In 1985 the BBC made a documentary about the number 31 bus route called To the World's End. (It's still on iPlayer).
In 2026 TfL have just launched a bus route that really does go To the World's End, London-speaking.
It's a new Superloop route to the back of beyond, which in this case is two stops beyond Rainham.
Route SL12: Gants Hill - Rainham Ferry Lane South Length of journey: 13 miles, 50 minutes
London's newest bus route is really three in one. First it's a limited stop version of route 66, speeding along the A12. Then it's a much needed north-south link across Havering, speedily linking Romford, Elm Park and Rainham. And then it's a break into virgin territory to serve no houses whatsoever, just an industrial estate by the Thames estuary, which is the headscratchy bit. Let's take each part separately.
Part 1 - The Limited Stop 66
If you get your kicks on route 66, which is already a speedy radial route, you can now get them faster on the SL12. The six mile dash starts outside Gants Hill station, stopping just five times on the way to Romford compared to 18 aboard the 66. At present both run every 12 minutes, which seems generous on a corridor that's already well bussed. Gants Hill isn't the most useful of terminuses but you can easily change between the SL2 and SL12 here, adding an extra limb to London's existing Superloop network. For Central line interchange Newbury Park is your best bet.
n.b. The bus shelter at Gants Hill has an almost brand-new spider map, but because it's dated 1st August 2026 it doesn't include the SL12 and I Wouldn't Have Done That.
n.b. The bus shelter at Gants Hill doesn't have a roundel on top, whereas most of the other shelters along the route do.
n.b. The first five miles of the SL12 follow the A12, so there is some accidental logic to the numbering system here.
As usual when a Superloop route launches, some passengers haven't taken on board the 'express' concept. It even says LIMITED STOP on the front blind but not everyone notices. Thus on my journey someone dinged the bell just after leaving Padnall Road expecting to get off almost immediately, but was instead swept ahead two miles to the Romford outskirts. As the doors closed another passenger then dinged, stood up and watched four stops go by before finally escaping in the town centre. She had a long chat with the driver before alighting and seemed to be appeased.
Part 2 - The Much-Needed North-South Link
Many outer London boroughs have good radial transport links but nothing decent orbitally, a deficit the Superloop is designed to mitigate. Havering has always been particularly tough to cross north to south, the only railway connection being the Liberty line, runtiest of the Overground family. The SL12 thus provides an invaluable new service by connecting the Elizabeth line to the District line and c2c, previously only doable slowly and indirect. Initial loadings look good, especially on the hyperleap between Romford and Elm Park which would previously have been 10 stops on the 252.
n.b. The new buses smell new, also they have USB ports at every seat.
n.b. If you're sitting at the front on the top deck there's no STOP button in sight, only one out of reach at the top of the stairs. (In fact the nearest button is on the back of your seat, furthest from the aisle, but nobody's going to see it there.)
n.b. Elm Park remains quite flaggy, whereas most other London suburbs have taken down their threadbare red crosses.
From Elm Park to Rainham the corridor of housing is quite narrow so three routes already follow the same route south for almost two miles. The SL12 now adds a fourth which is perhaps over-frequent overkill. I suspect whoever assembled the original SL12 consultation had never been to Rainham because they failed to include a stop in the town centre, but thankfully everyone screamed and buses do now call at the key Tesco interchange. The leader of Havering Council remains unimpressed that adjacent development areas like Beam Park have been missed, thus is already lobbying for "a second Superloop to reach those parts missed by the current service", but populists do tend to want the moon on a stick.
Part 3 - To The World's End
Within Greater London there are only two places where you can draw a circle with diameter two miles and not hit a TfL bus route, or at least there were. One is the middle of Richmond Park and the other was the Ferry Lane trading estate south of Rainham, a remote industrial stripe amid the marshes by the Thames estuary. It's long been TfL's aim to fill this latter gap, saving estate employees a lengthy walk, but never previously justifiable in terms of cost. In 2019 an exceptionally detailed study of Bus Services in London Riverside East considered multiple imaginative scenarios and concluded that the only potentially feasible option was a peak hours shuttle from Rainham station, no more than six buses a day. Instead the Mayor has sent brand new double deckers running five times an hour, a decision you could describe as questionable.
n.b. The first SL12 of the day departs at 5am, the last arrives at 1.15am.
n.b. The SL12 terminates here even at the weekend when nobody's working.
n.b. The only reason this isn't absolutely bonkers is that the bus company's garage is just round the corner off Ferry Lane, so the vehicles would have to run empty anyway.
After leaving Rainham Tesco the SL12 ducks under the railway and enters the top end of the industrial estate. The first stop is called Rainham Station South Side, although it's a bit of a hike to a train so not the friendliest of interchanges. We've entered a world of big sheds and open marshes, one you probably only recognise if you've walked the last leg of the London Loop. The A13 scythes through on a concrete viaduct, chopping the estate in half, the SL12 terminating on the other side between a huge distribution warehouse and a scrap metal yard. The contrast with the Gants Hill roundabout, indeed with any other Superloop route, is extreme. Let's hope the employees who actually work here find the SL12 useful.
n.b. The south side of the estate is a long thin loop of road that's over a mile long. And yet the SL12 only stops at the very top end, exiting by doing a full anti-clockwise circuit, so anyone employed at the tip faces a ten minute walk to catch a bus that goes straight past their workplace. In the consultation 11 people requested an additional stop on Ferry Lane but this was not taken forward.
Part 4 - Beyond the SL12
Now that London's bus network has a new remote terminus, what might you discover if you come here?
A five minute walk through the estate brings you to the edge of the Thames estuary, hidden behind a thick concrete wall to help keep potential floodwater at bay. Stand atop the embankment and you can see the incinerator at Belvedere and the town of Erith, also perhaps a number of large ships and small boats sailing by. A plaque on the wall confirms this as the landing point for the Pilgrim Ferry, an estuary crossing operational between the 12th and 19th centuries, initially aimed at those making a pilgrimage to Canterbury. Should TfL ever chooses to reinstate the ferry, the SL12 is perfectly poised to make the connection.
