Earlier this week I spotted this 40 year-old poster at Leytonstone station.
It's an original from January 1985, unexpectedly uncovered.
I could tell it was original because it had come loose in the bottom left hand corner and half a dozen even older posters were lurking underneath.
I hope someone preserves it.
More to the point I hope it's still there.
The Capitalcard was a new addition to London's ticketing system in 1985. At the time Travelcards only allowed travel on the Underground and buses, but the more expensive Capitalcard allowed travel on British Rail services too. You can see an example of a Capitalcard here. They remained in use until 1989 when Travelcards gained BR validity and the Capitalcard brand was phased out.
I wondered what other fare-related posters might be in the stack, before and after...
1900: Pay the clerk at the ticket office window, there's a good chap 1913: Please be patient while we locate the correct paper ticket from our rack 1932: Let our new automated ticket machines speed you on your way 1947: Riding the Underground is cheaper than half a pound of brisket 1955: Your Central line journey now costs a ha'penny more 1968: Yellow flat fare tickets are fair for all 1971: Use your new pennies to take a ride to Bank 1981: Fare zones make travel cheaper and more flexible 1982: Your fare has doubled, sorry, blame Bromley 1983: The new Travelcard means more convenience and less queueing 1985: The power of London's Bus, Rail and underground services from just one card 1988: Don't be afraid, stick your ticket in the electronic gate 1995: You should absolutely definitely buy a One Day Travelcard 2003: Embrace the future, get your Oyster card today 2005: Daily capping is a proper gamechanger innit? 2010: Oh go on, we'll let you use Oyster on rail services now 2014: Why not go contactless, but avoid card clash at all costs! 2015: Are you still using Oyster? Loser 2023: Please stop buying One Day Travelcards, we hate them now 2025: Just swipe your device and let us worry about how much it costs
The withdrawal of route 347, London's least frequent bus, is a excellent excuse to update the new top 10.
London's ten rarest bus routes*
* scheduled TfL buses, in one direction, ordered by weekly frequency (no school journeys, no mobility services)
1)389Barnet → Western Way 2)399Barnet → Hadley Wood
The 299 bus runs regularly between Muswell Hill and Cockfosters. Once the morning rush hour is over one vehicle flips its blind to become a 399 and nips round Hadley Wood to the shops in Barnet. Here it flips its blind again to become a 389 for the eight minute trip to the Underhill estate. Then it's eight minutes back to Barnet, and flip back to 399, and back to Hadley Wood, and flip back to being a 389 again. And repeat, but only until the evening peak - both services are all sewn up by 3pm. The 389 is also London's shortest bus route while the 399 is London's least used bus route, so they now hold all the crowns. Flipping infrequent. Mon-Fri 5/6 buses, Sat 5/6 buses; weekly total 30/36 buses
2)385Chingford → Crooked Billet
When they say Crooked Billet they really mean the big Sainsbury's close to what used to be Walthamstow Stadium. The 385 exists solely so TfL can claim that people living along the eastern edge of the Lea Valley reservoirs have a bus service (even if it is a bit sparse and packs up by 4pm). Mon-Fri 6 buses, Sat 6 buses; weekly total 36 buses
2)R10Orpington ← Knockholt ← Orpington (circular) 5)R5Orpington → Knockholt → Orpington (circular)
The southeast corner of London is remarkably rural, green and villagey. These minor routes penetrate the border with Kent, serving Cudham on the London side and Halstead on the other, via a variety of other obscure non-urban locations. The R10 goes anti-clockwise round the big loop while the R5 goes clockwise, slightly more often. The 150 minute gap between services is the longest of any TfL bus route. Mon-Fri 6/7 buses, Sat 6/7 buses; weekly total 36/42 buses
5)H3Golders Green → Hilltop → Golders Green (circular)
The H3 minibus meanders round Hampstead Garden Village to the north of the Heath, along long residential roads where every householder owns a car. It pauses at the Spaniards Inn, nips up to East Finchley station, turns round beneath East Finchley Cemetery and then heads all the way back again. You probably wouldn't (and after 3pm, you can't). Mon-Fri 7 buses, Sat 7 buses; weekly total 42 buses
7)375Romford → Havering-atte-Bower → Passingford Bridge
Over to Romford for a one-and-a-half-hourly bus, introduced in 2008 as part-replacement for an Arriva service that linked Romford to Epping. The 375 trots infrequently to the edge of London, continues to the first practical turning point at Passingford Bridge and then heads back to Romford again. It no longer connects to anywhere useful but keeps the edge of Havering ticking over. Mon-Fri 9 buses, Sat 9 buses; weekly total 54 buses
7)U10Uxbridge → Ickenham → Ruislip
The U10 serves otherwise-isolated estates in Ickenham and Ruislip and has done since 1994. It entered the top 10 in 2022 when its frequency was cut from hourly to every 90 minutes, to the dismay of local residents, notionally to improve reliability. Now that the 347 has been extinguished London's least frequent buses are the R5/R10 (every 2½ hrs), the 375 and U10 (every 1½ hrs), the R8 (every 80-85 minutes) and the 146 (a bit worse than hourly). Mon-Fri 9 buses, Sat 9 buses; weekly total 54 buses
9)N28Camden Town → Earl's Court → Wandsworth 9)N113Trafalgar Square → Brent Cross → Edgware
The N28 interleaves with the N31 between Camden and South Kensington before bearing off alone, not quite so often, towards Wandsworth. The N113 was introduced in 2012 as a parallel service to the N13, running to Edgware rather than Finchley, introducing an overnight service to the A41 corridor for the first time. These are the only N-prefixed buses to run just eight times a night. (The N11, N27, N31, N33, N41, N65, N72, N74, N136, N199, N250 and N381 run nine times, so they'd be joint twelfth) Mon-Fri 8 buses, Sat 8 buses, Sun 8 buses; weekly total 56 buses
11)SL6Russell Square → West Norwood → West Croydon
I know I said this was a top 10 but I had to include number 11 because it's a Superloop service. Twelve buses into town during the morning peak and twelve back again in the evening is ridiculously fewer services than the rest of the Superloop routes. It's the only bus you're not allowed to get off untill the express section is complete so makes for a unique commuting experience Mon-Fri 12 buses; weekly total 60 buses
London's next dead bus 347: Romford to Ockendon Location: outer London/Essex Length of journey: 12 miles, 45 minutes
The 347, which dies this weekend, is London's least frequent bus. It runs at two hourly intervals just four times a day - all journeys done and dusted by 5pm - and is also one of London's least used bus routes. It exists to serve a few quiet lanes on the Essex fringes either side of Upminster and has done since 2004. But TfL have decreed that residents of those far flung lanes can do without a London bus service, all to save a bit of money, so the 347 runs for the very last time tomorrow. Many may mourn its passing but few will miss it.
