6 ms·

Interesting to hear this perspective, usually I just hear people fawning over TfL. FWIW, TfL has been dealing with funding crises for years. I believe it is fa

Interesting to hear this perspective, usually I just hear people fawning over TfL. FWIW, TfL has been dealing with funding crises for years. I believe it is far less subsidised than public transit systems in other major cities. There was talk a while ago about TfL officially going into a state of "managed decline", where the priority would be attempting to mitigate the impact of funding shortfalls on service levels. Like, that was a phrase used publicly at the highest levels. I don't know if they ever technically activated that scenario but they have been on the brink financially at least since Covid. As for the specific criticisms, I mostly use the tube which is probably the best of the TfL services. I am on the Northern line which is super frequent and reliable so I can't complain. The hub and spoke model does mean it's a pain getting from one non-central area to another non-central area. Buses are better for that but they do have issues with delays in my experience. I moved here from a city with notoriously awful public transit so to me it's great, but I guess there are probably cities in continental Europe with far superior systems. Honestly though, it's 2023 and I still need to buy paper tickets for the Paris metro...

jaymzcampbell 3y ago
In terms of the hub-spoke issue (this used to pain me when my friend lived 15 mins by car away - but 1.5hrs by train as I had to go into central and all the way back out) - the SuperLoop[1] is in some way aimed to attempt to address that by providing dedicated express bus routes on the outer ring of London. 4 out of 10 of the proposed routes have come online by virtue of renaming previously existing express routes. [1] https://tfl.gov.uk/modes/buses/superloop https://tfl.gov.uk/modes/buses/superloop
- vidarh 3y ago
  I wish they'd do something similar with trains, maybe a bit further out. London badly need to shift the focus on transport upgrades in the centre further out to induce demand further out. You'd get far more bang for the buck. Instead it's all reactive, and keeps inducing more demand where you can least afford further upgrades. There's a whole lot of existing track that could serve as the basis to make it viable to commute without going via central London between a belt of commuter towns outside of, or on the boundaries of, London that are in far better positions to handle "cheap growth". My pet example, largely because I live in Croydon and a past employer wanted to relocate the office from the centre to Guildford, is Guildford to Croydon. Both have fairly large centres and scope for significant increases in density near their transit hubs. There are several viable routes direct between them, but the shortest, potentially fastest routes along existing rails only have a smattering of trains that go the whole distance, as part of trains providing some basic level of service to intermediate stations. The current fastest routes you can depend on for commutes are both significant detours North to Clapham or South to Redhill. The most direct routes via Epsom and Leatherhead are few enough or stop enough that they are almost never worth considering. Committing to maintaining commuter-level direct services between bigger towns that already has track connecting them in an outer loop, or arc at least, would do a lot to make it more attractive for companies to consider moving out, and pulling demand out with it and offload the centre. My boss mentioned earlier had to abandon his plan to move the company in part because a large portion of his staff would walk over the extra commute - for me it'd increase the average commute from an already tedious one hour to 1h30 -, but for many of us it wouldn't take much longer if only there were direct connections instead of the hub-spoke.
  - pasc1878 3y ago
    The problem for your case is that there are not enough train paths to add a new train, also your case would not produce a viable service as not many would use it. The speed of the services also matter as the Clapham Junction to Guilford direct train is significantly than the Clapham Junction to Guildford via Epsom, due both to track speed and number of stops. The extra milage here is cut by the speed of the longer part and the CJ-G runs on 4 track rail so allowing it to miss stations whilst the other lines have to stop everywhere. Much better examples of hub-spoke issues are north of London between East and West Coast main lines.
    - vidarh 3y ago
      > The problem for your case is that there are not enough train paths to add a new train, I can find no indications that the lines in question are anywhere near capacity. Even if they were, adding new track to create such an arc around London would be far cheaper than continuing the crazy efforts add capacity in the centre. > also your case would not produce a viable service as not many would use it. This is entirely backwards thinking. It's how we've ended up in this mess in the first place. You need to guarantee commuter level service as a means to drive economic activity and demand for housing, then you can expect use. That requires a 20+ year commitment to get people to take the routes into consideration when moving or setting up a business. This, much more so than the specific path, was the crux of my argument: It's stupid to induce further demand in the centre rather than investing in inducing demand in places where further