Havering Council have recently spent money making this liminal stripe a tad more attractive for workers taking a fag break, courtesy of the Rainham Riverside Public Realm Improvement Project. They've added proper steps, garden seating, several bright yellow bins and a substantial metal pergola lookout, all with informative signage. Best not imagine the smell when this was the site of a factory manufacturing fertiliser from fish carcasses. I particularly liked The Museum of Garden Escapes, a raised bed of non-native self-seeded plants laid out on the footprint of the former Three Crowns pub. Full marks, at least compared to how it used to look.
The estate ends at a wall of silos belonging to the Tilda rice factory, this being the furthest south the SL12 gets. Follow the squished riverside path past their private jetty and you emerge onto an undefended stretch of estuary and, at least at low tide, a spread of mudflats. The chief attraction here is a fleet of concrete barges constructed during the war when building materials were scarce, and used on D-Day as part of the Mulberry harbours. A decade later they were dumped here in the Thames as protection from the great flood of 1953 and here they remain, sunk into a beach at a variety of angles, slowly not-rusting away.
A short distance away, anchored eight metres down into the riverbed, is a twisted mass of galvanised steel in humanoid form. This is The Diver, a submersible artwork installed in the year 2000 by artist John Kaufman and dedicated to his grandfather who used to be a diver in the old London Docks. Come at low tide and the entire sculpture standsproud above water level, but as the Thames slowly rises the diver starts to vanish, until at certain spring tides each year the top of the helmet is fully submerged. Previously to get here would have been a 40 minute hike from Rainham station but now it's only 20 minutes from a Superloop bus stop far more convenient for the middle of nowhere, at The World's End.
An extraordinary thing is happening tomorrow on Stroudley Walk, a new cafe is opening! We've had fried chicken for a while and a juice bar gave it a go after lockdown, but this is the first time there's been a sitdowner with macchiatos, croissants, hash browns and lasagne. It's called Minnie's Coffee and Food and it made me double-take.
It lurks underneath Zellie Emerson House, one of four new housing blocks hereabouts, in a small unit I'd assumed would stay uneconomically empty. Instead our local social housing company have hired out the space as part of their HARCA Café Collective, "an initiative making quality food and drink accessible and affordable to residents and visitors across Bow and Poplar". It's not clear whether Minnie is the owner's name or a reference to Minnie Lansbury the East End suffragette, but given the estate's history and thematic rebrand I'd assume the latter.
Apart from the obvious hot drinks the menu also includes breakfast options (until 11am), snacks and a limited range of lunches. I can't remember the last time anywhere round here did a genuine cooked breakfast, and OK there's no bacon but £8 is a pretty good deal. As for lunches each day of the week brings a single meat or vegetarian choice (Mondays curried, Tuesdays stir-fried, Wednesdays filo royale, Thursdays lasagne and Fridays crispy with potato wedges), also soup, also foccacia-based sandwiches, also six quid salads. And yes I know you've probably had this round your way for ages but this is Stroudley Walk for heaven's sake, a culinary dead end since time immemorial.
Like most modern food outlets they've not bothered with a website just an Instagram account nobody would ever think to search for. Unnervingly the first post said "Almost ready to serve you!" and that was in June. Also their tagline is "More than just coffee, we’re a community" which I reckon is wilfully unproven given they haven't opened yet. But opening day is Monday at 7.30am and to celebrate they've got a special offer of 50% OFF ALL HOT DRINKS UNTIL MIDDAY. I live nearby and have a kettle so not even Builders Tea for 75p is going to tempt me in, but I wish Minnie well as gentrification finally sparks to life in Stroudley Walk. It's what the incomers who've paid half a million to live in the tower nextdoor have been waiting for, indeed long expected.
They didn't have blogs or the internet forty years ago, so here are 30 things I didn't digitally publish at the time. To help you get your bearings I was 21, teetering between university and a job, so chose to delay things by undertaking an extra year's study up north.
Mon 1: Sign on at the dole office, but am called to one side to undergo a random check. Thankfully they weren't tough checks in those days. [On TV: London Plus with John Stapleton] Tue 2: My university tutor pops up on Radio 1 Newsbeat talking about vaccinated chickens. Get a phone call inviting me to a job interview on Friday but turn them down because I've decided oil economics isn't for me. Wed 3: Have to go for a job-related medical. Worried it might be a full strip-off but it's no worse than filling a bottle and getting my blood pressure checked. [The supervising medic was called Dr Doodoo] Thu 4: Two friends from university drive over and meet the tortoise, then we go for a walk round Ruislip Lido, watch the water skiing and have cheeseburgers in Wimpy. [Ooh look, I have a photo]
Fri 5: My dad takes the morning off work but the man from Anglian Windows never turns up to do the survey and I have rarely heard him so cross. Sat 6: Wimbledon FC beat Watford 1-0 to stay top of Division 1, so I annoy my brother by putting a Womble on the doorstep when he gets home from the match. [On TV: Episode 1 of the season-long Doctor Who story, Trial of a Time Lord] Sun 7: Mum and Dad are debating where to go for a silver wedding getaway next month [it turns out to be a cottage near a radar station in Norfolk] Mon 8: University friend returns and drives us down to the Odeon Marble Arch to watch Aliens. Thoroughly enjoy. [Alas moving up north will squash this budding friendship] [A quick check online and I see he's just retired from his top job in the City] Tue 9: When our nextdoor neighbour moved out she gave us £40 to go out for a family meal, so tonight we go to the Ponderosa Steak House in Watford High Street, a legendary venue. I have sirloin steak and they forget to offer us any free refills. Wed 10: Buy a £299 Sony hi-fi from Tottenham Court Road and nearly collapse lugging it home on the tube. Thu 11: For my 'final' meal Mum cooks roast lamb (washed down with a bottle of Riesling) and lemon meringue pie. [nobody has ever made lemon meringue pie as well as my Mum did]
Fri 12: A very long drive up the A1 with the boot full of boxes. Mum refuses to drive over the Humber Bridge so we take the M18 and M62 to Hull. I'm not convinced she's impressed by my new student digs (and neither am I). One of my new flatmates takes me out for beers along the Cottingham Road. [this never happens again] Sat 13: Explore Hull, mainly to find food, a barber and a photobooth because I need 4 mugshots for registration on Monday. Start to suspect the girl in the room nextdoor might be overwrought and clingy.
