DLR extension: Abbey Road
The Beatles never came to this Abbey Road. There isn't a big recording studio, there isn't even a zebra crossing. But there might soon be accidental tourists, lured to a quiet corner of the Lower Lea Valley by a temptingly named station on the London tube map. They'll be disappointed. When I first heard that the DLR was planning to open up a station at Abbey Road, I was mighty surprised. There's not much here, only the dead-end corner of a Newham housing estate and an ageing collection of light industrial units. West Ham station isn't far away, so what local population there is has hugely better connections just down the road. The site has easy access to the middle of the Greenway, and a train depot, not that this would sway anyone to open a station specially, surely? Baffled I was. But now here it is, a proper 21st century station accessed via the old brick bridge at the end of a single row of terraced houses. I guess it's here because this is one of the rare spots where a road crosses two miles of railway, and the planners had their eye on prospects for future development. Remember, Pudding Mill Lane must have looked like a bloody stupid location for a DLR station once, and now look at it.
Abbey Road station is yet to prove a big hit with the locals. Indeed on Wednesday morning there were five times more staff here than passengers. That's partly because there was only one passenger, me, but also because the station was being given a damned good collective scrubdown in celebration for its grand opening. Every glass surface cleaned, every seat rubbed over, every horizontal surface duly mopped. As job creation schemes go, I doubt there'll be sufficient vandals and litter louts at AbbeyRoad to keep this army of cleaners employed full time.
My solo wait at Abbey Road provided an opportunity to inspect the heritage plaque at the foot of the northbound platform. 'Erected on the site of the Cistercian Abbey of St Mary's AD 1135' The plaque was embedded in the bridge in 1892 (previously visible only to passing train drivers, now to all and sundry) and commemorates the once-very-important Abbey of Stratford Langthorne. Archaeologists preparing the way for the Jubilee line extension excavated 683 skeletons here, probably of former monks, as well as the eastern end of the former church. Almost nothing of the monastic estate remains above ground today, bar the foundations of the gatehouse in Abbey Gardens. You'd like Abbey Gardens, a community project based on shared cultivation (in-depth website here, Harvest Festival 17th September), now easily accessed from the station via Baker's Row. I'd not expect Beatles-searching tourists to be impressed, but there's rather more Abbey around here than you might think.
DLR extension: West Ham
Ooh, hang on, a real station. The DLR runs from the old North London lineplatforms, now slightly spruced up, and easily accessed from the Jubilee line overbridge. Passengers can catch a train to Abbey Road or Star Lane (although it might be quicker to walk than to wait). Passengers can catch a train to Stratford or Canning Town (although it's probably quicker to take the non-stop Jubilee instead). Or passengers, what passengers there are, can catch a through train to Beckton or Woolwich (depending). Keep an eye on the next train indicators on the Jubilee platforms opposite, they might well signal a faster way out.
DLR extension: Star Lane
Another "hmm, why?" station, this. Major industrial estate on one side of the tracks, a patch of grass and a few houses on the other. But there are plenty of answers to "hmm, why?" if you look. The station's halfway between West Ham and Canning Town, and the DLR has a habit of infilling to promote community connectivity. TfL's new eco-friendly West Ham Bus Garage is close by, so this gives drivers a fresh means of access. The neighbouring industrial estate is destined for greater things, so having a station primed and ready will aid future development. The station's footbridge provides a welcome (and rare) means of crossing two barrier-like railway lines. And if you happen to live round here (yes, I know you don't, but people do), a new station on your doorstep brings nothing but benefits.
It feels quite expansive, does Star Lane DLR, accessed from either side via a lofty staircaseor lift. There are bike racks on both flanks, of a very appealing DLR-specific design, at least so long as nobody wrecks the symmetry by chaining a bicycle to them. Up on the footbridge, artist Toby Paterson has stencilled all the glass walls with a repeating geometric pattern. These are different at each of the new stations along the line - a simple idea and yet very effective. And finally, down the stairs from the ticket machine area, a big island platform for waiting on. You'll probably never hang around here, but don't begrudge this shiny new halt to those who will.