The death of the 347 has its roots in a 2023 consultation which proposed merging the minor 346 with the unloved 497. The merged 346 was introduced last March, bringing three buses an hour to what had been barely-served roads between Harold Wood and Upminster. This made the 347 mostly redundant, but with a Mayoral election imminent TfL couldn't quite bring themselves to pull the plug. A decision to kill off the route was made last August and announced last month, much to the disappointment of the leader of Havering Council. To read his statement click here, to view the consultation click here, to read my summary click here, to watch Geoff's video about a ride on the 347 click here and to take one final virtual ride read on.
The 347 slips out of the back of Romford station on the hour, every two hours, pulling up at bus stop Z to generally minimal interest. There are quicker ways to get to Upminster and Ockendon stations, including the Lakeside-bound 370 and of course the train, so you have to be quite dedicated to choose to board this circuitous single decker instead. The 347's paltry timetable is still posted here although the route no longer appears on the spider map pinned up in the shelter because this was updated and replaced prematurely two weeks ago. The bus stop panel also displays a 'Route 347 will be withdrawn' poster with a map designed by TfL's How Bloody Complicated Can We Make This department. I could drone on for ages about why their awful map didn't need to show seven alternative routes, including not enough of the key ones, but thankfully here comes the bus and I need to get on board.
Our ageing vehicle rattles and whines its way past Romford's shops, picking up nobody. Its windows are filthy which is a shame because we'll be speeding between fields later, but why use a decent vehicle on a doomed and underused route? Our first passenger boards outside the police station, a lady with a metal poppy hanging from her handbag, and a second in a hoodie at the next stop. One has only boarded because we came along first - the 174 or 498 would have done just as well - and the other is heading to a workplace in Upminster that won't have a direct bus service next week. By the time we reach the rusting flyover only one of them remains, and then it's time for the Tesco twiddle.
When the 347 was introduced it was deemed important to serve the Gallows Corner Tesco Extra so the bus has to filter right to leave the A12, meander down to the back of the car park and then negotiate its way back out again. Since then Harold Wood Hospital has been turned into a housing estate allowing the 346 to filter through to the station much quicker, but sending the 347 that way would have involved a pesky consultation so nobody bothered and we have to queue back out onto the A12. Passengerwise it works though. Nobody wanted us at the supermarket but here on the arterial a pensioner with a wheeled chair flags us down and the driver gets to demonstrate that the step-free ramp still works.
Twenty minutes in and we've reached Harold Wood station, a Crossrail interchange, beyond which comes the first set of lanes where the 347 used to be the sole route. Nobody's interested in boarding, however, and the reason for this is soon evident as we catch up with the 346 in front. Since the route was reformulated last year the 346 and 347 now share the next sixteen stops, out past Pages Wood and into Upminster, and us being stuck behind the other route is the perfect exemplification of why the 347 is no longer needed. A couple of passengers board and alight the other bus, including one who successfully flags it down during the remote mile with no bus stops where it's not officially Hail & Ride either. If anyone from TfL's Let's Add New Bus Stops department is reading, residents of Cornsland Close would appreciate an official stop rather than watching 100 buses a day skipping by.
We cross the Southend Arterial and enter the outskirts of Upminster past the new housing estate where the pitch and putt used to be, enjoying some fine views across the Ingrebourne valley towards the heights of Emerson Park. The 346 finally gets overtaken outside Upminster station because it's paused for a driver changeover, allowing us to pick up one final passenger heading to North Ockendon (who could have caught the 370 but we happened to come by first). Upminster has a Brewdog these days, perhaps to balance out the longstanding Wimpy and Waitrose. The first half-mile of St Mary's Lane retains two bus routes for now, much to residents' relief, but after the railway bridge the 346 veers off into Cranham and we enter the 2½ miles of Outer London TfL are about to abandon.
Someone's been busy at Chester Avenue because the westbound bus stop and its bus shelter have already been removed, which seems somewhat premature. Six streets of semis are about to lose their bus service too, I reckon 300 houses all told, although all but Winchester Avenue will still be within 400m walking distance of the 346. The Jobbers Rest and the Thatched House are also outside TfL's nominal walking distance, although both pubs have decent sized car parks and trade will not be harmed. Ditto the golf club and its co-located restaurant Jaxon's Eating House, which sounds like the most Essex name imaginable even though we're still in London, just about.
Franks Cottages are the first houses to be genuinely inconvenienced by the 347's departure, assuming you don't think a bus that barely runs is too much of an inconvenience anyway. There are eight cottages altogether, one with a red telephone box in the front garden, on a gentle bend just before the M25 thunders over. The other properties along this stretch are all farms with long driveways hosting subdivided commercial units, should you be in need of animal feed, joinery supplies or white van hire. The most intriguing is Fairoak Showman's Quarters, a Traveller plot accommodating half a dozen caravans because fairground operators need somewhere to hunker down during the off-season. In total this stretch of St Mary's Lane has seven bus stops that'll never see another bus, not after tomorrow, and will all likely go the same way as poor Chester Avenue.