Sun 14: Struggle to cook in the communal kitchen because it's shared by six of us. No toaster so we have to use a ropey gas grill. My Smash instant mash proves far too watery. Mon 15: Successfully register for the course in a very analogue manner, i.e. laminated cards, pigeonhole numbers and pins in maps. [On TV: Calendar with Richard Whiteley] Tue 16: Introductory lecture and seminar. Try to discover who amongst my new coursemates is worth making friends with. [should have stayed for lunch rather than going down the chippy] Wed 17: Use one of my photos to get myself a student railcard [aww, cute], then dash back to college for a video narrated by Annie Nightingale. Thu 18: A first visit to the work experience location. Mr Kipling gives us a tour of the building. Fri 19: A quiet evening in implodes somewhat when my clingy neighbour pours out her troubles and tells me she has weight issues, nervous issues, panic attack issues, agoraphobia and claustrophobia, also fear of travelling, also she hasn't told her parents any of this but she has told me. I fear this is going to be tough. Sat 20: Up early to whizz across country to a friend's 21st birthday party in Cheshire (via Doncaster and Liverpool). Help cut the cucumbers. Her boyfriend sends a bouquet from Crewe hospital where he's recuperating. It never gets wild because three generations are present. Sun 21: Sleep on the sofa, then return the cutlery to the sailing club and start my 5-hour journey back. Thank goodness for the emergency pack of Garibaldis.
Mon 22: First day of work experience. They've nicknamed me Lofty after Michelle's fiancé on Eastenders. Tue 23: Second day of work experience. They didn't tell me to wear trainers so I have to stay in the viewing area. Wed 24: Third day of work experience. Remembered my trainers this time so I get to participate. Thu 25: Fourth day of work experience. Rachel says she's thinking of quitting already. Fri 26: My paranoid neighbour knocks on my door and asks if I'd look after her tub of 40 Valium for her. [I should never have agreed - see October 10th]. Sat 27: Go exploring down Whitefriargate and The Land of Green Ginger. My neighbour has started banging on our adjoining wall. I've started pretending I'm out. Sun 28: I'm discovering what it's like to be the chosen confidante of someone who's chronically depressed. Please stop fiddling with my frog. Mon 29: The Hull Daily Mail celebrates its 101st birthday by going tabloid. [On TV: On Brookside, Heather walks in on Nick overdosing on heroin] Tue 30: Potentially suicidal are you? This was not how I was expecting my first month in Hull to turn out... (it gets a lot better on October 16th)
It's September again but never fear, London's putting on a last flurry of events, activities and happenings before the nights draw in and we're all invited. Here's my weekend-by-weekend guide to free September delights.
All month
» Totally Thames (Sep 1-30): Once again a whole month of river-focused events, many ticketed, ranging from art to walks to virtual talks to a folksong singalong. Thankfully the website's events section is easier to scroll through these days, but it's still hard to spot the highlights.
» Lambeth Heritage Festival (Sep 1-30): Dozens of free talks, guided walks and openings across the borough (plus a proper 36-page brochure to flick through, bliss). Hats off to whoever organises this every year. If you live locally you should definitely take a look.
Weekend 1: September 5/6
» Greenwich+Docklands International Festival (21 Aug - 6 Sep): This significant splurge of spectacular performances delivers artistic wonders annually. The GDIF brochure now mostly tells you what you've missed. On this final weekend there's a heck of a lot of dancing in Stratford on Saturday and a street dance finale in Woolwich on Sunday.
» Lambeth Local History Fair (Sat, from 10): A coming-together of local societies, heritage organisations, friends groups and local history publishers at Brixton Library. Includes short films and guided walks.
» Creative Mile (Sat, 11-5): Art in venues across Brentford, a full mile from the canal basin to the Steam Museum.
» Black on the Square (Sat, from noon): The Mayor's latest culturally-themed Trafalgar Square takeover, now in its fourth year. Performers include Triniboi Joocie and Tomorrow's Warriors.
» Brassworks (Sat, from noon): A Festival of Horns at Woolwich Works, also noisy parading up and down outside.
» Croxfest (Sat, from noon): OK this one's not quite in London, but where else are you going to hear The Silent Rogues, Lickin Stick, Many Bats and Our Friends Electric other than on the Green in Croxley?
» Denmark Street Sessions (Sat, 1-11): A heck of a lot of live performances down former Tin Pan Alley.
» Angel Canal Festival (Sun, 11-4): Waterside gaiety beside City Road Lock, this year celebrating its 40th anniversary. The Mayor of Islington usually arrives by narrowboat. I went in 2023.
» Brompton Cemetery Open Day (Sun, 11-5): Includes opportunities to meet bees, birds of prey and Chelsea Pensioners.
» Palmers Green Festival (Sun, 12-5): All the fun of music on the green, donkey rides and dozens of community stalls in Broomfield Park N13.
Weekend 2: September 12/13
» Open House London (this weekend and next): The grand-daddy of architectural festivals, with hundreds of weird and wonderful buildings throwing open their doors across the capital for two weekends. The online calendar currently includes 819 properties, over 500 of which are "just turn up". It's quite central-London-centric again this year (3 in Havering but 98 in Westminster), although I always think the outer boroughs have some of the genuine treasures. It's possible to search by date, borough, event type and map location and also to filter out events that are fully booked. As ever there's far too much to choose from, but if you need inspiration here are my reports from 2018, 2019, 2022, 2023, 2024 and 2025. Be there or regret it for the subsequent 51 weeks.
» Heritage Open Days (Fri - next Sun): In an awkward overlap, the nationwide opening-up of historic buildings coincides with Open House again this year. 121 are in the capital, including sculpturetastic Dorich House, 600 year-old Harmondsworth Great Barn and the British Vintage Wireless and Television Museum (many appear in the Open House listings too).
» London Design Festival (continues next weekend): Hundreds of design-er events, many aimed at "the trade" but others more public-focused. I see TfL have an installation at The Pickle Factory all week, for example.