expansion is far cheaper by reacting to congestion instead of planning ahead. Don't fix congestion where it occurs when it is expensive to do so. Instead route around it and make it attractive to avoid. > The speed of the services also matter as the Clapham Junction to Guilford direct train is significantly than the Clapham Junction to Guildford via Epsom. It sounds like you've misunderstood me. Clapham Junction to Guildford via Epsom is certainly not what I was arguing for. That'd entirely defeat the point of connecting towns outside or on the edges of London while bypassing the overloaded central routes and stations. If you're already on the South Western Mainline I fully agree it makes no sense to go off it before you can get directly onto the line to Guildford. The point of what I suggested was to provide an example of avoiding a detour in towards the centre entirely in the first place. Hence the example of avoiding Clapham entirely when coming from Croydon, as one example of a way of improving connections between towns big enough to form viable commuter paths given time and opportunity to for people to take it into account when moving. The key point of that example is that the travel time from West Croydon to Epsom + travel time from Epsom to Guildford is already competitive with the typical (but not the fastest) travel with interchange at Clapham Junction, but the trains run rarely enough on those routes that the change at Epsom will almost always make it significantly slower not due to the track or the stops, but due to the lack of frequent enough and direct trains. A direct service would cut the average time via that route significantly enough to be competitive on time even without any track improvements even if still stopping at every stop. Even just that would be an improvement by removing the annoyance of a change. > due both to track speed and number of stops. As pointed out, on the line I actually talked about, track speed is sufficient, though not great. But gradually upgrading tracks on a relatively lightly loaded line is also a lot easier and cheaper than building new lines - the point was not to avoid the need for upgrades, but that it is possible to start a service without having to build entirely new lines. > The extra milage here is cut by the speed of the longer part and the CJ-G runs on 4 track rail so allowing it to miss stations whilst the other lines have to stop everywhere. There's no inherent need to stop everywhere even if fast trains and stopping services runs on the same tracks. Plenty of places run express trains and local trains on two tracks with careful timetabling. E.g. ensuring stopping services wait at stations if necessary. I grew up with that. Yes, it has challenges and causes delays at times, and yes it sometimes makes the stopping services even slower, but it works up until a service frequency well above the current one on the lines in question, at least for parts of the route. As a starting point for services you'e pointed out not many would use at the outset it's perfectly fine. > Much better examples of hub-spoke issues are north of London between East and West Coast main lines. Great, but that's entirely besides the point, which was not the specific route, but the overall idea of connecting towns on the edges of London together to reduce the need to go further in.
- pasc1878 3y ago
  Unfortunately people who have travelled the superloop say it is not much quicker than existing bus services many of which are slowed by traffic not the number of stops and there are no orbital routes they can use to speed their routes up (except using the flyover 100 yds from me meaning there ios no superloop stop near than 25 minutes walk away even though it passes 100 yards from my home) ALso in South London there are orbital rail and tram routes so your case does not seem to happen in South London.
vidarh 3y ago
People are fawning over TfL relative to the train companies and relative to public transport elsewhere in the UK. In that context they are indeed doing well given the really bad cards they've been dealt. It's a standing joke that there is no weather the UK train companies can't use as an excuse for delays, for example (I have personally heard them use weather as an excuse when it was slightly overcast, no wind, and temperatures in the mid-teens celsius). The biggest problem with transport in the UK in general tends to be cost more than anything. E.g. there are regular examples of people doing stupid shit like buying a car for a single journey for less than the train ticket, or some student who took a detour between Sheffield and Essex by plane via Berlin[1] because it was cheaper than the direct train even factoring in travel to/from the airport (though marginally enough that presumably his motivation was more wanting to actually go and because it was ridiculous than the few pounds he saved). While TfL is not that extreme, they're still not cheap either. I think the biggest problem with TfL pricing is that the discounts for passes is very minimal compared to many other places. > Honestly though, it's 2023 and I still need to buy paper tickets for the Paris metro... It's been a few years since I went to Paris, but the contactless Navigo Easy pass was introduced in 2019. Are there places in Paris you still can't use it? [1] https://www.independent.co.uk/travel/news-and-advice/teenager-flies-from-sheffield-to-essex-via-berlin-because-it-is-cheaper-than-getting-the-train-a6837836.html https://www.independent.co.uk/travel/news-and-advice/teenage...

