, because I ABSOLUTELY LOATHE this new breed of 'documentary'. The kind of documentary which fails to a) entertain b) educate.

BBC churns them out with regularity - the usual pompous, patronising 'oh my god look how awful life can be in another country' trash.

Poor old India seems to get more than its fair share of these senseless, asinine offerings.

God knows how many times the Indian trains/cities theme has been recycled. There was something equally painful by Caroline Quentin called 'A Passage Through India'. Some of the most boorish TV ever created. Anything by the highly enthusiastic, gurning, Simon Reeve is also terrible.

To save another hideous waste of taxpayers' cash, let me help:

India is busy, noisy, has widespread pockets of deprivation, old cars, street entertainers (sometimes with snakes), is often described as 'bustling' and loves its food. Indian food.

There you go, now go and make some programmes that actually make good use of our cash....

 

[GT49er]

There you go, now go and make some programmes that actually make good use of our cash....

Yeh right, let's have more and more real super duper high quality educational and entertaining programmes like The Voice, The Apprentice and the Great British Bake Off ...................

 

[pasty]

Well I liked it

 

[Tom Hark Preston Park]

It was all a bit dumbed-down gollygosh Blue Peter-ish IMHO. Still, a decent consolation prize for the Beeb's generic presenters who failed to land the Big Blue Live gig.

 

[Bladders]

I like railways so I didn't mind it.

Though I take you're point about the content.

 

[Beach Hut]

Was looking forward to this and very poor.

All I have found interesting so far is the deliveries of lunch and the intense manual labour for parcels

 

[Giant Seagull]

I thought it was patronising guff, BBC four did a far better programme on the same thing and they didn't need any presenters for that, let alone 3.. oooh look at me im gonna get on a train, and its busy and I might have to shove my face in someones arse, arent I brave. Just get on it and sod off.

 

[mr sheen]

Michael Palin covered all the same ground on the BBC years ago, lunches, parcels etc etc