» St Katharine Docks Classic Boat Festival (Sat, Sun): Annual gathering of small boats near Tower Bridge, including Dunkirk Little Ships, dockside entertainment, opportunities to go on board and yachting celebrity Tom Cunliffe.
» Hampton Court Open Gardens (Sat, Sun): One of half a dozen opportunities annually to explore the palace's historic grounds for free.
» Markfield Road Festival (Sat, Sun): Art, DJs and a carnival procession, spilling out into the streets up N15 way.
» Scadbury Open Weekend (Sat, Sun, 2-5): Archaeological excavations at the moated medieval manor house near the Sidcup bypass. I went in 2022 and enjoyed.
» The Great River Race (Sat from 10.15am): 300 craft engage in a spectacular paddle up the Thames from Docklands to Richmond.
» Emerge East (Sat, 11-9): Placemaking exercise at Barking Riverside, including DJ AG, sauna sessions, nature workshops and a Luke Jerram inflatable.
» Thames Tidefest (Sun, 6-6): River-based activities scattered between Brentford and Chiswick, with a particular marquee-focus at Strand-on-the-Green, W4. (yes there is far far too much going on this weekend, they should spread it out better)
Weekend 3: September 19/20
» Open House London: Weekend two
» Heritage Open Days Weekend two
» Bermondsey Street Festival (Sat, 11-7): A designery "village fête", plus the obligatory dog show, plus curated live music, plus food and stalls. Now in its 20th year.
» Chiswick House Dog Show (Sun, 11-4.15): With a theme of 'Faithful Hound', celebrity judges give the dogs of W4 the runaround.
» Pearly Kings and Queens Harvest Festival (Sun, 1.30): Cockney royalty offers live entertainment in Guildhall Yard.
Weekend 4: September 26/27
» Woolmen’s Sheep Drive and Wool Fair (Sun, 10-4): The celeb leading this year's first tranche over Southwark Bridge will be revealed shortly, but they'll do well to beat Mary Berry or Michael Portillo. Come too for wool-related trade stalls and lamb burgers.
» Brixton Windmill Harvest Festival (Sun, 1-5): Milling, Morris dancing and making hedgehog buns, as autumn draws in.
» Something Else Probably (maybe): I'm still looking, but there must be something.
n.b. This year the Chelsea Physic Garden Open Weekend is at the start of October...
n.b. ...and the annual Thames Barrier all-day closure is on Sunday 11th October.
n.b. Peckham Festival and the Mayor's Liberty Festival are having a year off.
It's time to rest Slim Summer Saturday after eight slender weeks. Technically there are still three summer Saturdays to go but that's enough for now. I only introduced the feature to help get me through a particularly busy season of long-distance travel and I'm pleased to say it achieved its purpose.
Slim Summer Saturday posts started out particularly slim (a photo of a tree in Harringay) but ultimately ended up a few paragraphs long so became less of a throwaway. Statistics show that the most viewed SSS post was the first one, the aforementioned tree, confirming there is no correlation between 'effort expended' and 'exposure earned'. Every SSS post gained more than 10 comments, which is more than yesterday's Full Fat Friday post managed. The most-commented SSS post was a cut-and-pasted list of things someone else remembered, which just goes to prove that nostalgia is always a successful fallback. The other seriously successful post feedbackwise was a photo of a peculiar tube map I saw in a bar in Spain, because inviting transport-related engagement usually delivers.
I have learned that less is sometimes more. And normal Saturday service is now restored.
London's next dead bus 349: Ponders End to Stamford Hill Location: north London, outer Length of journey: 6 miles, 50 minutes Dies: tonight
Normally when I do one of these write-ups I go for a last ride and then weave all the themes into a seamless travelogue. This time I've split it into separate bits so you can pick and choose.
Past, Present and Future
The 349 was introduced in 2004 to strengthen bus capacity down the old A10, aka the High Road, as Ken Livingstone expanded the network. It's now being removed because that capacity isn't needed and times are tight, along with other cuts and tweaks as TfL take a small axe to services in the upper Lea Valley. If you're heading south currently the 279 starts at Waltham Cross, the 349 joins in at Ponders End, the 149 and 259 are added at Edmonton Green, then the 476, 243 and 76 feed in through Tottenham. The plan is for the 259 to nudge back to Ponders End to fill in the gap left by the 349 and also for the 279 to switch to Stamford Hill at the southern end, all starting tomorrow. In separate plans the 149 will be whisked away later. No journeys become impossible as a result of any of this, you might just have to wait longer for a fuller bus.
Bus Geekery
The 349 is currently one of the contenders for London's straightest bus route. It has a right turn just after the first stop and a left turn just before the last stop, but everything else is straight up (or down) the High Road. That's 94% of the route on the same road (even if that road's not perfectly straight). Other contenders for the title include the 32 (93% along Watling Street with a short bend at either end) and the 116 (91%, wrecked only by the pedestrianisation of Hounslow High Street). From this weekend the 279 will also be 93%, the Waltham Cross bypass accounting for most of the unstraight 7%.
The Withdrawal Poster
It's better than some and less good than others. The map is very complicated because it includes every single bus stop on two routes. It's trying to show that one route is being withdrawn while two other routes are both curtailed and diverted, all on the same map. However the text is about withdrawing just one route and how to cope afterwards. It offers this advice correctly but sub-optimally. Effectively it says "when the 349 disappears use the 279, unless your journey includes Enfield Bus Garage in which case use the 259". What it omits to say is "for any journey inbetween Ponders End and Seven Sisters you can catch either the 259 OR the 279". This is most journeys, but this broad advice has been skipped to focus on edge cases. Basically you can't win when writing bus change posters, they're either too complicated or too simplistic, and this is simultaneously both.
80 things I saw on my southbound journey
» Enfield Bus Garage. A man waiting by the bus stop asking if I have £1 to spare (I do not). Hassidic teenage day out. Long wait to turn right. The QUBE. Sign welcoming us to Ponders End Shopping Centre. The White Hart (former pub, its name falling off). The Kürecikliler Centre. Desserts End. Cycle lanes and copious traffic calming.
