Tube geek (1)It'd be quicker to walk
Harry Beck's London Underground tube map is a design classic, bringing underground order to overground chaos. His network diagram provided Londoners with a vivid mental image of the way their capital is laid out, but surrendered geographical perfection for linear clarity. In short, the map tells lies about distance. According to the map it's the same distance from Paddington to Aldgate as it is from Paddington to Amersham, although in real life Amersham is at least five times further away.
A number of stations are in fact a lot closer in real life than they appear on the map. Every year thousands of tourists descend onto the Underground at Covent Garden for the one stop journey to Leicester Square, without realising that these two neighbouring stations are the closest together on the entire network, only 250 metres apart. It's possible to walk from one to the other at surface level in three minutes flat, whereas the tube journey takes at least five minutes even in perfect conditions (2 minutes down to the platform via the lift, 35 seconds on the train and 2½ minutes back up via the second longest escalator on the network). I checked. I'm like that, you know.
Here are a few other stations that are surprisingly close at street level, and the actual tube journey times between them (courtesy of the tube website's route finder) (See also tube map with walklines - here)
• Bayswater to Queensway (220 metres apart) - 14 minutes via Circle and Central lines
• Regents Park to Great Portland Street (220 metres apart) - 17 minutes via Bakerloo and Circle lines
• Euston to Euston Square (300 metres apart) - 22 minutes via Victoria and Circle lines
• St Pauls to Mansion House (400 metres apart) - 25 minutes via Bank/Monument
• Kenton to Northwick Park (400 metres apart) - 58 minutes via Bakerloo and Metropolitan lines
• Ickenham to West Ruislip (1km apart) - 76 minutes via Piccadilly, District and Central lines
Tube geek (1) It'd be quicker to walk