At London's easternmost mini-roundabout the 347 turns right and follows Clay Tye Road rather than continuing past the koi carp temple and veering into Essex. Initially there are marshy fields to either side and views of elevated traffic on the M25, then the scrawny hedgerows and outlying houses begin. Many are sprawling bungalows, some are detached hideaways and all have an air of independence about them as befits the Havering/Thurrock margins. Only one house displays a St George's flag, proudly flapping beside its electronic gates, and likewise only one has a Circus Skills Workshops trailer parked outside the kitchen.
Europe's largest datacentre is planned to be built across adjacent fields, hence posters are attached to lampposts decrying the loss of 175 acres of scruffy Green Belt. A large patch has already been swallowed by the geometric forest of Warley Substation and its associated battery farm, but that's a battle lost. The strung-out houses gently coalesce to form an unnamed hamlet - North North Ockendon perhaps - within which are a garden centre, a reptile shop and a nursing home. Arguably they shouldn't be London residents, being the wrong side of the M25, and as of next week TfL will be treating them as such by withdrawing their bus service.
The mitigation is that Clay Tye Road is also served by bus route 269, a non-TfL service run by NIBS Buses of Wickford. In good news it runs five times a day but in bad news it runs less frequently than the 347 and won't take you to the shops in Upminster or Romford. Instead it connects Brentwood to Grays, both proper Essex destinations, and spends less than five minutes inside the Greater London boundary. TfL have deigned to show the 269 on their not very good map and pointed out it charges special fares, but it's unusual to see them abdicate responsibility entirely. That said hardly anyone here ever caught the 347, they all have cars, and if anyone really wants a red bus rather than a yellow one they can always walk ten minutes up the hill to North Ockendon proper.
North Ockendon proper no longer contains a pub, the Old White Horse having closed in 2022, but it does still have a 14th century church, a holy well and a car dealership. Here the 347 drops off its Upminster passenger and then rattles on out of the village and finally out of London. You could see the adjoining fields better from a double decker, or indeed if someone had cleaned the windows, but they're scrappy fenland fields and paddocks so you're perhaps not missing much. At this speed South Ockendon swiftly arrives, a proper suburb with a village hall, a village green and 400 acres of ex-council housing. The 347 turns off as soon as it possibly can, because why serve Essex when you're funded by Londoners, and draws to an abrupt halt outside thec2c station.
It's probably right that the 347 is being withdrawn, especially now that the 346 has been remodelled to cover much of its route. And whilst it's technically bad news for Franks Cottages and the 40 houses down Clay Tye Road, conjuring up an alternative service to fill the gap would undoubtedly be a massive waste of money. A bus that runs only four times a day isn't going to be missed much anyway. But it's still a shame to see such a quirky rural ride extinguished, so if you want to experience one of the last journeys of London's least frequent bus you have until Friday teatime and then it's gone.
I spent a lot of time yesterday trying to buy tickets in the Great British Rail Sale. This is one of those rare bonanzas when rail companies significantly reduce the price of some of their advance tickets, usually in the winter months when fewer people are travelling. Often only one operator offers bargains, for example just GWR or only LNER, but occasionally the government steps in and encourages most of them to join in.
This is a nationwide sale to celebrate the 200th anniversary of the railways, specifically the opening of the Stockton and Darlington Railway in 1825, and 20 different rail companies are taking part.
At greatbritishrailsale.nationalrail.co.uk you can discover the best savings available, but to identify which trains are included at which times on which days you have to search for tickets as usual on operator websites, ticketing portals and apps. Some fares are amazing (London → Sheffield £6.30), other merely quite good (London → Blackpool £29) and others still quite pricy (London → Penzance £41). Some of the best-looking bargains are however very hard to find or may have sold out, plus that's only a single ticket so it'll cost double to come back again. But it pays to keep hunting.
I was particularly interested to find cheap tickets to big towns I've never been to so spent ages yesterday trying to concoct day trips at bargain prices. They're all further north than Nottingham so not necessarily on the cheap list, also sometimes only the slower operators are offering good value tickets, also not necessarily at convenient times. But I eventually managed to plan trips to three of them for a total cost of just £45, which I'm particularly pleased about, and you can expect to read about those in February and March. Let's hope the weather's better by then.
Officially Midsummer Day is 24th June.
But we don't have a Midwinter Day.
If we did, when might it be?
Midwinter is today.
If you take winter to be 1st December to 28th February, i.e. meteorological winter, then today is the middle day of the season. We've already had 44 days of winter and after today we still have 44 days to go, so we must be halfway through. Things aren't quite so clear cut in a leap year, but it isn't a leap year so midwinter is today.
And midwinter is also 4th February.
The astronomical definition of winter is the period between the winter solstice and the spring equinox. Winter is 89 days long so we're looking for the 45th day after the solstice and that's 4th February. Technically the solstice moves around by a few hours every year so sometimes the halfway point is on 5th February instead. But whichever day it is, 4th or 5th February, the bad news is it's still three weeks away.
And midwinter is also the day after tomorrow.
I'm basing this on temperature because it would make sense to think of midwinter as the coldest part of the year. Clearly this varies from year to year so the trick is to average out a lot of past temperature data and see where the coldest day is. I found a dataset for Oxford with a daily record going back over a century, so have been able to calculate the average maximum temperature on every date from 21st December to 6th February. Here's the graph.
The average maximum temperature in mid-December is about 8°C. It falls to about 7°C by the start of January and fluctuates around 7°C until the end of January, after which it inexorably rises. The coldest week in this dataset is 17th-23rd January and the day with the coldest average is 17th January, suggesting 17th January is the height of midwinter.