» Ponders End Park. Balkan Brew. Shaggy-haired postman scanning a code inside an opened pillar box. Caravan in front garden. Van delivering charcoal to a kebab shop (if you think about it, it must happen). Memzy Barbers. NIW Furniture. Man on mobility scooter following the cycle lane by cutting through a bus stop. ICC House Of Prayer. Jet garage [petrol 155.9p, diesel 178.9p].
» Bounces Road. Nursery based in former pub. Wonky spire atop Edmonton Baptist Church. Woman weaving through traffic wearing pink crocs. Temporary traffic lights with five minute queue. Digger full of soil. Bus station (edge of). Edmonton Green Shopping Centre. Speedy Spud. Overground station.
» Hut called Cafe Nadia. Man yelling outside police station. Hugs & Mags. Tiny front garden at number 341 brimming with tall colourful flowers (hollyhocks included). Edmonton Glory House Revival Centre. Kingdom Life Chapel. Old school launderette. Hot Nuts. Edmonton Labour Party HQ (with postwar signage). North Circular Road at Angel Corner.
» Superloop bus. Big Ben Fisheries. Brazilian flag outside The White Horse. The Gilpin's Bell freehouse. Arch across road marking change of borough. Wire horse outside Florence Hayes Recreation Ground. 'This Is Tottenham' banners. London Beard Co. White Hart Lane. 3 Points Cafe (which is more than Tottenham have got at the moment).
» Shopping parade dated 1829. Tottenham Hotspur Stadium. Pubs and cafes that Spurs supporters go to. Sign pointing to Skywalk. King Ledley mural. Car with N17 numberplate (naturally). Whitbread-topped clock. Winglab. Job Centre Plus. Trampery Tottenham ("a focal point for entrepreneurship").
» Jenny Greetings. A very closed Poundland. Pub called The Elbow Room. Ghost sign for former undertakers. High Cross micropub. College with lots of cars out front because term's just restarted. Very long Tesco. Seven Sisters Market reborn. Flashing sign saying OVERHEIGHT VEHICLE TURN BACK. German container aboard freight train.
» Advert for tuition to get into grammar school. Brazbq (rarely has a six-letter name conveyed a restaurant brand so well). Texaco garage [petrol 161.9p, diesel 186.9p]. Hosiery World. Row of cement mixers for sale outside shop. Megaphone City. Very ropey-looking lone fruit stall. Gitty Pinter Campus. Stamford Hill Bus Garage. Georgian Orthodox church.
The family who sat alongside
Mum and Dad and two boys. Dad with the loud and chatty eight year-old in the front seat. Mum and quieter six year-old behind (inwardly cursing the old man hogging the other front seat). Riding from Edmonton (where they live now) to Tottenham (where they used to live) to visit the school shop to buy uniform before term starts. "I liked our old house more" says eldest son. "But you have your own room now," says Dad. "I'm the psycho one!" says eldest son. "I can't believe the patty shop has closed," says Dad. "If we lived in those flats I would drop apples off the balcony," says eldest son. Good luck to the teacher who has him in their class this week.
Implementation of the changes
As usual the TfL Tile Switching Team have been out early, switching tiles before the date of the actual change. This is great for future journeys and arguably a useful nudge pointing out imminent changes. However it never helps if you're unfamiliar with the area and turn up during the interregnum. In particular there are pairs of southbound stops in Tottenham where one stop is for buses heading towards Stamford Hill and the other for buses towards Manor House. This week the 279 stops at one of them but from tomorrow it'll stop at the other, so swapping the tiles early means you might wait in the wrong place. It's only a small lie but it needn't have happened so prematurely.
Summary
The 349 dies tonight. TfL can take a dozen vehicles off the road as a result.
The view from Roxeth is very fine. The playing fields of Harrow School, the spire of St Mary's Church and various villas on the slopes below.
However Roxeth isn't the cultured enclave at the top of Harrow Hill it's a suburb at the bottom, originally a villageto the southwest, hence arguably Harrow-Under-The Hill. It's another example of somewhere that does have a station, indeed it has two, but ever since the bigger one was called South Harrow in 1903 the original name's been ebbing away. It lingers in streetnames, also the local library, park and two schools, whereas the local authority ward of the same name is a modern invention and doesn't quite match the original Roxeth at all. Let's start on the opposite side of the road to my first photo where we find Roxeth's oldest building, a 17th century weatherboarded farmhouse called Roxeth Farm.
Alas the owners have sought to shield their property behind a very high hedge so all you can see is a hipped roof from the side and a sash-windowed slot at the front, but it does look to be delightfully wonky. I had wondered if the barn out back was another rural survivor but no, it's one of three pavilions for Harrow School's extensive cricket fields, the Philathletic Ground. According to the whiteboard on West Street the last matches played here were against Merchant Taylors' on 20th June, over ten weeks ago, because one thing that termly fees of £21,990 deliver is a very long summer break.
The centre of the village was a four-way junction on the Northolt Road, now a five-way maelstrom called Roxeth Corner. The only building a Victorian would remember is The Half Moon pub, a half-timbered beauty originally named after the shape of the village pond. Its place in history relates to Britain's first fatal car accident in 1899 which, as a plaqueelsewhere attests, took place below Harrow School during a descent of Grove Hill. The Half Moon was merely the site of the subsequent public enquiry, hearing how a rear wheel collapsed and two passengers were hurled from their seats, one dying instantly and the other from his injuries three days later. Perhaps unsurprisingly the pub is now an Indian Grill and Shisha Lounge called the Salt Bar, but if you still want a more traditional local try The White Horse a short walk up Middle Hill.
The road rising eastwards here is Roxeth Hill, this the route the 258 bus takes to climb from South Harrow to the upper heights of Harrow School. Full marks to the TfL employee who designated the bus stop halfway up with the letters RH. Roxeth Hill is lined by some of the finer buildings erected as the suburb expanded, from small-scale workers' cottages to Arts and Crafts semis, also rustic Christ Church built to cater to a growing population and set back from the main road. Roxeth Primary still educates pupils in an angular hall built for that very purpose in 1851, indeed it's Harrow's oldest surviving state school. I suspect the triple-bend footbridge shoehorned outside is pupil-related, self-evidently over-engineered when a lollipop lady would do, but the upper span does offer excellent views across the rooftops of Roxeth and the plains of Ruislip.