DLR extension: Canning Town
Out: It's not an ideal situation. Two sets of DLR platforms, separated both horizontally and vertically, with the same destinations served from both. Want to go to Woolwich? Ah, the first train could be upstairs, where it always used to be, or it could be downstairs and across a bit, on the newly opened platforms. There'll be some electronic display screens soon to alert passengers to which train's pulling in where, but alas they're not yet functional. Think of it as the DLR version of Camden Town. Stay awake and you should end up on the right platform to catch the next service out, or else just head to the usual place and there'll be a train to your destination eventually.
In: It's not an ideal situation. Two sets of DLR platforms, separated both horizontally and vertically, with services pulling into both. Just arrived from Woolwich? Ah, your train could be upstairs, where it always used to be, or it could be downstairs and across a bit, on the newly opened platforms. Those who arrive downstairs don't seem especially pleased. Most travellers from Beckton or Woolwich don't want to go to Stratford, they want Docklands or the Jubilee, so they're not happy to find themselves isolated on the line to nowhere. Canning Town's where most of these passengers get out... then traipse down, across and up to get to where they wished they'd arrived in the first place. I can do the full DLR-to-DLR trek in 80 seconds flat, but that's off-peak with no slowcoaches on the escalators. The elderly couple I saw on Wednesday took six minutes. They spent the first minute looking bemused, the second asking a member of staff where trains for London were, and the third shuffling down the platform to the lift. Then a fourth descending to subway level, a fifth to cross to lift number two, and finally a sixth to ascend to the top level platform. Next time, if there is a next time, they'll know to wait patiently at Custom House for the next through service rather than catch the first train through, it'll be quicker. Beware the weasel words "Change at Canning Town" - you may get more than you bargained for.
DLR extension: Stratford International
It's been two years now since the High Speed station at Stratford International opened to passengers. Mostly, they stayed away. The station building existed in a closed bubble within a building site, and access throughout that time has been by transfer bus only. You just wouldn't, not if you didn't have to. But now there's a new lifeline, a curving track round the edge of the Westfield Stratford City development to link Kent commuters to East London's rail network. About time too. But the problem is, for the time being at least, Stratford International DLR is in just as much of a bubble as the bigger station across the road.
Architecturally, this is a fairly standard DLR outpost. A concrete chasm leading to dead-end buffers, similar to Woolwich Arsenal but open to the sky. There are two bay platforms but currently only one is needed, with each train lingering only a few minutes before departing back the way it came. There are two exits for passengers, one at each end of the platform. The main exit leads up a set of self-aware escalators to the end of Stratford City's North Loop Road. More intriguing is the ascent viastaircase to a wholly pointless alternative plaza, laid out with ticket machines that nobody need use and maps that nobody need read. One day there'll be a bus stop alongside, but that's years off. For now a lonely stretch of pavement has been barriered off, allowing passage to the main exit at street level for those who exit this way by mistake. It's not far to the other Stratford International's cavernous ticket hall, where still not very many passengers pass through on their way to umpteen non-International destinations. Expect footfall to increase somewhat when the gates to Westfield open in a couple of weeks time. Much of that will be shoppers whizzing home to Kent, but most, I suspect, will be Londoners lured out to catch the DLR home, when they'd actually have been far better off walking back through the shopping mall to Stratford proper. It's still going to be a bubble out here, even post retail explosion, and I'd expect passenger traffic to remain light for a few years yet.
So is this DLR extension a colossal waste of money, benefiting a lucky few who can't be bothered to walk? Well yes, sort of, for now, but long term, absolutely no. After the Olympics this is going to be the closest station to the Athletes Village, so there'll be thousands of new homes for whom this DLR halt will be the perfect escape route. There might even be actual International services to the continent if you hang around long enough, to justify the station its name. This is London planning perfectly for its future, even if all looks fairly pointless now.