And midwinter was also 21st December.
This is because 21st December was the winter solstice and by definition the winter solstice has the minimum number of daylight hours. It's seemingly weird that temperatures continue to fall for four weeks after minimum daylight but that's because the land and sea are still emitting heat absorbed in the summer.
So take your pick as to when Midwinter Day falls, but it could be last month, it could be next month or it could be right around now.
21st December - minimum daylight
15th January - midpoint of meteorological winter
17th-23rd January - coldest daily temperature
4th February - midpoint of astronomical winter
News from the South Do These Benches Have Sutton's Least Attractive View?
This cluster of seven benches can be found at the northern end of the Beddington Industrial estate, close to Therapia Lane tram stop. The site has a particularly miserable ambience and a particularly unattractive view. But is it genuinely Sutton's least scenic place to sit?
AI While specific benches in the London Borough of Sutton with notably unattractive views aren't widely documented, certain areas may offer less scenic seating options. Benches situated near industrial zones, busy roadways, or construction sites might provide less appealing vistas.
And yet many people must endure this grim panorama because the evidence is all around. I counted a dozen large Coca-Cola bottles and at least fifty Guinness empties liberally scattered across the surrounding grass. I guess the litterers come from the adjacent factories, showrooms and tram depot, maybe at lunchtime or more likely after hours, huddled in their hoodies to chat and vape with their workmates. Outdoor drinking is a lifestyle choice played out across London, not just here in Sutton, but what is that miserable backdrop they're all staring at?
AI The grey industrial buildings are part of the Heidelberg Materials Ready-mixed Concrete Croydon facility. This plant supplies ready-mixed concrete for various construction projects, ranging from major developments to residential applications like foundations, driveways, garages, and patios. The facility is strategically located near key roads, including the A23, A232, A235, and Purley Way, facilitating efficient distribution within a 12-mile radius.
Don't all rush.
News from the East What a Silley name!
Silley Weir Promenade is a ridiculous name for a street. It stretches underneath the viaduct at Gallions Reach DLR station forming a pedestrian plaza along the front of a fresh batch of flats. This underwhelming expanse of public realm must have looked great in the artist's impression but in real life boasts a few scant saplings, some slabby benches and an utter minimum of so-called 'play equipment' for any small kids unfortunate enough to live here. But why on earth is it called Silley Weir Promenade?
AI The name "Silley Weir" likely references a historical or geographical feature, such as a weir (a barrier across a river) that may have existed in the area. However, detailed historical records explaining the exact origin of the name are not readily available.
But it can't have anything to do with a weir because this is a former brownfield site by the Thames. Could there perhaps be a more estuarine reason for the inexplicable choice? Search harder won't you?
AI Silley Weir Promenade in London E16 is likely named after the engineering and shipbuilding firm R. & H. Green & Silley Weir, which played a significant role in London's maritime industry. This company was involved in various projects, including the construction of housing for shipbuilding workers, such as the Jubilee Crescent cottages built in 1935.
Ah them. At the height of their business R&H Green & Silley Weir's dry dock had 3000 employees engaged in ship, boiler and marine engine repairs and tanker cleaning, I've since discovered. By contrast the local shops on Silley Weir Promenade employ maybe 20 people doing nails, pilates and raw wine vintnering, most of whom probably know nothing about the name either.
News from the North Heartbreak Cup Result Fails To Dent Scarf Sales
You walk out of Arsenal tube station on the day of a big cup tie and what faces you is a flapping red stall selling scarves, caps and woolly hats. The hats probably don't sell so well in summer. Look closely beneath the personalised knitwear and you may also spot some very red bears. The scarves were of course flying into punters' hands during the heady optimism of the pre-match build-up, when Arsenal's fans still believed the team had a god-given right to thrash their midtable Mancunian visitors, but alas the game didn't go like that.
AI Arsenal fans are expressing a mix of frustration, disappointment, and concern following the team's FA Cup exit against Manchester United. The match concluded with a 1-1 draw, leading to a penalty shootout where Arsenal was defeated 5-3. Key moments contributing to the discontent include Kai Havertz missing a crucial penalty during regular time and again in the shootout, and the team's inability to capitalize on their numerical advantage after United's Diogo Dalot received a red card.
The smell of burger and onions was also very much in the air, partly because fans love a greasy bellyful before the match but mainly because various entrepreneurial local residents have hired out their tiny front gardens to small shacks dispensing cheesy chips and grilled meat. Appetites were far less hearty after the match as supporters reflected on the utter shame of being despatched in the third round.
AI Overall, the FA Cup defeat has left Arsenal fans feeling disheartened and anxious about the club's trajectory, with many calling for significant changes to reverse the current slump.
Selling scarves outside football stadiums is always a risky economic proposition. Hang on, are you sure Kai Havertz missed two penalties?
AI Apologies for the earlier confusion. Upon reviewing the match details, Kai Havertz missed a crucial penalty during the shootout in Arsenal's FA Cup defeat to Manchester United. Additionally, during regular play, he missed two significant scoring opportunities but did not take a penalty.
News from the West New Neighbourhood Heralds Greener Cleaner Renaissance
This colourful sign has recently been attached to a lamppost on a street in Sutherland Avenue, West Ealing. welcome to THE DRAYTONS, it says, a cleaner greener neighbourhood. 'The Draytons' sounds like some posh suburb or upmarket New England hideaway but I've never heard the term used about this part of W13 before. What's going on?
AI "The Draytons" is a well-established neighborhood in West Ealing, offering residents a blend of historical charm and modern conveniences. This neighborhood is characterized by a mix of housing types, such as terraced and semi-detached houses, as well as flats.