By contrast the main road south from Roxeth Corner is architecturally grim. Here former pubs and cottages have been replaced by dubious postwar and postmillennial flats, while the former petrol station has become a drab stacked hotel. The largest presence is Harrow Police Station (alas not Roxeth Police Station), an outdated flag-flying office block whose front desk remains at risk of closure. Arguably the big Waitrose is a big improvement on what was on the site before, namely a mighty tall gasholder with the letters 'NO' painted on the side, this because it was a key navigational landmark on the approach to Northolt airfield. The sole attractive building on this stretch is the clubhouse of the Royal British Legion's Harrow branch which was built in 1927 in Dutch style, its bar and function room even busier visually than the twiddly exterior.
Which brings us to the tube station, namely South Harrow, which was opened in 1903 by the District Railway and transferred to the Piccadilly line in 1932. Charles Holden designed the new station building which outside looks to be less of a stunner than usual, but inside has a whoppingly broad ticket hall and a pair of delightful recessed benches halfway up the stairs in case an ascent of 40 steps proves too much. To the north of the station the railway crosses Roxeth Marsh on a low viaduct, hard though it is today to imagine the adjacent avenues as mushy fields. But just down to the left is the source of the River Roxbourne, a minor brook so named because it rises outside Roxeth, and I've previously blogged that in depth so won't dive in again.
More relevant is what's been crammed under the arches immediately opposite the station. This is South Harrow Market, one of London's quirkier retail hideaways, essentially two long alleyways serving a warren of tiny bazaars. Most serve up food, so you may need to push past a delivery driver or two, while others will print you a banner, buy your gold or stab needles in your feet. The curse of AI graphics has struck several of the menus, hence I found the Nepalese and Gujarati pictures less convincing than the proper photos at Syria Food. Again it's a shame it's not called Roxeth Market, given it's right on the edge of the original village, but the nominative pull of the adjacent tube station has proved too strong.
Continue down the Northolt Road and barely any businesses mention the old place, with only Roxeth Library flying the flag. Even the Chiltern Railways station at the foot of the hill was only called 'South Harrow and Roxeth' for the first three years after opening, after which it was renamed Northolt Park thanks to the creation of a neighbouring housing estate, thus Roxeth's chances of long-term renown were scuppered. For a proper commemoration best see the information boards at the entrance to Roxeth Recreation Ground, these a step up from Harrow's normal design. The text confirms that the name "Hroecs Seath" was first mentioned in monastic documents in 845AD, even if nobody's 100% sure what Hroecs Seath meant, also that several trees in the park are leftovers from ancient field boundaries. You have alas missed this year's Roxeth Show, the revival of a 1970s tradition, because that was in July.
Across the railway line from the rec is South Hill Drive, a lengthy avenue whose streetsign has the unusual combination of a 'No Through Road' symbol and underneath "Except by Toll Road". Follow along and all looks normal at first until suddenly the road forks at two white gates, both closed to vehicles unless you have the correct gizmo to open them. The low road enters land owned by the South Hill Estate while the high road enters the Mount Park Estate, another private residential enclave. Both declare that there is NO THOROUGHFARE FOR THE GENERAL PUBLIC but fail to clarify whether pedestrians are included so I strode through a side gate, greeted a resident walking down the hill with a Waitrose bag and chanced my arm.
It feels more Surrey than Middlesex, a sylvan climb where villas and minor mansions still feel the need to hide behind high fences and hedges despite supposedly being private anyway. Some have odd names like The Hut (which definitely isn't) or The Site, while others go for supreme Metro-land bland and call themselves Northmount, Southview, Hillcrest or The Oaks. A dozen have been here since the 19th century, a few are totally-out of character modern flats, and I have no idea how residents successfully held suburbia at bay but it's an extraordinary and privileged residential backwater nonetheless. I exited unscathed through a gate near the top of Sudbury Hill, still historically in ye olde Roxeth, another patch of secret London unlocked.
Sat 1: I have never previously tried to get ten days' blogposts prepared in advance whilst also writing posts for current publication. Wish me luck finishing the last few by Thursday. Sun 2: My favourite London meteorological data resource, NW3 Weather, has finally revamped to a modern mobile-friendly template, maybe 10 years later than it should have done. Naturally I hate the new format because nothing fits on a laptop screen any more, so I'm delighted the old version remains if you know where to look. Mon 3: I've been playing Threes on my phone for 12 years, that's over 22,000 games, and today I finally got my first 3072 tile. My high score more than doubled to 185,148 as a result. Just one more tile to get (maybe never). Tue 4: Nipped into Stanfords to buy a road map of the Basque Country (Michelin 144). It cost just £6.99 (and will prove incredibly useful because a satnav can't solve everything).
Wed 5: A squirrel turned up on my balcony attracted by a tub of water in a drought. We engaged in a lengthy staring match, then he came right up to the French windows and I tempted him away with an acorn (because I keep a stash too). Much nibbling ensued. Thu 6: I realised last week that my EHIC health insurance card had expired so sent off for a new GHIC, the post-Brexit equivalent, not thinking it'd arrive in time. It arrived the day before the holiday, hell yes.
holiday unblogged Fri 7: When we boarded the plane at Gatwick an important man was sitting in my seat so the stewardess relocated the three of us across the aisle. I may never sit in seat 1A again. Sat 8: The house where we're staying is firmly shuttered to keep out the heat, thus always dark inside. It's not usually 37°C here but apparently full-on shuttering is normal midsummer behaviour. Sun 9: I note that tattoos aren't generally a thing in the Basque Country, because if they were in this weather I'd have had an eyeful by now. Mon 10: Other cities' transport networks are often baffling and allow you to make a complete mess of things. I thought I'd done really well at the Txik Txak terminal in Biarritz, successfully buying a group ticket just before the bus departed. However when I showed it to the driver he gestured me off the bus with a Gallic shrug, this because I'd merely shown him my receipt and the ticket was still in the tray. Thankfully he waited while I ran back to collect it.