jaymzcampbell 3y ago

In terms of the hub-spoke issue (this used to pain me when my friend lived 15 mins by car away - but 1.5hrs by train as I had to go into central and all the way back out) - the SuperLoop[1] is in some way aimed to attempt to address that by providing dedicated express bus routes on the outer ring of London. 4 out of 10 of the proposed routes have come online by virtue of renaming previously existing express routes. [1] https://tfl.gov.uk/modes/buses/superloop https://tfl.gov.uk/modes/buses/superloop

vidarh 3y ago
I wish they'd do something similar with trains, maybe a bit further out. London badly need to shift the focus on transport upgrades in the centre further out to induce demand further out. You'd get far more bang for the buck. Instead it's all reactive, and keeps inducing more demand where you can least afford further upgrades. There's a whole lot of existing track that could serve as the basis to make it viable to commute without going via central London between a belt of commuter towns outside of, or on the boundaries of, London that are in far better positions to handle "cheap growth". My pet example, largely because I live in Croydon and a past employer wanted to relocate the office from the centre to Guildford, is Guildford to Croydon. Both have fairly large centres and scope for significant increases in density near their transit hubs. There are several viable routes direct between them, but the shortest, potentially fastest routes along existing rails only have a smattering of trains that go the whole distance, as part of trains providing some basic level of service to intermediate stations. The current fastest routes you can depend on for commutes are both significant detours North to Clapham or South to Redhill. The most direct routes via Epsom and Leatherhead are few enough or stop enough that they are almost never worth considering. Committing to maintaining commuter-level direct services between bigger towns that already has track connecting them in an outer loop, or arc at least, would do a lot to make it more attractive for companies to consider moving out, and pulling demand out with it and offload the centre. My boss mentioned earlier had to abandon his plan to move the company in part because a large portion of his staff would walk over the extra commute - for me it'd increase the average commute from an already tedious one hour to 1h30 -, but for many of us it wouldn't take much longer if only there were direct connections instead of the hub-spoke.
- pasc1878 3y ago
  The problem for your case is that there are not enough train paths to add a new train, also your case would not produce a viable service as not many would use it. The speed of the services also matter as the Clapham Junction to Guilford direct train is significantly than the Clapham Junction to Guildford via Epsom, due both to track speed and number of stops. The extra milage here is cut by the speed of the longer part and the CJ-G runs on 4 track rail so allowing it to miss stations whilst the other lines have to stop everywhere. Much better examples of hub-spoke issues are north of London between East and West Coast main lines.
  - vidarh 3y ago
    > The problem for your case is that there are not enough train paths to add a new train, I can find no indications that the lines in question are anywhere near capacity. Even if they were, adding new track to create such an arc around London would be far cheaper than continuing the crazy efforts add capacity in the centre. > also your case would not produce a viable service as not many would use it. This is entirely backwards thinking. It's how we've ended up in this mess in the first place. You need to guarantee commuter level service as a means to drive economic activity and demand for housing, then you can expect use. That requires a 20+ year commitment to get people to take the routes into consideration when moving or setting up a business. This, much more so than the specific path, was the crux of my argument: It's stupid to induce further demand in the centre rather than investing in inducing demand in places where further expansion is far cheaper by reacting to congestion instead of planning ahead. Don't fix congestion where it occurs when it is expensive to do so. Instead route around it and make it attractive to avoid. > The speed of the services also matter as the Clapham Junction to Guilford direct train is significantly than the Clapham Junction to Guildford via Epsom. It sounds like you've misunderstood me. Clapham Junction to Guildford via Epsom is certainly not what I was arguing for. That'd entirely defeat the point of connecting towns outside or on the edges of London while bypassing the overloaded central routes and stations. If you're already on the South Western Mainline I fully agree it makes no sense to go off it before you can get directly onto the line to Guildford. The point of what I suggested was to provide an example of avoiding a detour in towards the centre entirely in the first place. Hence the example of avoiding Clapham entirely when coming from Croydon, as one example of a way of improving connections between towns big enough to form viable commuter paths given time and opportunity to for people to take it into account when moving. The key point of that example is that the travel time from West Croydon to Epsom + travel time from Epsom to Guildford is already competitive with the typical (but not the fastest) travel with interchange at Clapham Junction, but the trains run rarely enough on those routes that the change at Epsom will almost always make it significantly slower not due to the track or the stops, but due to the lack of frequent enough and direct trains. A direct service would cut the average time via that route significantly enough to be competitive on time even without any track improvements even if still stopping at every stop. Even just that would be an improvement by removing the annoyance of a change. > due both to track speed and number of stops. As pointed out, on the line I actually talked about, track speed is sufficient, though not great. But gradually upgrading tracks on a relatively lightly loaded line is also a lot easier and cheaper than building new lines - the point was not to avoid the need for upgrades, but that it is possible to start a service without having to build entirely new lines. > The extra milage here is cut by the speed of the longer part and the CJ-G runs on 4 track rail so allowing it to miss stations whilst the other lines have to stop everywhere. There's no inherent need to stop everywhere even if fast trains and stopping services runs on the same tracks. Plenty of places run express trains and local trains on two tracks with careful timetabling. E.g. ensuring stopping services wait at stations if necessary. I grew up with that. Yes, it has challenges and causes delays at times, and yes it sometimes makes the stopping services even slower, but it works up until a service frequency well above the current one on the lines in question, at least for parts of the route. As a starting point for services you'e pointed out not many would use at the outset it's perfectly fine. > Much better examples of hub-spoke issues are north of London between East and West Coast main lines. Great, but that's entirely besides the point, which was not the specific route, but the overall idea of connecting towns on the edges of London together to reduce the need to go further in.
pasc1878 3y ago
Unfortunately people who have travelled the superloop say it is not much quicker than existing bus services many of which are slowed by traffic not the number of stops and there are no orbital routes they can use to speed their routes up (except using the flyover 100 yds from me meaning there ios no superloop stop near than 25 minutes walk away even though it passes 100 yards from my home) ALso in South London there are orbital rail and tram routes so your case does not seem to happen in South London.