That's not true though, that's just your best guess, you've made that up. What if I asked you to go away and think about the question again?
AI While the term "The Draytons" might be used in real estate listings or by locals familiar with the area, it's not universally recognized or widely used as an official neighborhood name by everyone. It’s more likely to be a colloquial term used to describe the cluster of streets around Drayton Gardens, Drayton Avenue, and Drayton Green in West Ealing.
Well that's more honest but it's still purely speculative. This community brand plainly exists because it appears on a sign, so I'm going to ask you to go away and search more carefully to find the information you should have uncovered in the first place.
AI The Draytons' Community Association (DCA) is a local residents' group in West Ealing, London, serving individuals living in the Draytons and Manor Road areas. The DCA's primary purpose is to foster a sense of community among residents and to address local issues collectively. This includes organizing events, providing a platform for residents to voice concerns, and engaging in local planning matters. For instance, the DCA has been involved in responding to Ealing Council's draft local plan, particularly concerning proposed developments in West Ealing.
We got there finally. And while I doubt anybody outside Ealing genuinely cares, the important lesson is that AI doesn't generally get things right first time. Often the initial answer is generic, speculative or plain incorrect, yet presented as fact. Asking for a second opinion ("are you sure?") often generates a much better answer, and a third opinion better again, eventually providing the answer we should have been given in the first place. Never take an AI response for granted without checking.
AI ChatGPT can make mistakes. Check important info.
If we sleepwalk into a world where everyone accepts AI's first answer as plain fact we are all screwed.
And by 'in the future' they mean today, 13th January 2025, so hurrah for faster journeys.
TfL have been improving the signalling on the four sub-surface lines since 2016, the intention being that we'd see more trains in service travelling more quickly more often. It's been an exceptionally slow project and is by no means complete. But as each new section of signalling is completed TfL introduces a new timetable, eventually, and the next set of timetables is being introduced today, indeed has just gone live.
The catalyst for the new timetables was the completion of signalling upgrades between Stepney Green and Upminster in March 2023. That seems a ridiculously long time ago but it takes time for changes to bed in and for new timetables to be written. District line trains are now being driven automatically in that section, indeed all the way to Earl's Court and a couple of stations beyond. The idea is that computers can drive trains more effectively and efficiently which means the timetable can be a bit tighter, and thus journeys get shorter. But by how much?
n.b. In what follows I'm going to consider off-peak trains around noon because these have pretty consistent running times. Rush hour services are rather more variable, and individual trains may not necessarily match these timings.
You might expect the biggest improvements to be at the eastern end of the District line where the latest signalling upgrades were, so let's see how trains here have speeded up.
Upminster → Whitechapel Last week: 38¾ minutes This week: 37 minutes
Whitechapel → Upminster Last week: 38½ minutes This week: 35¾ minutes
That's good. That's just under two minutes faster heading west and almost three minutes shaved off heading east. In percentage terms that's 5% faster westbound and 8% faster eastbound. Perhaps not enough to notice while you're travelling, particularly because there are fifteen stations between Upminster and Whitechapel, but a significant saving if totted up over a year's commute.
Not many people are masochistic enough to ride the full length of the District line, but if you did here are the off-peak timing changes in today's new timetable.
Ealing Broadway → Upminster Last week: 90½ minutes This week: 85½ minutes
Richmond → Upminster Last week: 88 minutes This week: 83 minutes
That's a five minute improvement for both routes, or 6%. Again that's pretty good for a single timetable change, although it is spread out across a 43-station journey. I've checked back to the timetable in operation 10 years ago and timings were also around the 90 minute mark back then, so this is a genuine step change.
To see where the biggest improvements have been made, here's a westbound journey divided into four parts.
As you can see almost all of the improvement is between Upminster and Barking with mere minor tweaks elsewhere. Again don't take these intervals as gospel throughout the day, they're a lunchtime snapshot.
How about an end-to-end journey on the Hammersmith & City line?
Hammersmith → Barking Last week: 60¾ minutes This week: 58½ minutes
Barking → Hammersmith Last week: 60¼ minutes This week: 59 minutes
The improvement on the Hammersmith & City line isn't so great, mainly because only Stepney Green to Barking is within the zone with recently improved signalling. Percentagewise it's only 2%, all of which could of course be undone by a tediously long wait in the tunnel outside Aldgate East.
The Circle and Metropolitan lines also have new timetables today but I can't see any significant speeding up there.
And before you get too excited, remember that the TfL posters only promised 'faster journeys', not more trains. In fact the number of trains operating on the District line is being cut, this because if trains are running faster you don't need quite so many of them. Previously 74 trains were used in the morning peak, now it's 72. Previously 75 trains were used in the evening peak, now it's 73. Previously 61 trains operated between the peaks, now it's 59. "We're running fewer trains" is not a headline TfL will be crowing about any time soon.
Also, none of this is providing any extra capacity. Trains are still running at exactly the same frequencies as before so if you're waiting to catch one nothing will be arriving sooner. The whole point of the signalling upgrade was meant to be an improvement in frequency allowing more passengers aboard but this still hasn't happened. The Circle line still runs resolutely every 10 minutes, just as it ever did. The Hammersmith & City line also still runs only every 10 minutes. Richmond, Wimbledon and Upminster won't be seeing any additional trains in this new timetable, just trains that reach their destination a bit sooner.
It is thus not as excellent change as it could have been, nor as excellent a change as it should have been, indeed your average punter probably won't notice anything's changed. But technically yes, 'Signalling improvements will mean faster journeys for you', and those slightly faster journeys kick in today.