Tue 11: Portugalete metro station in Bilbao is the furthest west I've been this year. I thought it was a lot further west, but on checking it's merely due south of Lyme Regis. Wed 12: I was expecting total eclipse day to be a manic panic checking weather forecasts, traffic news and contour maps. Instead the forecast was so perfect that I relaxed all afternoon watching Netflix with the shutters down, then sauntered over to a bar safe in the knowledge that a full solar bite would be unobscured from the precise spot I'd chosen to holiday in. Still can't believe my luck. Thu 13: Things we saw on TV: several gossipy studio-based shows with half a dozen manicured hosts, very very long ad breaks, Basque TV channels promoting local culture (watch live here), a 2 hour-edition of First Dates (Spanish version), various potboiler dramas, Doc Martin dubbed. Fri 14: Since 2000 all Spanish numberplates have comprised four digits followed by three consonants, e.g. 9183 LZG. Registrations have been issued sequentially, first 9999 plates ending BBB, then BBC, then BBD, etc. We're currently up to the N's. The earliest number plate I saw was 3123 BDZ on a motorbike and the latest was 2844 NRW on a new white van. Sat 15: We nearly went to Biarritz today but thankfully checked for local events and discovered it was the day of the big Assumption fireworks so traffic would have been monstrous from mid-afternoon and much of the beachfront would have been sealed off. Monday was much quieter (and much better weather).
Sun 16: As soon as I got home from the airport I made myself beans on toast and had a proper cup of tea. I do miss the cheesy ham pintxos though. Mon 17: Having successfully taken my laptop to Spain and back, today it awoke with a blue screen of death I'd never seen before, demanding a 32-character BitLocker code. Eek. I didn't have a 32-character code, nor did any of my verification attempts uncover one. Eventually I solved the problem by clicking on 'Skip this drive'... and haven't dared turn off my laptop since. Tue 18: Just before 11pm my niece gave birth to her first child, instantly making my brother a grandfather. I merely became a great uncle which doesn't feel anywhere near as scarily generational. Wed 19: The baby's name was revealed, and as expected yes it has been used for a Disney character. Thu 20: I don't think I've ever seen grass in London looking so dry. This is Wanstead Green looking more like a threadbare carpet of straw.
Fri 21: I loved re-watching the Housemartins documentary London 0 Hull 4, as seen on BBC2's Paul Heaton Night, because the first time I saw it in 1987 I was living half a mile round the corner from 70 Grafton Street where the band formed. Sat 22: The spout of my kettle has furred up so I decided to give the gauze a scrub. I did this very gently but still managed to break the gauze, hence the kettle now pours much more smoothly but also lets chunks of limescale through, dammit. Sun 23: The westbound waiting room at New Malden station now has a sign on the door saying 'Calming space' alongside an autism infinity symbol. SWR's Calming Spaces "are waiting rooms which incorporate calming features to create a more inclusive space for customers who are neurodiverse or may have non-visible disabilities." It's a lovely idea, should you be planning on travelling to Surbiton rather than Waterloo, but only brief respite before the utter hubbub of a train carriage. Mon 24: Today is 40 days after St Swithin's Day, which was dry. I've done my usual check since and can confirm that 33 of the subsequent days were dry, which is the saint's best prediction since 1989 and 1990 (which were also both 33☀️ 7🌧️). It would have been 35 if only I hadn't gone to Norfolk and Romford and been hit by rogue showers.
Tue 25: The long-standing motor vehicle service centre at 169-173 Bow Road has closed and is up for sale. This is because ATS Euromaster Ltd is winding down its UK operations. A sign attached to the gate says "Closed Until Tomorrow", and somebody really should cross out the last two words. The site has a guide price of £1,750,000 and I expect it to be sold for housing. You could easily cram several dozen flats onto this brownfield quarter-acre, and in five years' time I bet somebody has. Wed 26: I did not open the bottle of champagne given to me when I moved into my flat 25 years ago, a possible option having evaporated, so the wait for a suitable moment continues. Thu 27: You may remember that last year, rather perversely, I set foot in every London borough at least 40 times. This year I've reached the same total but in August, so who knows how high I can get it by New Year's Eve. Fri 28: Today my Dad and I got to meet (and hold) the newest member of our family. He's so small, also his nails are surprisingly long, also he wriggles a lot, also I'd like to think that was a smile, also thanks for filling your nappy five minutes before we arrived, also by the time he's my age there still won't have been a total solar eclipse in the UK. Sat 29: Christmas puddings, festive bakewells and panettone are back on the shelves in Tesco, and obviously I bought six mince pies to celebrate.
Sun 30: Radio 4 Extra repeated an episode of The Grumbleweeds from 1986 (blimey, as late as that?), and I can't believe we found it funny and listened every week. Mon 31: On Instagram I watched reels of people having a great bank holiday abroad, at festivals, up mountains, at restaurants, on rivers, at airports, at weddings etc and all I did was walk across Selsdon Woods and Southwark Bridge. Must try harder.
25 things we learnt from TfL FoI requests in August 2026
1) In the first half of 2026 TfL earned £2,374,283 from 90,511 Penalty Charge Notices for bus lane infringements. 2) The TfL bus fleet comprises 6528 double deckers and 2454 single deckers, of which
2357 are diesel, 2937 electric, 3668 hybrid and 20 hydrogen. 3) The estimated cost of replacing the platform canopies at Barons Court station is £10.3m. 4) The three junctions responsible for the greatest number of yellow box penalty charge notices are i) West Hill/Wandsworth Fire Station SW18, ii) Homerton High St/Homerton Fire Station E9, iii) Vauxhall Bridge Road/Rampayne Street SW1. 5) So far this year, 12% of bus damage incidents have involved a Wrightbus Eclipse Gemini 3, 10% have involved an ADL Enviro 400H MMC and 9% have involved a Wrightbus NRM.