DLR extension: Stratford
It's a two minute journey from Stratford International round to Stratford, half of it in the open (past the Aquatic Centre, and ooh look, the Olympic Stadium) and the other half through an unexpected tunnel. The line curves through a broad trench beneath the Westfield complex, all brightly lit concrete and parallel escapeways, for a good thirty seconds or so. And then it emerges bang in the middle of Stratford station, low level, dividing the two halves of the building in two. It would be brilliant if this was a line most passengers wanted to use, it's so conveniently placed, but instead most need to scurry over the top to reach the platform or exit they actually require. Don't be tempted to leap on the new DLR just because it looks nearby - you'll probably be quicker crossing to the Jubilee to get to West Ham, and definitely so to get to Canning Town. And definitely don't leap aboard to get to Westfield, walk along the subway and ascend the escalators at the far end. But I rather liked the opportunity to wander out once more in front of Stratford station's glass façade, just as I did as recently as five years ago when these were the North London line platforms, even if the view was now more building site than bus station. If the new DLR extension is to succeed, it's the connection here that has to lure them in.
DLR extension: Stratford High Street
That's three consecutive stations with Stratford in the title, a sequence so tempting that one train guard yesterday had to warn inbound passengers not to disembark here by mistake. Not that it's very far to walk if you do. DLR trains take under a minute to rumble between Stratford and Stratford High Street, and it'd be even shorter if the latter station had been actually built on the High Street. Instead the old Stratford Market station building lies boarded up, for now, with access to the platforms down a long ramp concealed round the back. That's not going to attract the punters in, not that there are as many as you might think passing by on the main road. The Broadway is currently Stratford's busiest shopping road, not the High Street, which boasts little more than a dead cinema, a bingo club and a Chicken Pizza Village.
Throw in all the approach ramps and Stratford High Street station is probably double the length it needs to be. That's bad news if you decide to gain access in the middle by the lifts because there isn't an entrance there, instead you have to walk up to one end or the other and double back. Passers-by can easily peer down into this station, subtly recessed behind a glass wall, while rising behind are the Victorian brick walls of the Stratford Workshops. They used to print most of Britain's train tickets and train timetables in there, apparently, not that it's easy to get hold of either at the new station next door. As for the southern entrance, that's ideally placed for a handful of council properties set around a soulless green, although the local population would probably rather save money by walking to Stratford or West Ham rather than frittering away cash on the train. I strongly suspect there'll be more passengers getting off here than getting on, that's my hunch. But even then I bet it'll still be much busier than Abbey Road next down the line. Of which more tomorrow...
1987: Tower Gateway → Island Gardens; Stratford → Island Gardens
1991: Bank → Shadwell
1994: Poplar → Beckton
1999: Island Gardens → Lewisham
2005: Canning Town → King George V
2009: King George V → Woolwich Arsenal
2011: Canning Town → Stratford International
It has a fairly complicated service pattern, the DLR, and it's about to get even more complex. Trains run on four different routes, and from noon today should run on two more.
Bank → Lewisham
Bank → Woolwich Arsenal
Tower Gateway → Beckton
Stratford → Canary Wharf
Stratford International → Woolwich Arsenal
Stratford International → Beckton
The service pattern on the new extension is going to be, how can I put it, confusing. All trains from Stratford International will go to the low level platforms at Canning Town, that's the easy bit, then some will head for Beckton and some to Woolwich Arsenal. But it won't be the nice coordinated mix that you're expecting. Try to get your head around this.
From Stratford International...
weekdays
via Canning Town
to Beckton
to Woolwich
0530 to 0600
every 10 mins
every 10 mins
0600 to 1000
every 8 mins
every 8 mins
1000 to 1500
every 10 mins
every 10 mins
1500 to 1900
every 9 mins
every 9 mins
1900 to 0100
every 10 mins
every 10 mins
all weekend
every 10 mins
every 10 mins
Or, in other words, if it's rush hour all the trains from Stratford International go to Woolwich. And if it's not rush hour all the trains from Stratford International go to Beckton. Should you want to travel to somewhere on the other branch you'll have to change at Canning Town, and then it'll be quicker to take the Jubilee line. Jubilee line trains are quicker and more frequent, plus you won't have as long a trek at Canning Town to reach the upper DLR platform. Sorry, this new Stratford International extension isn't going to be quite as much use for through journeys as you might have expected.
Here's the service pattern on the other two arms affected by the new extension.