Kensington and Chelsea have manifold magnificent garden squares of which Onslow Square is one of the larger examples, tucked away between Old Brompton Road and Fulham Road. Turn left out of South Kensington station and you'll be there in two minutes. When Queen Victoria came to the throne it was still all market gardens on the edge of the village of Brompton, then in 1845 the charitable trust who owned it decided to build houses. They invited George Basevi to be the architect, impressed by his work designing Belgrave Square and the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge, but he died after just four houses had been completed. His replacement was Charles James Freake, a self-made builder whose contracts for the Grosvenor Estate sequentially made him a) highly indebted, b) very rich, c) a baronet. His £2000 homes sell today as £3m subdivided flats.
Onslow Square still boasts a full-on rim of terraced stucco, apart from the corner where Charles built a church and the opposite corner where the Luftwaffe left a hole. These are prestige homes whose house numbers are sequentially emblazoned on the pristine white pillars of Doric porches, approved typeface only. First floors have French windows topped with triangular pediments leading out onto cast iron balconies, or at least the earlier houses do because Freake's designs grew less fussy as the years passed. Originally the top floor and basement were reserved for servants, but these days the minion who polishes the brasswork drives in from elsewhere. I also spotted the van of a 'Carpet Planner' because mere fitters and layers are insufficiently SW7.
Famous former residents include novelist William Makepeace Thackeray who bought number 36 off-plan in 1853 and paid for it in instalments. To either side are blueplaques for Beagle voyager and pioneering meteorologist Robert FitzRoy, and also for Baron Carlo Marochetti who cast the bronze lions at the foot of Nelson's Column. The architect Edwin Lutyens was born at number 16 and spent his childhood here, long before the Cenotaph ever needed designing. Today's millionaires tend to keep stumm about their presence, except when roaring off in their Bentley Turbos and Alfa Romeo Spiders.
The central gardens are very large and very private, ringed with shrubbery to prevent too many prying eyes seeing within. Entry requires a resident's key which must be touched on a beepy pad by one of the handful of entrances and costs £15 to replace. Perambulating round the outer path or sprawling quietly on the lawn central are all acceptable. Cycling, scooting and ball games are only permitted for those under the age of five, beyond which some level of personal responsibility is required. Parties may not be held at any time, except on one special midsummer's day when residents gather for canapes and liquid refreshment at the Onslow Neighbourhood Association Garden Party (tickets £27, everyone off home by 8.30pm).
Onslow Square is one-way in a clockwise direction, thus relatively quiet, except along the eastern side which forms part of a B road and is currently served by four bus routes. It also isn't entirely rectangular, with an extra prong also called Onslow Square sticking out in one corner towards Onslow Gardens. The geometry is further compromised by the lack of any throughfare on the opposite side because that's where the vicar lives, and behind that is the former Royal Brompton Hospital, a pioneer of cardiac surgery. Its Victorian buildings are now an "exclusive, modern and highly secure gated development" and have been since 1997, but if you want a proper prestigious address for your millions you'd really rather be in Onslow Square.
Meanwhile in Dagenham, a square that's more pebbledash than stucco. It lies deep in the Becontree estate which when completed in 1935 was the world's largest public housing estate. Turn left out of Dagenham Heathway station and it's three stops away on a bus heading north. The estate's architects liked to draw large geometric shapes within their street patterns, hence the perfect circle of Valence Circus to the northwest and the right-angled Hunters Square to the east. Here they drew an off-piste quadrilateral across two former fields and linked it to their chief spine road called Heathway, set back just out of sight.
There's nothing classical about the houses in Osborne Square. Built from brick or pebbledashed plaster they form chains of four, six, eight or ten, a kind of hemi-demi-semi-detached formation. Each had a recessed porch which some of the later homebuyers duly filled in or extended. These days the overall look is underwhelmingly regimented but this would have been a massive step up for those moving from slums in the East End... an inside toilet! a garden! two bedrooms! Most front gardens since have been sacrificed for parking and most south facing walls are bedecked with the necessary satellite dish. Love and care varies, from weedy paving and scattered bins to trimmed lawn and intermittent foliage. One resident has created the obligatory display of gnomes, Flowerpot Men and plaster geese, another has gone unnecessarily hoity-toity with security gates and golden twiddles.
Access roads link to Osborne Square in the centre of each side, apart from in the southeastern corner where Osborne Road arrives on the skew, all of which helps to keep traffic speeds right down. When faced with what to put in the centre of the square the architects didn't build a nice shared garden as in Kensington, they built a cul-de-sac with eighteen more houses, an addition which gives Osborne Square the overall shape of a belt buckle.
The central space additionally once included Osborne Hall Congregational Church, the birthplace of the fabled Dagenham Girl Pipers! The tartan troupe was formed in 1930 when the vicar chose 12 girls from the Sunday school and trained them in secret for 18 months before giving a first performance to an audience of startled journalists on a dais out back (video here). The girls went on to drone tunefully in front of royalty, Fuhrers and generations of Dagenham residents, until the last four veterans finally chose to retire in November last year. The church building vanished rather sooner and has since been replaced by a much smaller evangelical hall and a block of flats, but there is at least now a special dimpledplaque outside.
A bite to eat is provided by the Top Tearoom at the Osborne Partnership's very lowly-looking community hall on the west side of the square. Their charity works especially with adults with learning disabilities from across the borough, but their cafe is happy to welcome any member of the public on weekdays, especially the over 50s on Tuesdays and Thursdays for warming soup and a roll. The menu's pinned up outside and has gloriously affordable prices, including sandwiches for £2, tea and cake for £2.50 and a tuna jacket potato for £4. Meanwhile a warm sausage roll costs just £1.20, hugely cheaper than any savoury pastry in Kensington, even if you have to give 20 minutes notice when ordering.