6) With regard to automatic numberplate recognition, TfL operate 4243 enforcement cameras and 181 monitoring cameras. 7) Since fares restarted on bus routes through the Silvertown and Blackwall Tunnel, passenger numbers on route 108 are down 15% compared to the same time period in 2025. On route SL4 numbers are up 4% and on route 129 up 0.5%. 8) Last year in the borough of Greenwich, while crossing the road, 9 pedestrians were seriously injured on a pedestrian crossing, 6 within 50m of a pedestrian crossing and 10 elsewhere. 9) Between February and July on the Northern line, 9% of timetabled trains failed to serve the Battersea extension. 10) The four criteria used to assess tube seats following a deep clean are i) Dust or debris in crevices ii) Dust or debris on seats iii) Grime or dust on panels iv) Gum residue. The required pass mark is 80%.
11) Last year on the Underground there were 5149 reported incidents of passengers possessing an open container of alcohol but only 203 of passengers consuming alcohol. 12) Employee headcount at the eight operational control centres for the tube is 8 for the Waterloo & City, 48 for the Bakerloo, 50 for the Victoria, 65 for the Central, 69 for the Piccadilly, 76 for the Northern, 92 for the Jubilee and 247 for the combined Circle, District, Hammersmith & City and Metropolitan. 13) The new signage on the bus lane on Westminster Bridge Road incorrectly omitted motorcycles from the list of permitted vehicles so has been removed pending replacement. 14) In the last year the drivers of 63 TfL maintenance vans have been caught exceeding a 20mph speed limit. 15) Since the start of last year the tube line with the greatest number of reported robberies was the Central line, while theft of public property was most prevalent on the Piccadilly line. The Northern line was top for violence, sexual offences and public disorder.
16) If you'd like a copy of all the in-carriage line diagrams used on the tube, DLR and trams, here's a zip folder. 17) TfL's total expenditure on taxi services during the 2025/26 financial year was £6,968,396. 18) In the last financial year 3,335,464 passengers on 190,439 buses were checked by revenue staff, leading to 17,947 penalty fares being issued and 2892 successful prosecutions. 19) Over the last three months 25% of Elizabeth line services at Acton Main Line departed at least three minutes late. 20) In the week starting 29th June a bus on route 70 knocked a motorcyclist off his bike in South Kensington and another bus on route 70 crashed into a house in Notting Hill. The same driver was not responsible for both incidents.
21) There are no current plans to introduce any new weekend-only Night Services on the tube, Overground or buses. 22) When planning for a possible Rotherhithe to Canary Wharf footbridge, a report estimated that a 15m high bridge would require opening 1-4 times an hour in the navigational peak, whereas a 20m bridge would have 95% availability. 23) 43,641 London addresses are registered to two active 60+ Oyster photocards, 864 hold three and 116 hold more than three. 24) In the last twelve months the vehicle with the highest number of ULEZ Penalty Charge Notices is a Ford Focus Titanium X TDCi with 361 fines. The vehicle with the highest number of Congestion Charge PCNs has a diplomatic plate (290 fines). 25) If you ask TfL to use their office printer to print out every tube map ever produced in colour on A3 paper, along with guidance on how to fold them, they will refuse.
I missed reporting on several transport stories while I was away so here's a brief catch-up.
🚦 This Saturday the gyratory at St Paul's is being tweaked. The southern end of King Edward Street is being pedestrianised (to create Greyfriars Square) so traffic will have to go a different way and so will local buses. Precisely where the 4, 8, 25, 56, 76 and 133 stop will be altering, and route 100 has already been extended to St Bart's. TfL have produced a ridiculously complicated map to try to explain things (my head exploded), so if you need to catch a bus the City of London's vastly oversimplified version should be clearer.
🚡 It amazes me that every time I do one of these round-ups there's a new thing at the cablecar but there always is. This time it's an interactive audio guide you can listen to on the way across with different stories in either direction. It's narrated by Engi-Bear, the cablecar's lumpen mascot, and produced by an Italian software team called POPGuide. You need to bring your own headphones (and indeed your own phone). The unusual thing is that it costs £1, just £1, when they could have given it away for free or tried to make more money out of it. Upselling has never been so flaccid.
🚇 TfL have added another weekday closure of most of the Piccadilly line to their already excessive roster of downtime, specifically Wednesday 28th - Friday 30th October (immediately before a full line closure at the weekend). Whatever is wrong with the new trains must be proving intractable, given it'll be at least next spring before any member of the public gets on board, fingers crossed.
🚌 London's next dead bus is the 349 which is being withdrawn on Saturday. Expect bloggage. On the same day the latest Superloop route is being introduced, the SL12 from Gants Hill to Rainham. The good news that it'll be free to use for the first week, should you happen to live in the area. TfL have produced a route diagram and a long list of stops in both directions, but not a map because that would be too useful. I cannot overemphasise enough how remote the Rainham terminus is, so expect bloggage there too.
📽️ In mid-August TfL published their Advertising Annual Report, a glossy 49 page compilation of all the showiest campaigns of the last year. It reads like a bunch of talented professionals congratulating themselves on a job well done, but unfortunately that job is to make their advertising more and more difficult to miss. Key phrases include "empowering brands to unlock creativity and turn heads" and "innovation remains central to our shared focus". The scariest project is a "plan to deliver world-first, ten-metre-long digital corridor wraps in selected Elizabeth line stations", i.e. huge moving screens you can't take your eyes off. It's so controversial they've made a full-scale mock-up at UCL "to evaluate how digital corridor wraps might impact the experience of customers who are neurodivergent or disabled". See photo.
They hope the research will show any potential impacts can be mitigated, but I hope someone will grow a conscience and halt the introduction of these massive digital intrusions. Advertising targets shouldn't be fixated on increasing distraction, forever designing formats it's more and more impossible to take our eyes off.
📱 The report also suggests you could be seeing a lot more adverts on TfL Go in future. At present the app generates 76 million page views a month but only made £5,000 in revenue last year, thus "TfL Go represents a significant long-term growth opportunity".
🚌 If you enjoy those free heritage bus days when the London Bus Museum floods a historic route with vintage vehicles, the list of planned events has extended. Route 106:3rd October 2026. Route 6: 20th March 2027. Route 107: 13th June 2027. Route 85: 2nd October 2027.
