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Has anyone else noticed how bus drivers put the heating on in the bus when it's sweltering. Is it an in-joke? They are all chilled in their little cabins so they crank up the heating to make the passengers suffer

- Tess, London

Terrific news, this could save Londoners thousands of pounds in Mayoral Taxi claims. Well there must be a good reason why Good Old Boris doesn't chose to rub shoulders with his voters on the tube.

- S Russell, Barnes England

Tony, Islington - Boris is not responsible for this or most of the things you list. Air con on the TUbe has been planned since Ken was in power, Cross Rail has been planned for a couple of decades or so andthe Olympics were won under Ken, not Boris. he does not deserve credit as he has done nothing for Londoners apart from make it easier for West Londoners to drive around.

- Marathon Runner, London

Tube to Lewisham ?
Why not to the Downham Estate.
Now there's a radical thought.

- Sally70, Bedford

Fair enough re: Ken v Boris but Ken spent 8 bloody years talking about how diffcult it is to implement A/C on the tube.

Boris at least has started the ball rolling.

Sod London politics, I just want a bearable underground, whoever delivers.. it's not a big ask.

- Des, Wickford

Where will the heat go that the air con will generate? It seems like it will create more of a heat problem...

- Christine, London

Thanks Ken, at least you had the vision and could see London's future and didn't spend your time as Mayor taking credit for other peoples work.

- Adam, Soho

These trains were on the drawing board when Ken was mayor, so lets not talk up Boris yet please.

- David, Isle of Wight

Air con might sound good but has anyone thought how it's going to circulate all those germs all the more? Or what if terrorists used it to distribute something sinister through the whole system in one fell swoop? We'll all be as sick as pigs in no time! Oink! Oink!

- D Woodstock, London

London is going from strength to strength under Boris. The Woolwich Arsenal DLR opening, Crossrail beginning, new air conditioned Tubes, the Olympic stadium nearly finished plus so many other things he has been opening in the last few months. I can't believe how much he has done for London compared to Ken. It's good to see him taking all the credit, he deserves it after all for being an almost miracle worker in the last twelve months.

- Tony, Islington

Well done Boris, a good move, keep it up!

Can i ask when the Bakerloo line will be extended down to Lewisham via the Old Kent Road please?

- Nick, London

Is it just me or is this a bit of a waste of money? I would rather the signalling were improved so that the trains travelled at the right speed, didn't get stuck in hot tunnels and were therefore more frequent and less crowded. This is solving a symptom that affects a few days of the year, not the problem that affects the network every day.

- Mark Priest, Fulham

No, Katie Price wouldn't go for him... He's got hair on the wrong part of his face! Katie likes barnets!

- Pete, London

Tom, London:

"Because the way Boris runs his PR operation gives Londoners incorrect and misleading information which is never properly challenged."

Yes, and Ken was NEVER guilty of that, was he...

And Art Frayer, you are a GENIUS sir! I feel a six-figure LU salary coming on for you...

- John, London

oooh erm.

does any1 have that guys number in the picture. He's hot!

im newly single and looking for luuurve!

- Katie Price, Sussex (& Ibiza)

Nice one Boris.
And thank you for winning the Olympics for London, and for brokering the Good Friday Agreement, bringing down the Berlin Wall and winning the 1966 World Cup.
Or was that all done by others also?

- Fresh, London

Clearly Mr Pastry has been on our buses in Summer when drivers insist on putting the heat on.

- Sharon, Hackney

"when the tubes are delightfully cool next summer, people are going to thank the current Mayor."

St, you're persisting in missing the point to the point where I wonder precisely what your motive is. Apart from anything else, the tubes won't be 'delightfully cool' next summer, unless you're on the Metropolitan Line, which isn't a tube, or on one of the new Class 378s on London Overground and the extended East London Line which were ordered by, er, Ken's TfL. Boris will, I cheerfully predict, not mention this when the PR comes out.

Also, does anyone see the irony in Boris and fans cheering the introduction of trains with the interior ambience of a bendy bus? I thought they were 'socialist' and only fit for 'Scandinavian airports'?

- Tom, London, UK

If Ken had been good enough he would have been re-elected and then he could have taken the credit. But he wasn't and he can't. To all those Ken lovers still out there - sorry, you are just going to have to stomach Boris taking all the credit. It brings a smile to my face, which is more than Ken ever managed to do.