The fine folk at Footways, the walk-friendly social enterprise, have just produced another of their gorgeous free walking maps, This time it's for Clerkenwell, the historic Islington neighbourhood, and depicts all sorts of places to visit as well as the best ways to thread quietly and picturesquely inbetween. One side focuses on places to eat, drink and discover, including Finsbury Health Centre, Saffron Hill, New River Head and the St John restaurant, plus a potted history of the area. The other side features a fluorescent map ideal for exploring on foot with the newly-launched Green Link Way as a spine down the centre, plus an impresive list of 14 local museums and cultural destinations. I picked up my free copy at The Charterhouse near Barbican station, then used the map to walk round to three other places that also had copies available - the very ancient St Bartholomew The Great, the crusading Museum of the Order of St John and the underrated Islington Museum. All were well worth a repeat visit. Other pick-up sites are available.
Footways maps often start off free then disappear or you end up paying for them, so if you want a copy best move sooner rather than later. Their substantial Central London walkways map now sells for £6 in Stanfords, for example, and I've still never found their Camden Green Loop map despite checking at seven so-called distribution points. If you prefer gadgets to paper then a digital version of the Clerkenwell map is available on the Footways website, but not the map leaflet itself because the good stuff is only grabbable if you go walking. Which may well be the idea.
Major roadworks at the Bow Roundabout continue. They're now into their fourth month although it feels like forever, especially if you get stuck in queueing traffic.
Not much appears to have happened since the start of December, which is in part because no work was done over Christmas and New Year. In good news they took down the cones on Bow Road during that period, helping to prevent unnecessary delays, but in bad news they didn't do that on the other three approach roads and tailbacks remained.
The most obvious change is that workmen have finished filling in where the contraflow lane used to enter the roundabout and it's become pedestrian-accessible public realm. This benefits pretty much nobody. Further resurfacing has taken place under the flyover where the contraflow is to be redirected. A few new kerbs have been installed because a lot of the work is about shifting where the edge of the roadway is. New tactile paving has been installed where two sets of traffic lights haven't yet been installed. As the weeks go by plastic barriers occasionally shift, forcing pedestrians to walk a slightly different route to cross the road.
After months of liminal faffing under the Bow side of the flyover, the foot-deep trench gouged out to widen the carriageway has only just been filled in with tarmac. A fresh barrage of plastic barriers finally heralds works on the inside of the roundabout, a slight shaving of the kerb so that the western flank can be broadened from two to three lanes, resulting in rubbly chunks of 1960s concrete being wheeled away by the skipful.
It doesn't yet feel like we're approaching the end of the roadworks because not all of the realigned roadway is ready. The intended end date remains massively unclear.
• According to the yellow poster at Bus Stop M it's 15th January.
• According to the electronic sign on Stratford High Street it's 16th January.
• According to a works notice attached to the barriers it's 16th January.
• According to the yellow roadsign on the A12 sliproad it's 4th February.
• According to the updated one.network online map it's 3rd March.
• According to a freshly-installed works notice it's 9th March.
I fear the last two of those are the most accurate, which suggests this interminable fiddling still has two months to run.
Squares are much more common in Inner London than Outer London.
Over three-quarters of London's Squares are in Inner London.
Squares are more commonly a feature of dense housing.
Suburban street patterns are not generally amenable to squares.
Well-off Victorian neighbourhoods often plumped for Squares over Streets.
21st century developers often see benefit in naming small courtyards Squares.
Tower Hamlets has by far the most Squares.
Over 75% of these are in private developments where the roadway is not maintained by the local authority.
Harrow has just two squares, only one of which is publicly accessible.
By contrast Harrow has 201 Avenues, 123 Drives and 57 Crescents.
A quick check with the ONS confirms there were 4.1 million jobs in London in 2006. The report expected 5 million by 2025, whereas London actually passed that milestone in 2015 so the threatened congestion arrived much quicker than anticipated. As for London's population it was 7,550,000 in 2006 and now it's 8,860,000, so that's well over a million more people rather than just 800,000. It turns out the capital grew far faster than anyone in 2006 imagined because nobody foresaw the effect of immigration... but equally nobody foresaw the pandemic and working from home either.
According to TfL's 2024 Travel In London report, 23.6m daily trips were made in London in 2006 and the latest total is 26.1m. That's only 2½m extra journeys, not 4m, although it was 3½m when the pandemic struck suggesting the 2006 prediction was still on track.
What actually happened, according to a table in the 2024 Travel in London report, is that private transport dropped 7% (not 9%), public transport rose 3% (not 4%), walking journeys increased 2% (not 1%) and cycle trips increased 2% (not 4%), Comparing now with then is difficult because it depends on precisely which historic dataset you pick but the direction of travel seems good, if not quite good enough.
November 2006 was a febrile time in transport planning with the Overground just announced and all sorts of plans for extensions and light transit schemes in play. But what Ken Livingstone really needed to enhance London's transport capacity was the completion of a series of big ticket projects.
PPP consortia were upgrading trains and stations across the tube network, not always optimally, and one of them would enter administration the following year. Crossrail did indeed get built, perhaps against all the odds, four years later than was intended. Bus expansion continued apace under Ken's leadership, then very much didn't afterwards.
The 2006 report alas didn't have one of those diagrams showing what the tube map might look like in 2025, not this time. But it did have a summary timeline of hoped-for projects, an 'indicative programme', like so.
The Channel Tunnel Rail Link and Piccadilly line extension to Terminal 5 were already under construction so a done deal. DLR extensions to Woolwich and Stratford International were indeed on their way, as were what are now the Windrush, Mildmay and Suffragette lines on the Overground.
But the Thames Gateway Bridge, which was destined to cross the river between Gallions Reach and Thamesmead, would be scrapped by Boris two years later. The East London and Greenwich Waterfront Transits were ditched too, which was doubly bad news for estuarine residents.
As for tube line upgrades the top five happened, and the report even correctly stated 2017 as the year the last old District line train would operate. But new Piccadilly line rolling stock is only due to enter service in 2025, not 2014, and new Bakerloo rolling stock pencilled in for 2020 isn't yet in anyone's budget so even 2030 is implausibly optimistic.
