There are almost 20,000listed buildings in London, from palaces to pubs and parish churches to phone kiosks. They're particularly prevalent in inner London because that's where most of the old stuff is, and somewhat sparser towards the outskirts. There are also a few larger gaps where nothing's been listed, these generally suburbs in former agricultural areas where nothing old was noteworthy and nothing newer has proved architecturally significant. Today's question is thus...
Where in London is furthest from a listed building?
Thankfully Historic England provide a scrollable map on which every listed building is pinpointed, so I started there. This is a snapshot from northeast London, where you can see lots of listed buildings in the lower left-hand corner in Hackney, Tower Hamlets and Greenwich, and rather fewer as you continue outwards. A lot of these can be found along main roads because that's where settlement and commerce began, leaving several listed voids inbetween. I hope it's not too much of a spoiler to say that London's most heritage-non-adjacent location is on this map.
To find the largest gap I tried to identify the largest circle that could be drawn on the map without enclosing a listed building. To do this I took a roll of sellotape and moved it around my laptop screen until no blue pins were visible through the gap in the middle. I found five locations altogether, the only qualifying criterion being that the centre of of the circle had to be in London. Each centre turned out to be over a mile from any listed building, mainly because I got lucky with the size of my sellotape, and then it was just a case of measuring the radius of each circle as accurately as possible.
I can therefore confirm that the place in London furthest from a listed building is here, near enough.
This is the junction of Forest Road and Hainault Road in the London borough of Redbridge. The precise location is across the hedge in the middle of a large ploughed field about 100m south of the roundabout, but it's not public land and the entire boundary is shielded by a thickety hedge so that's the best photograph I managed to get. The nearest place you might know well is Fairlop Waters Country Park which is a ten minute walk to the west, alternatively Hainault Recreation Ground which is a large expanse across the road. The only nearby residents live on a caravan park, and although the 462 bus drives past it doesn't stop, there being no local need. Instead the land hereabouts is mostly open fields and the roads are super-useful ratruns for Essex-fringe drivers who pass through in great numbers.
So why is this the place in London furthest from a listed building? One reason is that centuries ago this was all Hainault Forest where nobody lived. Another reason is that after the forest was chopped down in the 1850s it all became agricultural land so the only buildings were three farms, none of them noteworthy. Another reason is that Fairlop Plain was acquired in the 1930s not for housing but for an airport, which when WW2 broke out became RAF Fairlop instead. Another reason is that the airfield was so comprehensively erased after 1946 that nothing of wartime significance survives. A final reason, possibly key, is that all the surrounding land then became either Green Belt or the huge Hainault council estate. That meant either you couldn't build on it or nobody built anything inspiring enough to be notable, and that's how this field became the only place in London to be over 1¼ miles from a listed building. [map][map]
And here are the listed buildings it's just over 1¼ miles from.
» The alien-looking one is the very wonderful Fullwell Cross library, designed by Frederick Gibberd in 1959 and given Grade II status in 2007. It dominates the roundabout at the top of Barkingside High Street, and if its dramatic copper-topped drum bears some resemblance to Liverpool's Roman Catholic Cathedral that's because Gibberd designed them both. Events today include Chatty Cafe, Scrabble Club and Lego Club, or simply borrowing some books beneath the inspirational ring of clerestory windows.
» The terrace of weatherboarded cottages is 195-209 Manor Road, likely built in the early 19th century and Grade II listed in 1979. I'd never noticed them before because they're set back from the road and have since been screened behind a lot of trees and shrubbery. Their old-school construction puts them at odds with most of the surrounding suburban housing, but they are very close to Grange Hill station so make an excellent commuter bolthole.
» The first church is All Saints Chigwell Row, a fine Gothic pile built to serve the growing village in the 1860s. It was only listed in 2024, but even before that Chigwell Row had so many listed houses that my sellotape circle wouldn't have been any bigger.
» The second is the Church of St Peter, Aldborough Hatch, also from the 1860s but listed much earlier in 1979. Its building material included chunks of Portland Stone from the original Westminster Bridge which had just been demolished.
The fifth and final listed building on my circle's periphery is Furze House Farmhouse in Marks Gate. It's the oldest of all the listed buildings listed here but I don't have a photo because it can't be seen. The farmhouse is tucked away behind a locked gate at the end of a long driveway, all of which are encased so completely within a sheath of woodland that you'd think some previous owner really wanted to be invisible. Everything between here and the centre of my circle is arable farmland, hence no buildings, hence no listed buildings, indeed fewer listed buildings than anywhere else in London.
In second place is a landfill site on the Rainham Marshes.
You can't get inside the landfill site so my photo is of Coldharbour Lane alongside, a remote dead end lane that curls around the huge spoilheap to terminate alongside the estuary. Absolutely nobody lives here, indeed nobody even lives within a mile, let along in anything listed. All that's been built even vaguely nearby are industrial sites and warehouses, some of them across the river in Erith, and basically whenever you ask a "Where in London is furthest from...?" question these marshes inevitably pop up.
In third place is the 18th tee of Addington Court golf course, close to Selsdon Wood and the Forestdale estate. It won't surprise you that there are no listed buildings in New Addington, and that's mainly why these fairways are nowhere near any of them whatsoever.
In fourth place are Tolworth Court Farm Fields in the Hogsmill valley, specifically Finch Hoares, a former hay meadow alongside Jubilee Road. Nothing in Tolworth is listed, especially not that ugly tower block, and it's over a mile until you find one that is.