- Mikkiduk, Hackney, London

When is Boris going to do something about the buses? There really is no excuse for buying buses that spew engine heat back inside so either your bum boils or your legs get burned, (depending on design) and everyone boils alive as soon as the sun comes out. Air con buses are commonplace in Thirld World but seemingly impossible in greater London. I've complained several times but they don't even bother replying.

- Jh, London, England

The contract was signed for these trains (complete with air con) under Ken Livingstone in March 2005. Boris Johnson had nothing to do with it. Being a politician, he's unlikely to mention that though.

Boris' main achievement so far seems to be in the field of appointing inappropriate people to be deputy mayor who then have to make a hasty exit.

- Ian, London

Excellent work Ken.

- Darren, London

I hope the drivers will get the relevant training to show the cold button is for hot days and the warm button is for cold days.

- Mr Pastry, Brisbane

@St: do you have any idea how long it takes to introduce these changes? Ken announced this solution years ago, but said the work would take till 2010 to be finished. Boris has done nothing but take the credit. Ken always cared about the Tube - he actually used it every day. I've never seen Boris on the Tube, though - only ever on the kerb hailing cabs.

- Charlie, Soho, London

I agree with some of the posters here: this shouldn’t be a Boris vs Livingstone thing, but the fact of the matter is, when the tubes are delightfully cool next summer, people are going to thank the current Mayor. If Livingstone had been smart enough to figure this out, perhaps he would have spent as much time as Boris has on sorting things like this out instead of coming up with ill-thought out grandstanding plans such as the removal of cars from Parliament Sq. - rest assured, air conditioned tubes will make a lot more people happier

- St, London

This is good news........now here's a challenge for Boris. Convince the bus companies to turn the heating off on the buses in the summer?

- Mm, London

I hope the RMT are tracking these and checking thay they are safe. Otherwise they'll have to go on strike.

- Anthony, Esher, Surrey

Sir

I have a solution as how passengers on the deep level lines can be kept cool during the summer;

all passing through the barriers should be given a pack of frozen peas that they place on their head for their journey. Upon leaving they hand in the peas, to be refrozen and used for another passenger / journey.

If travellers decide to keep peas the full fare, via Oyster card, would be charged but if handed in a discount would be offered.

At end of day, packs (used or otherwise) can be sold to fish and chip restaurants as mushy or garden peas. Therefore London Underground would be quids in.

If there is a reward being offered for best solution for over-heated tube travellers - please kindly deposit in my bank account.

Thanking you

Art

- Art Frayer, london

@S-M Hearmon: there are two major reasons why aircon on the deep tube lines is impracticable.

Firstly, there would be no room on any currently feasible train design for the equipment: you can't put the aircon units on top as the deep tube tunnels are too small - they're just big enough for the trains to fit in. They can't go underneath as that's where the traction equipment goes. They could go inside I suppose, but that'd mean reducing the space available for passengers by up to a quarter of each car.

Secondly and most importantly, there's nowhere for the waste heat put out by the aircon to go underground, so you could make inside the carriages nice and cool, but the platforms intolerably hot.

Neither of these restrictions apply to the sub-surface lines, which were built to mainline loading gauge, so there's room for the aircon units, and have plenty of vents (originally for smoke from the steam engines that first hauled the trains) through which waste heat can dissipate.

Advances in equipment miniaturisation might one day overcome the first problem, but the second will be much harder to overcome. Pumping heat out through groundwater might help cool the deep stations, but even that would be insufficient to deal with waste heat from the trains.

I suppose a solution might be to make the tunnels bigger and add many more extraction shafts, but that's the sort of expenditure that would fund Crossrail and most likely have change left over for another new tube line or two!

- Roy, England

Good lord, I can't believe people are still being taken in. You've got an internet, go and look it up. As it happens, the SSL order was placed by Metronet in 2003 (you can't built trains in a year) the first S-stock has been on test at Old Dalby (in Leicestershire, not Oxford) since March and was apparently even named by Tim O'Toole on 26/3/2009 just before he left LUL. In other words, Boris had nothing to do with it except turn up and rabbit at some reporters, as usual.