From Woolwich Arsenal...
weekdays
via Canning Town
to Bank
to Stratford Int
0600 to 1000
every 4 mins
every 8 mins
every 8 mins
1500 to 1900
every 4/5 mins
every 9 mins
every 9 mins
all other times
every 10 mins
every 10 mins
From Beckton...
weekdays
via Canning Town
to Tower Gateway
to Stratford Int
0600 to 1000
every 8 mins
every 8 mins
1500 to 1900
every 9 mins
every 9 mins
all other times
every 5 mins
every 10 mins
every 10 mins
Services to the City will continue as before, on both branches, but now with Stratford International infill. It's no great change for commuters from Woolwich. They already have extra rush hour shuttle trains to Canning Town, and these services will now continue up to Stratford. But it's a weird change for commuters from Beckton. They'll get trains every five minutes at the least useful times... before 6am, midday, late evening, even after midnight. But at rush hours, sorry, trains will run with eight or nine minute gaps, just like they do now, no improvement at all.
Happy 24th birthday to the DLR. With a bit of luck staff will be opening their presents this morning and there'll be a brand new train set to play with. Just don't expect it to be a gift most Londoners will find especially useful. Unless you live in the right place and want to travel at the right time, the Stratford International extension isn't likely to have been worth the wait.
The Beatles never came to this Abbey Road. There isn't a big recording studio, there isn't even a zebra crossing. But there might soon be accidental tourists, lured to a quiet corner of the Lower Lea Valley by a temptingly named station on the London tube map. They'll be disappointed. When I first heard that the DLR was planning to open up a station at Abbey Road, I was mighty surprised. There's not much here, only the dead-end corner of a Newham housing estate and an ageing collection of light industrial units. West Ham station isn't far away, so what local population there is has hugely better connections just down the road. The site has easy access to the middle of the Greenway, and a train depot, not that this would sway anyone to open a station specially, surely? Baffled I was. But now here it is, a proper 21st century station accessed via the old brick bridge at the end of a single row of terraced houses. I guess it's here because this is one of the rare spots where a road crosses two miles of railway, and the planners had their eye on prospects for future development. Remember, Pudding Mill Lane must have looked like a bloody stupid location for a DLR station once, and now look at it.
DLR extension: Star Lane
Out: It's not an ideal situation. Two sets of DLR platforms, separated both horizontally and vertically, with the same destinations served from both. Want to go to Woolwich? Ah, the first train could be upstairs, where it always used to be, or it could be downstairs and across a bit, on the newly opened platforms. There'll be some electronic display screens soon to alert passengers to which train's pulling in where, but alas they're not yet functional. Think of it as the DLR version of Camden Town. Stay awake and you should end up on the right platform to catch the next service out, or else just head to the usual place and there'll be a train to your destination eventually.
It's been two years now since the High Speed station at Stratford International opened to passengers. Mostly, they stayed away. The station building existed in a closed bubble within a building site, and access throughout that time has been by transfer bus only. You just wouldn't, not if you didn't have to. But now there's a new lifeline, a curving track round the edge of the Westfield Stratford City development to link Kent commuters to East London's rail network. About time too. But the problem is, for the time being at least, Stratford International DLR is in just as much of a bubble as the bigger station across the road.
DLR extension: Stratford
That's three consecutive stations with Stratford in the title, a sequence so tempting that one train guard yesterday had to warn inbound passengers not to disembark here by mistake. Not that it's very far to walk if you do. DLR trains take under a minute to rumble between Stratford and Stratford High Street, and it'd be even shorter if the latter station had been actually built on the High Street. Instead the old Stratford Market station building lies boarded up, for now, with access to the platforms down a long ramp concealed round the back. That's not going to attract the punters in, not that there are as many as you might think passing by on the main road. The Broadway is currently Stratford's busiest shopping road, not the High Street, which boasts little more than a dead cinema, a bingo club and a Chicken Pizza Village.
Today, if all goes to plan, the Docklands Light Railway will be complete. The Stratford International extension is scheduled to open this morning, just before noon, unless it doesn't, because the history of this particular branch is delay after hiatus after postponement. It'll open in mid 2010, they promised a few years back, then it was Autumn 2010, then late Spring 2011, then July 2011, then Summer 2011. And today's the last irrefutable day of Summer 2011, so it looks like today's the deadline the DLR will finally meet. Once this new line opens there are no definite plans for further extensions, only minor tweaks plus pie-in-the-sky pipedreams that Boris hasn't funded. For the foreseeable future, today's opening completes the network.