In fifth place, I think, is High Wood in the extremely rural hinterland beyond Orpington, beyond even the outpost of Pratt's Bottom. When I tried visiting every 1km grid square in London this is pretty much the last square I went to, so you won't have been either.
I hope I used my sellotape correctly to devise this ordering, confirmed by careful manipulation of online maps. But I do think I have the definitive answer to the question Where in London is furthest from a listed building?
It's in the borough of Redbridge in a ploughed field 100m south of the roundabout at the junction of Forest Road and Hainault Road, over a mile and a quarter from any listed building. And because it's all Green Belt round here that's very unlikely to change.
Sun 1: At the end of today's Radio 4 Midnight News the headlines were followed by a trail and then the programme Take Four Books. Hang on, I thought, where did the weather go? The Midnight News has always been followed by a beefy weather forecast ever since I started listening in the 1990s. The same thing happened tonight - no weather presenter, no weather - so I checked the Radio Times and they have indeed killed it off.
Until last night the listing always said News and Weather, but from today onwards it's only News. This cancellation wasn't announced, but it is plainly part of the latest round of BBC cost cutting, essentially forced by the last goverment enforcing a lengthy licence fee freeze. Other plans include scrapping the late-night weekday weather bulletin on BBC Two and using automated graphics for the overnight edition of Weather for the Week Ahead on BBC One. It's all so weather presenters don't need to do a late shift any more, saving cash and also helping the BBC to slim down their team of meteorologists by three. The Radio 4 Midnight News is also due to be cancelled before next spring so I shall be going to sleep less well informed on all fronts. Cold fronts, alas.
Sun 1: Today is the 10th anniversary of the introduction of the slogan 'See It. Say It. Sorted.' It's annoying, it's senseless and it gets played far more often than you'd like, but it is extraordinarily memorable and that's why it's still around ten years later. Apparently more than 200,000 texts are sent to 61016 every year, and since 2016 over 80,000 crimes have been recorded by the British Transport Police. Use of See it. Say it. Sorted. is mandated across every train operator and station in England, Scotland and Wales, so if you want to escape either take the bus, stay in your car or head to Northern Ireland instead.
Sun 1: This sign outside Meridian Water station intrigued me. It tells passengers which platform to use for various destinations, and it's not very good. Firstly the red lines are misleading because these lines branch rather than being sequential. No trains go direct from Stratford to Hackney Downs (p3), for example. But mainly I thought "hang on, can you really get a train from here to Cambridge?" because northbound trains from Meridian Water are exceptionally thin on the ground. So I checked the timetables and no you can't, ditto zero trains go direct to Stansted Mountfitchet. Also only the last train of the day goes to Liverpool Street, all the other southbound services go to Stratford, and only the midnight train goes to Hertford East. They really have made this much more complicated than it should be.
Southbound trains per weekday to Stratford: 41 to Liverpool Street: 1
Northbound trains per weekday to Bishop's Stortford: 7 to Hertford East: 1
In total 316 trains depart Meridian Water station every week, 85% of which go south to Stratford, so most of the rest of what's on the poster is irrelevant most of the time. Or indeed wrong.
Sun 1: Oh come on, it's far too early for the supermarkets to be launching their Christmas TV ad campaigns. Sainsbury is repeating its BFG theme which wasn't very engaging last year, and Tesco has a sugary 'delivery driver goes the extra mile' storyline that I expect to be sick of by Bonfire Night. It's also much too early for Tesco to be screening an advert for turkey prices at Waterloo station, and FFS even the John Lewis Christmas ad is launching today (3.11.26).
Mon 2: If you're taking part in Movember, I'm pleased to say I've spotted A Mustache Barber in Whitton. That said this may just be a traditional barber shop, not a tache specialist, because the list of specialist trims in the window goes no further than a flat top or a beard trim. If only they had a website or some online presence beyond an Instagram account they gave up on three years ago then we might know better.
Mon 2: What station is this?
You know Fulwell .
Mon 2: Today was the 90th anniversary of BBC Television commencing public broadcasting from Alexandra Palace, i.e. television was 90 years old today. There are many ways to commemorate the event, my favourite of which is always to watch Adele Dixon singing the opening song, The Magic Rays of Light.
Alternatively you can download the very first Television Number of the Radio Times as a 100 page pdf here (or view the next week's issue with the first TV programmes here). Also BBC4 is screening one of those first night programmes on Wednesday evening at 11.45pm, making Television Comes to London the BBC repeat with the longest gap between first and second showings... 90 years and 2 days.
Mon 2: As usual poppies have appeared on the front of many tube trains, as here on the Waterloo & City line. But I wonder if they've stuck poppies on both ends? You can see this end as trains enter the platform at Waterloo and when they arrive at Bank. But the other end is invisible to passengers because it's always in the tunnel at Bank and beyond the platform at Waterloo. Technically you could see it if you were standing on the arrival platform at Waterloo when a train arrived, but nobody does this so I wonder if they bothered with two poppies or just one.
Mon 2: Tower Hamlets libraries are holding their Writeidea festival again on the weekend of 20th-21st November, a chance to hear two dozen authors talk about their books in the comfort of the Town Hall. Most talks last an hour and all are free, even if you're not a signed-up borrower or indeed live outside the borough. Authors include Deborah Frances-White, Tim Pope, Dan Cruikshank and Owen Hatherley, so for example on Saturday at 4pm you could be hearing about LGBTQ history in the suburbs, how football shirts reflect politics or how best to draw a pub. Website here, programme here.