There were 50 ventilation fans renewed already as of 2008, there was an 8-figure sum allocated to tube cooling as of April 2008. It would be interesting to know whether that's still the case, or whether this is another press release intended to hide negative news by repeating something that was already announced.

"Why are some of you still banging on about the Ken v Boris thing?"

Because the way Boris runs his PR operation gives Londoners incorrect and misleading information which is never properly challenged. Additionally, as can be seen by some comments here, people are actually deliberately spreading disinformation, which also needs challenging. Boris didn't put air con on the S-stock, fact. If you disagree, prove it.

- Tom, London, UK

What short memories some of you have. Ken Livingston was the instigator of air-conditioned trains. It was he who placed the orders and justified the cost when he warned of the possibility of deaths if something wasn't done to improve the situation. Do you really believe it was Boris's eureka moment and he thought it up, arranged for the plans to be drawn up, signed the contracts and instigated the start date all in 12 months. You must have all come down with the last shower of rain. As usual, Boris tries to take the credit for Ken's actions to improve the lives of the people of London. We never know what we have lost until it has gone, do we?

- Val Daniels, Mijas Costa, Spain

Why is Boris getting all the credit? Why is Boris feted and Ken vilified? Too many of us believe too much of what we read and the London Standard took a swipe at Ken at every opportunity. Truth is the air conditioning takes time to develop and implement. Anyone who honestly believes Boris could have achieved this in one year is at best naïve - they are both politicians and probably neither one is better than the other it's just their political approach that differs.

- Peter N-L, LIlle, France

Sounds like a gimick to me- if you displace the heat from the carriages then the tunnels just get unbearably hot (as anyone who has ever used the NY subway in summer will know) meaning the aircon has to work harder as the ambient temperature is higher... Not really necessary and not very environmentally friendly either. Trust Boris to jump on the bandwagon and grab the credit though. He really is a deadbeat mayor isn’t he, it’s just empty gestures politics and knee jerk populist moves that go down well with the press but have no long term effect… well we better get used to it if his old chum Cameroon gets voted in.

- Nj, London

Why are some of you still banging on about the Ken v Boris thing? This is not a political situation, it is about making travel more comfortable in warm weather. Of course the deeper lines are more difficult to keep cool and it seems the additional ventilation will help. Just be pleased we are actually getting something done about the conditions we all have to endure, and the fact that we are, at last, getting new trains. The ones they are replacing are older even than me!

- Rod, Epping, UK

To Susan and St

Actually, it was Ken came up with the idea. However, you might want to know that it takes time to make air conditioned trains. And during that time, Boris got voted in.

- David, London

Goes to show if you put the hard work in, as Boris has in the last year, you get results.

- Frank, London

You will need the air conditioning on the new trains because they have so few seats, it is likely that you will be standing.

- Mike Constable, Islington, London

This was TALKED about (a lot) by Ken, but put in place by Boris!

- Craig, Ex-pat, Sydney, Australia

I can understand why the trains on deep old lines such as the Northern Line can't be fitted with air-con, but surely the station platforms can? The cool air would enter the trains and be blown along tunnels. The lines would then cool down.

- Peter, Wimbledon

It's all a bit complicated. Hot air rises so you simply need some wide vertical vents running up to the surface. That would create air currents blowing along tunnels and platforms. Air conditioning implies the trains can't have opening windows. I guess there's no profit in selling LU something cheap.

- Alan In Bow, London

Brilliant as the Met, Hammersmith & City and District lines get nowhere near as hot as the Victoria, Bakerloo and Central lines. Why couldn't they, instead of putting their engineering skills to use on the three they have done, start with the ones that need them the most?

- S-M Hearmon, London, UK

One has to ask; Ken had 8 years in charge and never managed to do this, why? Too busy building creating his nasty, marxist vision of London.

Good work Boris - so glad we have a mayor who is sorting out the little things which affect so many Londoners adversely.

- St, London

Obviously Susan hasn't got a clue, this was all down to Ken.

- D.W., London

This was first put in place by Ken

- David, London

Goes to show Ken never really did care about the health of Londoners. Absolutely outstanding work Boris. London owes you a debt of gratitude.

- Susan, London

Why is Boris getting all the credit when it was Ken who approved the plan?

- Ed, London

Is this going to reserved for all the MP's at Westminster and the Quangos to counteract all the hot air that eminates from the?

- Alan, carlisle uk

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