From the headline you might assume this guy is a bit of a mug to pay £6,000 for a yearly season train ticket so he can sit in a mop cupboard. But coming from someone that does the daily London commute, that journey is absolute hell and when it’s busy, you’re often stuck between an armpit and a sweaty butt.
That’s why the man in question, who doesn’t want his name published (even though there’s a blatant picture of him), might actually be a bit of a genius, or at least has found a solution to a very middle-class problem.
According to reports, he’s been doing the trip from Ipswich to London for over 17 years and to beat the issue of not always finding a seat, decided to designate himself the train cupboard amongst a load of buckets and mops.
It’s become such a regular thing that the staff recognise it as his regular spot.
He said:
I can usually get an official seat on the way in during the morning rush hour but in the evening the train I catch, the 6.30, is usually so full there’s no space.
I found this some time ago and I use it quite often. No one seems to mind but it isn’t great.
Apparently his work colleagues from London are jealous that he only has to do one train ride, while they have to get buses and tubes, but judging by that last statement I don’t reckon that he is loving it too much.
A spokesperson for Abellio Greater Anglia said that the space was actually a crew compartment, which are set to be removed soon in order to make space for more seating.
The spokesman said:
Two of the seven vehicles of this type operating have already been converted and on completion of the programme later this year, this will provide over 600,000 more standard seats a year (or 2,500 more seats a day) on our intercity services.
Hopefully this seating boost means mop-man will find a seat after all. Or he will go from having a secure spot to having to fight his way to have the “luxury” of sitting down.
Either way, it’s a small victory when you spend most of your life travelling and working at a job that you most probably don’t enjoy. He should just quit and pursue something that he doesn’t have to spend loads of money to get to. Maybe take a leaf out of this guy’s book and write computer scripts to do his job for him.