I do love my local library. Today I returned one novel on the Booker Prize shortlist and left with two more, which hopefully makes me better read than most.
Thu 1: There comes a day when you look at an old pair of trainers, perhaps several, and think "I've loved you but you're worn beyond repair so you've got to go, now hop into this black binliner", something I did today alongside half a broken office chair. Fri 2: The last time I saw my balconysquirrel this season. Sat 3: Ooh I got a Beatrix Potter 50p in my change. Oh I've already got a Benjamin Bunny, they're nothing special. (I still haven't seen any of the new animals)
Sun 4: There always seem to be three number 72 buses on the stand just to the north of Hammersmith Bridge, the drivers twiddling their thumbs for over 20 minutes until their timetabled departure time, which does suggest somebody official contracted a much too generous vehicle allocation. Mon 5: A sign on the door of Sapphire Court, a Stratford apartment block decanted in August last year, reads "Do not enter the building under any circumstances". It's amazing how many groundstaff in hi-vis it takes to stand around outside structurally deficient flats in case they collapse, but that's modern building standards for you.
Tue 6: Seen near Sutton station, this cobblers sign with inconsistently awful apostrophes. What made them write Repair's but also Repairs? What made them write Key's but not Fob's? (still, at least they dodged batterie's, trophie's and glas's) Wed 7: Nextdoor's builders spent the day bashing a door-sized hole in their brick wall, so I'm glad I went out to Newbury Park and Abbey Wood, what a racket. Thu 8: As my followers on Bluesky will already be aware, today I visited nine different postcode districts (E3 E15 E20 E10 IG2 IG3 RM6 RM8 RM7) whilst travelling on only two trains and no buses.
Fri 9: West Ham and Bromley-by-Bow stations have gained new digital advertising screens, and what grates isn't that they exist but the carousel of welcome messages suggesting we should all be excited/happy/grateful they've appeared. Sat 10: A small child threw a prolonged tantrum because the front seats on the 307 bus were occupied, so I vacated mine because I was getting off two stops later, but what I wanted to say to her father was "you've got a spoilt precocious brat there and you need to learn to say no to her".
Sun 11: This is a photo of the Thames at Strand-on-the-Green at low tide. I also went to Plumstead but I won't subject you to that. Mon 12: The Radio 4 quiz pilot 'Your Number's Up' must be coming back because they're seeking audience members again, which is excellent but I think it's someone else's turn to squeeze into a Bloomsbury pub cellar for two hours. Tue 13: It's sad to see Gabriels Wharf sealed off and emptied out, kicking out all the independent traders, some of whom have been there over 30 years. Something fundamentally temporary will replace it because the not-for profit deeds insist, or in projectspeak (sigh) the site will be "entering a new chapter with a refreshed meanwhile use".
Wed 14: This spraypainted gate in Parish Lane, Penge, may be the best representation I've ever seen of "Beware of the dog". Thu 15: Here's a truly excellent thing - Local Wikipedia, courtesy of Ed Jefferson. You enter a place or postcode and it presents a short list of locally-relevant Wikipedia pages (usually within 1-3 miles). Obviously I checked home first, then other homes... and yes, the possibilities for local research are multitudinous! Fri 16: Got the new Richard Osman out of the library - normally they have no spare copies for months. We Chase Shadows is amusingly adequate.
Sat 17:Hall Place in Bexley probably has the best topiary in London, a fabulous line of heraldic beasts with assorted sculptured yews behind. Unless of course you know better. Sun 18: Spotted a huge film crew in and around the block where Slough House is fictionally based, which must be for Slow Horses but could be for either series 7 or series 8, both of which are being filmed back to back. Mon 19: Getting off the bus in my Dad's village was particularly awkward because there were two wheelchairs in the aisle and I had a suitcase. The driver rolled his eyes and smiled as I finally escaped, as if this kind of thing happens all the time.
Tue 20: For my Dad's birthday cake I brought out our longstanding collection of plastic numbers. Alas it wasn't possible to make 88, but in good news it would be possible to make every other age up to 100. I eventually compromised by using a silver '18' and hiding the 1 behind the 8. Wed 21: In gossip over lunch, my niece's two-month old baby has already been to his first pumpkin patch and sat on his first tractor, but that's Norfolk for you. Thu 22: I enjoyed (but was disturbed by) the Channel 4 documentary 'The Experiment', in which Nazi opinions on disabled people were dressed up as a cost-cutting residential home and visitors were asked what they thought. Lesson learned - it can be very hard to see through well-marketed cruelty.
Fri 23: Hurrah, I've discovered another super-traditional suburban baker selling old school cakes and pastries for next to nothing. It's Mr Bunns Bakery on Chadwell Heath Lane, not far from the Crossrail station, who do absolutely massive Belgian buns for £1.70 (see photo, pound coin for scale). The icing was super thick and I struggled to finish it in one sitting, and maybe next time an Eccles cake or a hunk of lemon sponge. Sat 24: Ooh, the long-awaited letter is finally here! Oh, I wasn't expecting that choice! Obviously option 2 (except BestMate will persuade me probably option 1).
Sun 25: Seen in Harmondsworth churchyard, a freshly-filled grave topped with floral tributes in the shape of a white van and a chainsaw. Rest in peace Derek. Mon 26: My neighbours have an extractor fan with an incredibly long time setting, and I only realise how low-level distracting it is when it turns off and suddenly my flat's properly quiet again. Tue 27: An unnerving moment on the Jubilee line as the man next to me suddenly folded up his copy of Metro into a bowl shape so his wife could be sick into it.