vidarh 3y ago

People are fawning over TfL relative to the train companies and relative to public transport elsewhere in the UK. In that context they are indeed doing well given the really bad cards they've been dealt. It's a standing joke that there is no weather the UK train companies can't use as an excuse for delays, for example (I have personally heard them use weather as an excuse when it was slightly overcast, no wind, and temperatures in the mid-teens celsius). The biggest problem with transport in the UK in general tends to be cost more than anything. E.g. there are regular examples of people doing stupid shit like buying a car for a single journey for less than the train ticket, or some student who took a detour between Sheffield and Essex by plane via Berlin[1] because it was cheaper than the direct train even factoring in travel to/from the airport (though marginally enough that presumably his motivation was more wanting to actually go and because it was ridiculous than the few pounds he saved). While TfL is not that extreme, they're still not cheap either. I think the biggest problem with TfL pricing is that the discounts for passes is very minimal compared to many other places. > Honestly though, it's 2023 and I still need to buy paper tickets for the Paris metro... It's been a few years since I went to Paris, but the contactless Navigo Easy pass was introduced in 2019. Are there places in Paris you still can't use it? [1] https://www.independent.co.uk/travel/news-and-advice/teenager-flies-from-sheffield-to-essex-via-berlin-because-it-is-cheaper-than-getting-the-train-a6837836.html https://www.independent.co.uk/travel/news-and-advice/teenage...