Rail upgrades weren't necessarily in the hands of the Mayor but most if not all of these happened, for example the massive Thameslink programme that transformed north-south connections. But towards the bottom of the list we have a litany of big projects that all too swiftly hit the buffers.
The DLR never extended to Dagenham Dock, although the Overground would eventually reach Barking Riverside. The West London Tram was scrapped within months and is now served by a single Superloop route. Trams have never reached Crystal Palace, indeed the tram network hasn't been extended since 2000. The Cross River Tram is another lost project with no hope of resuscitation. And although there were still high hopes for Crossrail to be followed by Crossrail 2, completed in 2025, London never managed to shake the magic money tree twice. At least the list ends up with the Silvertown Link, target 2022, which as we've just learned will be opening in three months' time.
The report contains tons more which I won't burrow into further, but if you're interested you can read a copy here. It took forever to find because of course the TfL website no longer hosts it, nor any of the other sites that referenced it 19 years ago, so thank goodness for the deepest recesses of the Wayback Machine.
But if nothing else the T2025 document demonstrates three things. Firstly you need a big bold plan for the future otherwise nothing ever gets better. Secondly predicting decades into the future is nigh impossible, but often you get stuff right and the future thanks you for it. And thirdly if anybody wrote a similar document now - call it T2044 - it would be miserably less optimistic with a few high hopes and a lot of tinkering round the edges because there is no money. 2025 is no 2006, so T2025 was as good as it gets.
45 Squared 1) VINCENT SQUARE, SW1
Borough of Westminster, 220m × 200m
Russell Square is smaller. Trafalgar Square is half the size. Lincoln's Inn Fields is marginally longer but less broad. Eaton Square is half an acre larger but Square only in name, being extremely oblong. And OK, Vincent Square may be a tad kite-shaped but it's also a proper Square with a perimeter of buildings facing out onto ten acres of grass so I'm claiming it as London's largest.
Vincent Square sits halfway between Victoria station and Tate Britain, but just far enough off Vauxhall Bridge Road that you might never know it was there. In the 18th century this area was TothillFields, a marshy area on the edge of Westminster used for horseracing, bearbaiting, seasonal fairs and other forms of communal recreation. Things only started to change in 1810 when the Dean of Westminster, William Vincent, asked a groundsman to surround a large square of grass with a ploughed furrow to mark it out as playing fields for Westminster School. Thus a private school acquired ten acres of common land no questions asked and still use it as a playing field to this day - they call it 'Fields'.
Picture a open space easily large enough for a full-sized cricket pitch, not that it's the season, with a half-timbered pavilion to one side and several nets on another. Elsewhere are tennis courts, a mini assault course and several football goals ready to be pushed into position, plus (yesterday at least) a groundsman dashing around readying everything for the first Day of Lent Term. Most other private schools in central London have to bus their pupils out to rugger practice but here they can walk down in their pink and blue hooped jerseys and get started on tackles and tactics far more quickly.
The joy for residents around the perimeter is that they thus face a well-tended greenspace with the nearest nosey neighbour over 200m distant. In the northeast corner a handful of the original 3-storey brick villas survive, specifically at numbers 3, 4 and 86. Later townhouses are one floor higher with stucco at ground floor and basement level and a continuous iron balcony running above. One of the residents within the smartest sweep is defeated Tory leadership candidate Robert Jenrick, who splashed out £2.5m buying a property in 2013 because it's always useful to have a second home within a short walk of the Commons. He finally managed to get his roof extension past Westminster's planning officers at the third attempt in 2020 but rest assured you can't see it from the street.
The chief political presence on the square is actually Liberal Democrat HQ at number 1, a morose office block thankfully set back in one corner where it's minimally prominent. They moved here in 2021 and it says something for the current state of the party that they only occupy the top floor, just up the stairs from Pringle knitwear. The Embassy of the Republic of North Macedonia doesn't have a great street presence either, although their sunburst flag brings a welcome splash of colour to the square's southwest corner.
The most impressive buildings are on the northern side, anchored by the HQ of the Royal Horticultural Society who moved here in 1904, as the Roman numerals above the door confirm. The Arts and Crafts frontage conceals their green-fingered library and offices, and immediately behind is the barrel-shaped Lawrence Hall, originally proposed by Edward VII so the RHS could have somewhere purpose-built to hold their shows. A second more spectacular hall followed one street back in the 1920s, but this has since been sold off to Westminster School to use as a sports centre because the gym, badminton courts, fencing pistes and climbing walls have to go somewhere.
Vincent Square has far more than its fair share of institutional buildings. Nextdoor with the ripply brickwork is Westminster Kingsway College, which started out as a School of Hospitality in 1910 because Auguste Escoffier and César Ritz needed somewhere to train top quality chefs. It's since broadened its vocational offering and is now just one cog in the capital's largest further education portfolio, but you can still book a table at The Vincent Rooms if you fancy sampling the very best in up-and-coming student cuisine. Even Jamie Oliver had to start somewhere, and he started here.
Medical professionals also moved in en masse, and then moved out. Westminster Children's Hospital is now flats. The Nurses' Home has been merged with the Theological Hostel and is now a 160 bed hotel. The Doctor's surgery at number 11 is now the home of the aforementioned Shadow Secretary of State for Justice. And the Grosvenor Hospital, once the gynaecological wing of St Thomas's, reopened in 1981 as Westminster Under School and is now packed with bubbly long-socked prep-schoolers. They too share the ten acre sports field, aided on their way by a lollipop lady who sees their crocodile across an impressively unbusy street. In a different world that playing field could have accommodated hundreds of council homes, but it'll never happen because this is Vincent Square SW1 and a headmaster got here first.