Wed 28: Supermarket update: Tesco have changed the branding of their budget-priced thick-sliced Toastie loaf. Well it surprised me. Thu 29: According to today's RAJAR data, the 10 most-listened-to programmes on BBC Sounds are The Archers, Whodunnits (R4E), Desert Island Discs, I’m Sorry I Haven’t A Clue, Drama on 4, In Our Time, Just A Minute, Friday Night Comedy, Sounds of the 60s (R2) and Today. The most-listened to podcasts are Newscast, Limelight and Americast.
Fri 30: Croydon's Whitgift Centre is bleak these days isn't it? Now plainly much too large to support the number of stores who want to trade there. Still, at least they're trying with a few Christmas decorations. Sat 31: If you enjoyed Hallowe'en being on a Saturday, either for maximum social potential or because it was easier to avoid, be aware it won't be happening again until 2037.
Walking the England Coast Path Birchington → Reculver (5 miles)
In my very long-term attempt to walk the coast of Kent, yesterday I plugged a five mile gap on the north coast. In 2014 I'd got no further east than Reculver and in 2019 no further west than Birchington so in 2026 I've connected them together. I actually walked all the way from Birchington to Herne Bay because the intervening miles are marshy nomansland with no stations, but today I'll just blog about the gap. Thankfully all the fog had cleared by the time my train reached Gravesend so it was a glorious coastal stroll. [10 photos]
Birchington is the westernmost suburb on the Isle of Thanet, three miles from Margate and the other side of Westgate-on-Sea. It's flats and bungalows, it's retirement-a-go-go, it's small terriers with poppies hanging from their collars, also a pristine bowls club that shuts promptly on 1st October at the end of the season. My walk started at Beresford Gap, a cut in the chalk where housing makes way for cliff-edge greensward. They're hardly the highest of cliffs but sufficient for a panorama encompassing Margate tower blocks, distant ships and (because it was low tide) a vast wave-cut platform scattered with rockpools and seaweed. Several rustic shelters have been provided, each recently painted in that special shade of light blue only coastal local authorities use. Motor caravans must not be parked on Cliff Road between the hours of 6pm and 6am.
Where the chalk stops the streets dip back towards sea level, one astutely called Canute Road. This is Minnis Bay, a gently shelving rocky beach that morphs into an extensive sandy sweep, plus a semi-circular tide-lapped pool by the promenade for paddlers feeling brave. This is also dog-walking central, at least now September's passed and mutts are allowed on the beach again, also the regular recipient of an Environment Agency 'Excellent' award for bathing quality. Two dozen characterless beach huts provide minor shelter and two beachfront bars offer refreshment for the silver-haired and members of the local sailing club. The grassy embankment that leads to the town's beacon is lined by numerous benches, their backs all seemingly carved by the same carpenter, one of which commemorates a death just four months ago and another of which remembers Audrey & Archie Love You Lots Like Jelly Tots.
Here begins the Northern Sea Wall, a three mile concrete sea defence built in the 1950s to protect the farmland behind from unwanted inundation. It wasn't quite finished when the great flood of 1953 hit, hence the tidal surge covered 5000 acres and spread inland beyond the railway line. The sea has every right to be here because this used to be the Wantsum Channel, a (very) broad band of water that once separated the Isle of Thanet from the rest of Kent. The Romans used it as a shipping route and the Normans established what would now be inland ports up navigable creeks. But between the 12th and 15th centuries the channel gradually silted up, partly from slower flow and partly from an ecclesiastical landgrab, so by the reign of Elizabeth I Thanet was an island no more. Instead a broad swathe of almost-uninhabited farmland now stretches from coast to coast, several miles wide, and the remainder of the walk is thus a straight hike across the mouth of the former marine channel.
You can tell it's about to get remote because dogwalkers choose to go no further, there being nowhere to head except straight back. The edge of solitude is a spot called Plum Pudding Island, formerly the site of a sewage treatment works but now thankfully more about horses and caravans. I had the entire wall seemingly to myself after I'd passed the last birdwatcher, his binoculars trained on a flock of white seabirds paddling beyond the next groyne. A shingly lagoon here has managed to attract avocets and ringed plovers since it was de-silted ten years ago, and although all I got to see was two swans they did swoop round for a noisy splashdown just for me.
The sea wall is only slightly raised and also had to be vehicle-width so is quite broad. A parallel footpath runs immediately behind for anyone who prefers to walk three miles without ever seeing the sea (or perhaps to escape the worst of the weather should it be stormy). The farmland here is flat ploughed fields interspersed with drainage channels, plus the occasional interconnecting track for farmers only. After a mile comes a channel a tad wider than the others which it turns out is what remains of the Wantsum, now draining south to meet the River Stour before flowing east towards Sandwich. A public footpath here is the only escape from the seafront for a good three miles, and equally remote as it heads inland across the floodplain so best not follow it in the hope of heading somewhere less lonely.
And so the wall ploughs on, shingle banks to the right and two tiny towers in the distance growing inexorably closer. I did pass three people out walking, also a tiny handful of joggers, but the majority of those passing were on bikes because this flat coastline is absolutely perfect for it. Often they were in pairs so I heard a brief snatch of conversation as they passed, one couple gabbling about nuclear power stations and another about a mystery man ("was that the wedding at Quex? ...the one whose wife was hanging from a lamppost? ...isn't he dead now?"). Otherwise my sole company was a robin on a bush, a cormorant on a groyne and scores of gulls at the water's edge as the tide quietly splashed back in.
