At the end of this week sixteen central London bus routes are being tweaked, diverted or in four cases downright scrapped. I've already ridden the severed 11, the renumbered 16 and the doomed 507, which just leaves time to ride the imminently-deceased 521. It'll be missed, but only for a few hours a day.
The 521 isn't an original Red Arrow, it morphed out of the 501 and 513 in 1992, but it is one of the last two routes standing. It exists primarily to serve commuters arriving at Waterloo or London Bridge who need to get to work somewhere between Holborn and St Paul's, for whom there is no direct tube connection. Before the pandemic it was London's most frequent bus, firing out another spacious single decker every 2 minutes to cope with peak time demand. But a route that runs mostly empty most of the time can no longer be justified, especially now that working patterns have changed, so it's been decreed that the 521 is no longer needed. Its withdrawal will also leave one key London road unserved... but we'll get to that.
In mitigation TfL are changing the endpoints of two other bus routes in an attempt to hoover up custom. The 59 will now terminate at St Barts rather than Euston, thereby becoming the new alternative for the Waterloo contingent, while the London Bridge crowd are being nudged onto the 133 which will terminate at Holborn rather than Liverpool Street. It might work, or it might be the case that less frequent double deckers that have come all the way from Streatham won't be capable of absorbing passengers at the busiest times.
I hope you like my summary map. It may be seriously lo-fi but it is better than any map TfL have created because all of theirs obsess about where to change buses rather than providing an overview of what the hell's going on.
Route 521: Waterloo to London Bridge Location: London central Length of bus journey: 3 miles, 40 minutes Frequency: every 5 mins peak, 10 mins off-peak
Don't let anyone tell you that commuting is extinct. The Waterloo & City line is still packed bums-to-the doors each morning with queues two abreast to get onto the platforms, and its single decker equivalent continues to be remarkably popular, even in its final week. I was not expecting this.
The 521 has pride of place outside Waterloo station, taking prime position immediately outside a bespoke subway exit. It has one stop but two shelters and two separate queues, this because access is still permitted via the middle doors to speed up boarding. And oh my word those queues are long, not to mention immaculately behaved, should you arrive during the period of peak transfer. This is the sight that met me at half past eight, with at least 25 people ahead of me in both queues and very soon a similar number added on behind, most of whom would fail to board first time round. Seriously, I thought, they're withdrawing this?
Someone else has thought the same and stuck a 'Keep the 521 Bus Route Going!' poster on one of the shelters. Apparently it leads to a petition but when I hovered over the QR code I merely ended up on a page that wanted me to enter log-in details, so the attempt, although well-meaning, is both impractical as well as futile.
As an example of how well the 521 works, not only did I squeeze aboard the first bus but I also got a seat. There aren't many seats but it seems a lot of people prefer to stand, plus they were all getting off sooner than we seated folk. A 59 pulled up alongside us as we departed and I doubt I'd have crammed aboard that, plus absolutely nobody would have got a seat, so good luck next week. On departure our passengers settled into reading emails, watching videos, applying lipbalm and shuffling Spotify. It's not really a Metro-opening environment, plus most passengers had already had a rail journey to devour that.
Within a couple of minutes we were on Waterloo Bridge (along with a dozen other bus routes, so rest assured the 521's withdrawal won't sever north from south). The view (if you can see it) is outstanding, from glittering towers at Westminster to the classical dome of St Paul's, not to mention boats on the Thames and plane trees coming into leaf on the Victoria Embankment. What's more we didn't have to join the crawl up to Aldwych because the 521 is the sole route which gets to use the Strand Underpass. This brilliant shortcut was opened in 1964 taking advantage of the defunct Kingsway Tramway Subway, enabling northbound passengers to enjoy a weaving swoosh through a dimly-lit grey-walled box. A double decker would lose its top deck if it tried, hence this unique 400m experience falls off the London bus map as of Saturday.
The prime benefit of taking the underpass is that it skips two bus stops and two sets of traffic lights so we got to Holborn station in eight minutes flat. Approximately half our passengers alighted here, and it struck me they'd plumped for a ride on the 521 purely because it gets here quicker. They won't be left bereft next week when the 521 is scrapped because six other routes connect Waterloo to Holborn, but they will have a slower journey every morning forever.
Next came the eastward turn into High Holborn, but only eventually because the gyratory around Central St Martin's was against us. We were now picking up a few passengers who weren't heading to work, these being the staple load of the 521 between the peaks, but at this time of day they're still very much outnumbered. The buses going the other way, however, looked virtually empty because hardly anyone wanted to go back to Waterloo, and that's why the 521 spends most of its time transporting empty space.
On we headed, disgorging passengers at Chancery Lane, Fetter Lane and Holborn Circus until we were mostly empty space too. Next week the diverted 59 will be terminating approximately here alongside St Barts hospital. That means the vast majority of the 521's current passengers simply need to know to catch the 59 from Waterloo and that'll take them where they want to go. All of TfL's publicity, however, focuses on the need to change from the 59 to the 133 at Holborn Viaduct, which from my observations hardly anyone will need to do.
By King Edward Street, 20 minutes in, I think I was the last of the Waterloo boarders left. That may have been because anyone needing the next bit would have been better off aboard the Waterloo & City line or may have been because they knew what was coming next, which was a painfully slow meander through the City. The full length of Angel Street is currently under scaffolding while the adjacent site is transformed, sending eastbound buses on a jammed Barbican-ward detour and blighting multiple journeys for years. It took us 12 minutes to get from one side of St Paul's Cathedral to the other, essentially clogging up vehicles that could have been doing useful work elsewhere.
During the final five minutes we ticked off Mansion House, Cannon Street and Monument stations, plus the new exit from Bank. We four remaining passengers now had acres of space each, whereas it was the 521s heading in the opposite direction which were properly moving people. Crossing London Bridge the views were again splendid - the kind tourists fly to London for - and then we filtered smoothly into London Bridge bus station 'where this bus terminates'. Plenty of people were waiting to head back the other way but the real queues were for route 149 towards Liverpool Street... an astonishing 70 commuters were waiting to board that.
From next week TfL expect the 521's former passengers to board the 133 instead because that'll go to Holborn. But it won't depart from the bus station, they'll have to walk down to the main road and cross at the lights to the southern end of London Bridge and catch it there, because such is the price for TfL saving some money. It may be adequate mitigation but it doesn't hide the fact that withdrawing a bus route always makes life harder for someone however you try and dress it up. If you currently ride the 521 (or 507, or 16, or 11, or any of the other routes about to be made worse), your pain is helping to keep the rest of our fares down.
