Today's pointless transport challenge is to travel at least one stop on all of London's single-digit bus routes, interchanging only where routes overlap.
Can it be done in order 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9?
No, because route 1 doesn't overlap with route 2.
Can it be done in any order?
No, because route 5 doesn't overlap with any other route.
Can the remaining 8 routes be connected?
Yes.
The 4 is the only single-digit route which overlaps with just one other single-digit route.
So let's start there.
4 Blackfriars Station
Arrive at the first stop by Blackfriars station. The driver is resting. Wait.
Buses are supposed to run every ten minutes. I've been unlucky waiting for nine. 0h 00m: And we're off. Start the clock. 0h 02m: The bus remains tumbleweed empty. 0h 03m: Hang on, it looks like the 8 is on diversion, I'd better get off. (3m aboard route 4)
8 New Change - Cannon Street 0h 04m: I've just missed two 8s, one behind the other. 0h 06m: The 8 doesn't normally stop here, it's on diversion round St Paul's Cathedral until 27th August due to gas works in Newgate Street. 0h 17m: Finally. And oh look, two 8s, one behind the other. 0h 18m: It's quite busy on the top deck. 0h 20m: Sigh, temporary traffic lights just south of the cathedral. But we slip through. 0h 22m: We've just passed underneath the normal route, up Farringdon Street. 0h 23m: OK, we're back on the normal route at Holborn Circus. 0h 25m: Alight at Holborn station and walk round the corner. (10m aboard route 8)
1 Kingsway - Holborn Station 0h 30m: Apparently the next number 1 will be the 2nd bus. 0h 38m: No, it was the 6th bus. I'm only going one stop. 0h 41m: Other than the jabbering phoneblabber, that was fairly painless. (3m aboard route 1)
9 Aldwych - Bush House 0h 42m: Sigh. Bus stops are now spread out along Aldwych, and while walking from one end to the other a 9 has gone by. 0h 43m: I'm only a ten minute walk from where I started. 0h 49m: Time passes. At least there are two dangling windowcleaners to watch. 0h 51m: OK, here goes with the longest bus ride. The 9 is the last single-digit bus route to link the east and west sides of the West End. Twenty years ago there were four. 0h 53m: Join the bus procession down the Strand. 0h 58m: The tourist beside me is merrily snapping Trafalgar Square. 1h 01m: The tourist beside me is merrily snapping Piccadilly Circus. 1h 03m: Sigh, traffic looks seriously backed-up ahead on Piccadilly. 1h 05m: Ah, there's a hole in the road outside The Ritz narrowing the traffic. 1h 11m: Ah, the Piccadilly Underpass is closed westbound for repairs. 1h 22m: Hyde Park Corner is a sluggish vortex. 1h 24m: That was a depressingly slow 2 mile journey. (33m aboard route 9)
6 Hyde Park Corner 1h 27m: This is the first stop where I have a choice - the 2 or the 6, whichever turns up first. I've just missed both. 1h 33m: The 6 wins. And only a six minute wait, my shortest so far. 1h 34m: Enter the sluggish vortex. 1h 36m: The bus lane up Park Lane works wonders. 1h 39m: Marble Arch is getting a facelift and, depressingly, the scaffolding has prominent Vodafone branding. 1h 40m: Time for a quick switch across the road. (7m aboard route 6)
7 Marble Arch Station - Edgware Road 1h 41m: The timetable for the 7 is obscured under a poster warning of an event on 30th July. 1h 44m: Quickest wait yet. I'm only going one stop round to Oxford Street. 1h 46m: That would have been just one minute if it wasn't for a red light. (2m aboard route 7)
2 Marble Arch Station - Park Lane 1h 48m: I'm now waiting at London's busiest bus stop. 1h 55m: A lot of buses passed by before a 2 turned up. 2h 00m: The lady behind me, making an annoyingly loud call on speakerphone, drops her credit card under my seat and expects me to pick it up. 2h 04m: Enter the sluggish vortex. 2h 09m: It feels like we passed round every side of Victoria before we finally stopped. (14m aboard route 2)
3 Victoria Bus Station 2h 10m: Just for once I walked straight off one bus and onto the next. 2h 12m: That's all eight bus routes ridden, so technically I've finished... 2h 13m: ...but apparently this bus is on diversion via Parliament Square, so let's go ride the ninth bus as well. 2h 20m: Except there isn't a bus stop in Parliament Square so I've overshot. 2h 21m: I pressed the upstairs Stop button three times but it didn't register, grrr. 2h 22m: I pressed the downstairs Stop button and escaped. Now to walk the length of the Palace of Westminster. (12m aboard route 3)
2h 31m: Enter Westminster station.
2h 34m: Board Jubilee line train.
2h 51m: Alight Canning Town.
5 Canning Town Bus Station 2h 54m: I am now 1½ miles away from the next-nearest single-digit route, which is the 8 at Bus Stop M. 2h 57m: The driver keeps trying to leave but new passengers keep turning up. 2h 58m: There's a completely different clientele out here in Newham. 2h 59m: The first bus stop is closed, otherwise I'd have completed this nine-bus challenge in under 3 hours. 3h 00m: Alight at Hermit Road. I have completed this nine-bus challenge in exactly 3 hours. (2m aboard route 5)
Is 3 hours a record time?
Only inasmuch as no other idiot has tried it.
On a good day 3 hours would be easily beatable.
Would it have been easier doing this in the past?
Very much so, before TfL started culling many central London routes.
Seven years ago the shortest route would have been half the length.
That said, it would have taken even longer before April when route 3 was diverted from Whitehall to Victoria.
Can you extend the sequence beyond 1 to 9?
No, because TfL scrapped route 10 in 2018.
Best leave it there.