Civilisation gradually re-encroaches, this because there's a car park at Reculver so visitors are slightly more willing to walk a short distance along the wall. Eventually the two Norman towers take centre stage, perched loftily on a sandstone outcrop at the most strategic point for miles. You can't climb up direct, you have to deviate via a sloping lawn where once a large square Roman fort overlooked the mouth of the Wantsum. Only a few foundations of that survive, the two enormous towers instead being all that remains of a Anglo-Saxon monastery's 12th century extension. The remainder of St Mary's church was destroyed by gunpowder in 1809, having been deemed unsafe, but Trinity House insisted on keeping the twin towers and hanging beacons from them as an aid to navigation. Feel free to wander down the nave, head out through what used to be the porch and onwards to the outline of a Roman bathhouse, reflecting on an amazing history far more varied than most.
It gets much Kentier on the far side - a pub, a visitor centre and an adventure playground. This is Reculver Country Park, a non-English Heritage zone, reached by driving up a long dead end lane and paying for parking beneath the towers. Perhaps grab a pint from The King Ethelbert Inn, alternatively a coffee from local baristas HatsHats, and if you do partake rest assured there are also public toilets, the sole conveniences for miles. Yesterday the team from Bird Wise had turned up in their van to celebrate all thing seabird, but mainly to educate visitors on how not to disturb them. And best not wait for the bus, it only comes twice a day, so if you've come on foot I'm afraid it's a hike of over an hour to the nearest station.
I continued west atop undulating cliffs and across the woody contours of Bishopstone Glen, inexorably passing rows of wind turbines far out in the estuary. The last half hour along a concrete promenade was less enchanting, before this finally deposited me on the seafront at the resort of Herne Bay, still lightly buzzing at the fag end at the summer season. Here Cabin FM played out on the stumpy pier, a charity singer prepared to entertain diners in the bandstand and ageing bikers sunned themselves by the clocktower while passers-by admired their gaudy steeds. This second half of my walk is part of the Oyster Bay Trail, an eight mile seafront connection linking Whitstable to Reculver, thus previously blogged. Just know that from whichever direction you choose to approach Reculver it's both impressive and impressively remote, and I'm very pleased to have finally plugged the gap.
I bought my laptop in August 2024 and it's worked absolutely fine ever since. I made sure it came with proper Microsoft Office, and I made sure I bought it via a one-time-purchase, not some online subscription version. That's all worked fine too, but yesterday a message popped up telling me that Microsoft have ended support for Office 2021 and I should strongly consider upgrading.
Bugger that, I thought. How miserable to stop supporting something I bought only two years ago, how mercenary is Microsoft? I checked and Office 2024 was introduced five weeks after I bought my laptop, so I'm essentially being penalised for purchasing in August rather than October.
"You may still be able to use it" for goodness sake, what kind of ridiculous pressure is that? Of course I can continue to use it, you haven't actually made it impossible, you're just greedy opportunists who've deliberately ended security support to drive further sales.
I checked the prices, and to buy a one-time copy of Office 2024 costs £119.99. I have no intention of rebuying something I already bought, so no thanks.
The alternative option they're plugging really heavily is a Microsoft 365 subscription starting at £8.49 a month. Only a fool pays monthly so the better option is a £84.99 annual subscription, but that's not a one-time payment and can really add up. After two years it's £170, after three years £255, and that's just screwing your audience long-term in the hope they don't notice.
Also Microsoft 365 is a suite of in-browser apps, not separate programs, and I would only switch to that impractical set-up if it became the sole available option.
I'm not upgrading, obviously, I'm carrying on using Office 2021 which I paid for barely two years ago. But the direction of travel is clear, not just here but with all kinds of products the world over, they'd rather you start a subscription than let you buy something outright because that's so much better for them and so much worse for you.
25 things we learnt from TfL FoI requests in October 2026
1) Over 600 buses now have air-conditioning in the passenger saloon, with approximately 700 more on order. 2) The key unresolved issues with digital Oyster wallets are around the user experience to ensure that the right wallet is used by the reader. How this will work needs to be proven before TfL can progress with a digital Oyster proposition. 3) In the last financial year 2395 passengers made a DLR journey from Canary Wharf to West India Quay and 3132 made a journey from West India Quay to Canary Wharf (the UK's shortest rail journey) 4) If you've ever wondered how many times an Overground train passed Hackney Downs in the space of one week, it was 2140 times in June 2019, 2149 times in June 2021 and most recently 2069. 5) The word 'misbehaving' should not be part of an on-train Digital Voice Announcement script nor a pre-recorded station message. (if you're the reader who read my Unblogged September post and submitted this FoI request, next time perhaps hold back if you don't know all the details)
6) The 13 tube stations categorised as "close to impossible" with regard to step-free access are Arsenal, Barons Court, Cannon Street, Chalk Farm, Charing Cross, Clapham Common, Clapham North, Great Portland Street, Lambeth North, Mansion House, Mile End, Regent's Park and West Ruislip 7) TfL are the owners of 10 reinforced concrete half-joint structures, including Perivale Lane Footbridge, Bexley Golf Course Footbridge, Blackfriars Bridgehead and the Croydon flyover. 8) The bus shelter adjacent to Postal Close, Bexley, is owned by the London borough of Bexley. 9) Plans to boost frequency on the Overground include a) increasing the service between Crystal Palace and Highbury & Islington from 4tph to 6tph (expected May 2027) b) increasing the service between Liverpool Street and Enfield Town/Cheshunt from 2tph to 3tph (expected July 2028) c) increasing the service between Clapham Junction and Dalston Junction from 4tph to 6tph (not before May 2029). 10) TfL can't tell you if your Vauxhall Zafira 7 seater qualifies for Uber (obviously).
