In Russian metro there are count-up timers. Not that this is a big deal, though, when intervals between trains are shorter (2-4 minutes in St.-Petersburg; less in Moscow).
count-up timers like "you missed the last train by 30 seconds! haha?" Seems like a very tauntingly russian thing to do.
I guess you could see it that way, but everyone knows that the trains run regularly every 2-3 minutes so it's more you know how long of a wait you're going to have. For the most part all it does is let you know how long you're going to be waiting on the platform and how on time the trains are that day.
I thought they switched those out for countdown timers?
At least in St.-Petersburg: nope. After visiting Helsinki and seeing countdown timers there (they have ~6 min intervals and countdown timers show minutes only) I thought countdown timers would be more useful, even if more complicated to implement; but alas.