11) TfL own the bus garages at Ash Grove, Brixton Tramshed, Brixton Hill, Edgware, Henley Road, Twickenham, Uxbridge, Walworth and West Ham (leasing them to the relevant bus operator). 12) The current plan for introducing the new DLR fleet is that Stratford-Woolwich be 100% operated by new trains by 10th Jan 2027, Bank-Lewisham by 30th May 2027, Bank-Woolwich by 31st October 2027, Tower Gateway-Beckton by 5th March 2028, and Stratford-Lewisham by 16th April 2028. (fully blogged here) 13) Between 5th August and 9th September only seven passenger incidents were recorded on the Underground in the category "Faint/Illness due to heat condition" (at London Bridge, Knightsbridge, Camden Town, High Barnet, Parsons Green, Euston and Clapham South). 14) The cameras on buses are not used to enforce bus lane restrictions, therefore no bus lane Penalty Charge Notices have been issued from evidence recorded by these cameras. 15) There are 19159 fire extinguishers on the Underground, 892 on the Overground and 835 on the Elizabeth line.
16) The upholstery on London Underground train seats is vacuumed every 28 days, swept nightly for dust and debris and given a yearly shampoo. 17) The last five special Oyster card issues were the Adidas Oyster collaboration card 2012, The Year of the Bus card 2014, Adidas Arsenal Collaboration card 2022, Elizabeth Line Opening card 2022 and Oyster 20th Anniversary card 2023. 18) Last year the cycle hire docking station that was most often full was Royal Avenue, Chelsea (1400 hours). Last month it was Exhibition Road, South Kensington (87 hours). 19) The TfL advertising estate includes 966 digital escalator panels, 30 escalator ribbons, 238 digital platform edge doors and 4 sites categorised as "Premium iconic". The projector units on tube platforms are in the process of being phased out. There are no digital screens on the tram network. 20) 89 London bus routes include a Hail & Ride section. The lowest numbered of these is the 138. Over half the Hail & Rides are lettered routes. Four of them are school buses.
21) Music is played in a passageway at King’s Cross St Pancras station as part of ‘Music on the Underground’, a program where brands who purchase all the advertising space in the passageway can add music to enhance the customer experience. The music is restricted to Monday to Friday, 10am to 4pm. For example Channel 5 chose Max Richter’s The Four Seasons Recomposed. 22) Last year 93,256 holders of 60+ Oyster cards failed to renew their cards in time, 91,174 had their cards stopped, 67,231 reapplied and 59,835 were successful. 23) TfL sent out 4,983,464 emails alerting people that the Silvertown Tunnel would be opening on 7th April 2025, and a further 2,537,146 emails to say that it had opened. 24) Seven refurbished Central line trains have now re-entered service, the seventh of these yesterday. It comprises cars 91319, 92319, 93082, 92082, 93110, 92110, 91339 and 92339.
25) And finally confirmation that the FoI team sometimes go the extra mile... Q: As a child in 1958, I used to take the bus from The Surrey Tavern, on Trinity Road Wandsworth, to Tooting Bec. How much was the 'half fare' at that time for this distance. The choice of two buses were the No. 19 and the No. 49. A: Fares for London bus journeys around this period operated on a distance-based system, with children paying half-rate. Colleagues at the London Transport Museum have been able to check a 1960 fare chart for route 19 and the specific journey you cite was one fare stage (0.5 miles) and the child fare would have been 1½d.
On Wednesday the Ian Visits website celebrated its 20th birthday, an exceptional milestone. I say that having got there myself, but whereas I generally write one post a day Ian writes half a dozen, an exceptional output. His posts are generally "a mixture of transport, architecture, history, exhibitions and things to do around London", so he says, and his What's On list is a famously good digest of things actually worth visiting rather than overhyped brand opportunities. If you're reading this blog you probably ought to be reading his, not just for news on 5G tube rollout and HS2 updates but also gaslit streets, historical alleyways, upcoming lectures and new openings in zone 5. It is, in case you hadn't realised, a phenomenal amount of work.
To give you some idea of how much work it is I've been out to visit every story Ian Visits visited on Ian Visits' birthday. That's all six of Wednesday's articles and, because the day's first post was actually about the 20th birthday, also the first of Thursday's too. All in all it took me over three hours to get round the seven sites, during which time I rode six trains, caught five buses and walked five miles. I'm not saying Ian visited all of these places in a similar time, nor needed to, but imagine keeping up that level of content generation throughout the week.
And here it is, a somewhat sad looking hunk of rock on the Locksley estate in Limehouse. It would have been fun to use when surrounded by sand and undamaged, whereas chunks of the 1958 stone have since broken off and the whole thing's been hemmed inside railings for health and safety reasons. That said the gate in the railings was unlocked so I was able to go inside anyway, watched by a mystified council operative taking a break from sweeping leaves. The cleverest part, I reckoned, was that the knees make a tiny slide. So hurrah that the Heritage of London Trust are helping to restore Trevor Tennant's sculpture, a reminder that play equipment can be inspiring rather just a few bland rocks and pipes. And hurrah to everyone concerned for firing out a press release about a clamberable Gulliver on the 300th anniversary of the publication of Gulliver's Travels, all very Lilliputian.
The date for the reopening of the Museum of London under its new name on a new site is Saturday 28th November 2026, or one month from now (or four weeks given it's no longer Wednesday). The new building is the former Smithfield Market, or at least some of it, starting with the former Victorian General Market. It'll be packed with exhibits across three themes - Real Time, Our Time and Past Time - which Ian can tell you more about, while a separate paid-exhibition space will open in the former Poultry Market in 2028. Ian is right that the new museum now has a sign in place on its roof facing Farringdon Road. I spotted another LONDON MUSEUM sign up a sidestreet above what I presume will be the main entrance, covering what used to be West Poultry Avenue, and maybe don't put 28th November in your diary because I expect Day 1 to be ridiculously busy.
The Barbican Conservatory is a fabulous green space, London's second largest glasshouse after Kew, and home to over 1500 species of tropical plants and trees. It's closing until 2030 so the interior can be refurbished and renewed, a mighty project which means a lot of the existing greenery will just get in the way. They're thus giving away thousands of cuttings to anyone who wants one and is successful in a ballot, details of which Ian can tell you. Walking past yesterday I saw lots and lots of cuttings on tables just inside a steamy window, all carefully labelled, so for example I can tell you they have 39 Tradescantia pallida ready to go. If alternatively you just want a look inside before closure, the next bookable slots are on Friday 13th and Sunday 15th November.
» For more on the Barbican Conservatory giveaway see the Ian Visits website
If you can't get tickets for the Bayeux Tapestry why not jump ahead five centuries and see some Italian woodcuts. They're free to view and they're in Room 90, which is just behind Egypt and directly under Japan. Because woodcuts are inkprints a lot of them survive, unlike the wooden blocks they made them with (although apparently Francesco Denanto's Circumcision survives in Modena). These intricate images are invariably Biblical in nature, given pretty much no other book had captured the Renaissance zeitgeist, so expect a lot of pious Jesuses, angsty disciples, Old Testament setpieces and naked helldemons. Many of the black and white tableaux tell a good story, also it's refreshing to see what are essentially intricate cartoons, also how often do you get to see a caseful of Titians for nothing? Here until 21st March.
» For more on the Italian Renaissance woodcuts exhibition see the Ian Visits website
As painfully slow building projects go, JP Morgan's new Thamesside HQ is painfully slower than most. They bought the site by Canary Wharf Pier in 2008 and since then nothing whatsoever's gone up bar some foundations and a few metal poles. Now finally a planning application for a new tower's gone in, which includes news that they want to cover the ramp down from Westferry Circus with a park. It means bank employees could leave the building and walk to nearby stations with ease, but would also consign through traffic to the lower roundabout (and seemingly scupper the D8 bus). It's a novel eco-friendly idea but intrusive, and I suspect most drivers would be happier to see the JP Morgan site left empty for another 18 years.
» For more on the Westferry Circus planning application see the Ian Visits website
I've lost count of the number of times someone's claimed a Bakerloo line extension might be closer to completion, the stumbling block invariably being money. Now the Mayor finally has some financial certainty, maybe, as a move in Wednesday's Budget promised that regional Mayors would be permitted to borrow funds balanced against future tax revenues. The Bakerloo line extension even got a namecheck in the Chancellor's speech as an example of a project that might benefit. The tax change would happen gradually from 2027, so don't expect brown trains rumbling under the Old Kent Road before 2040 at the earliest, but it never hurts to stand wistfully at the tunnel mouth at Elephant & Castle and imagine how simple it might be to get to Lewisham.
» For more on transport projects potentially now deliverable see the Ian Visits website
The thing about the Ian Visits website is that he knows about new things nobody else has even noticed yet, like this micro-museum devoted to the Great Fire of London at the foot of the Monument. It really isn't huge, there's only capacity for 8 people, also as Ian points out it has a ridiculously extensive health and safety list by the entrance (the subheadings are Participate At Your Own Risk, Consult A Doctor, Epilepsy Warning and Claustrophobia Warning). Apparently what's inside is a five-minute animated film, also red walls, historic illustrations and an illuminated display of stylised flames, but you'll have to take Ian's word on that. Alas when I got there yesterday a workman was standing by the door while his colleague did some noisy maintenance inside, and his comment "it should be open again this afternoon" wasn't reassuring enough for me to come back. Hopefully your fiery visit will have better luck.
» For more on the Monument Micro Museum (and every other key London story going forward) see the Ian Visits website
We're now at the tough end of the alphabet for unsung suburbs. There's Victoria and Vauxhall but they're way too well known. There's Kingston Vale, Putney Vale and Streatham Vale, but that's stretching alphabetical licence too far. The only other V in the Ordnance Survey's 681-strong list is a small residential hollow at the top of Hampstead Heath, essentially just one street, but in the absence of anything better it'll have to do. Thankfully it's fascinating with links to DH Lawrence, fairgrounds and the Daily Mail, also extremely aspirational so well done if you live there.
The Vale of Health was once an insalubrious dip amid open heathland above Hampstead, so has undergone a sly nominal transformation over the years. As one of the sources of the River Fleet it's long been a bit damp, and was described by one Georgian gentlewoman as 'a stagnate bottom, a pit in the heath'. Its first inhabitant arrived in the 1710s, a harness maker called Samuel Hatch with a shop on the highway up by Jack Straw's Castle. He wanted a workshop to store his hides and was granted a small patch in the wasteland below where he added a cottage and cowshed, the area thus becoming known as Hatchett's Bottom. In 1777 the Hampstead Water Company enlarged the pond and drained the marshy ground, making it a tad less unappealing, but the area was still mostly used for tanning, then a varnish factory, later laundering clothes. As you can see the lakeside's changed a lot since then.
A few poorhouses were added in 1779, then a chimneysweep's cottage, then a builder spotted that a sheltered secluded spot might be the ideal spot for a handful of more middle classes houses. The name 'Vale of Health' was first recorded in 1801, presumably to attract sales, despite no evidence that living in a boggy bottom was truly good for you. Within decades the Vale became a hideaway for the well-to-do and the artistic set, also day trippers who enjoyed tea gardens, boats and a fairground (summer months only). Most of the 60-or-so houses we see today were tucked in during the 19th century, plus a hotel called the Vale of Health Tavern which was soon turned into flats. It's now a tightknit community of quaint and occasionally invisible villas, essentially one long curling cul-de-sac with a dead end coming off it, which unless you find the right way in goes happily unnoticed by the rest of the world.
The right way in, at least if you're driving, is a turn off from East Heath Road beside a sign (correctly) warning that the road is unsuitable for HGVs. One of the streetsigns here has been damaged so claims this is the Vale of Healt, but that's about the only misstep present. The road descends through a tunnel of foliage and is completely lined by parked cars, this because most residents live in close-packed houses built before the need for off-road space so vehicles need to be left here. You can also walk in across the heath, one particular woody track lit by facsimile oil lamps as you descend, quite sharply, into the secret world of Hatchett's Bottom.
The first row of houses is splendid in a very Hampstead way, all tall thin villas with Gothic gables and steps up to the front door, perhaps several. Everyone on the left has the benefit of a lake view, hence the third house is indeed called Lakeview, its neighbours including Heathhurst, Silverdale and (my favourite) Upfleet. At least two currently have the builders in, because if you can afford a pile here you can certainly stretch to extra shower rooms, bespoke stone worktops and micro-cement-style finishes. All the necessary services have been provided, by which I mean a red pillarbox and a noticeboard. Alongside is a beautiful street map seemingly created by some local graphic artist in the 1990s, ideally situated should your Ocado delivery need to stop off to work out where Blossom Villa or Lavender Cottage are.
One of the three blue plaques in the Vale is above the door of number 3 Villas on the Heath, this for the Indian poet Rabindranath Tagore who stayed here briefly in 1912. The recipient of the second plaque did better by living here for six months, just round the corner at 1 Byron Villas. This was DH Lawrence, this his first London residence in 1915 before he and his wife moved down to Cornwall. Byron did indeed have connections here, he and Shelley often dropping in on the recipient of the third blue plaque, the poet James Leigh Hunt (whose speakeasy can be found halfway along a narrow alleyway).
Plaque number 4 is black and appears on the front of Rose Cottage where Alfred Harmsworth spent three years of his childhood. He grew up to become Lord Northcliffe, Fleet Street's greatest populist newspaper magnate who (amongst many other self-interested interventions) helped turn the Daily Mail into the outspoken organ it is today. I love that the letter box at Rose Cottage now has a sign outside saying No Junk Mail, probably not as a reference to newspaper deliveries but it'd be hilarious if it was.
One arm of the cul-de-sac bends round past chocolate box cottages, quirky bungalows and heathfront villas, also houses so secluded that I'd have seen nothing had the gate in the thick hedge not been open. Signs repeatedly warn that Neighbourhood Watch is keeping a close eye, but I think the bloke bemused by my presence was just a jobbing gardener. Gaps in the treeline provide access straight onto the upper Heath, seemingly a key exercising spot for dogs, so you could be up at the Jack Straw's Castle bus stop in a couple of minutes if you don't mind a climb. 20 years ago there was a near perfect view across the Vale from up top but alas encroachingwoodland has all but put paid to that.
The other dead end slopes downwards past more of Heath Villas, pastel painted, its uncurtained windows revealing bookshelves, ceramics and other cultural furnishings. The property magic ends abruptly at the end of the terrace with Spencer House, the modern block of flats built on the site of the Vale of Health Hotel. If it looks dull from the road that's because the building's fully focused on the lake beyond, an inspirational view that repeatedly lured painter Stanley Spencer to use a studio here.
But the really quirky thing hereabouts is the corral of caravans and trailers across the road, officially titled The Fairground Site. It's not for your entertainment, it's a base for a travelling community living their best caravan life, also somewhere to store a Friendly Falafels booth between events when its not being used. Here people sit on garden chairs and cook using gas canisters, while across the road a Sunday magazine's photographer could drop in at any moment, such are the contrasts of the Vale of Health.
It's easy to slip out here onto the Heath proper, perhaps to the Ice House, a conical-roofed building half-concealed in the trees which was originally built as an estatekeeper's hut. Alternatively head down to the pond for a look back at the rear of the buildings fortunate enough to be water-facing, also their fancy extensions and back gardens. I suspect the true joy of living here is having the whole of Hampstead Heath at your disposal just a few metres from your front door, such are the benefits of being some of the only housing ever to have been permitted on this huge urban open space. The Vale of Health may have been named in deceit but it's a lot easier to see the health benefits of living here today, should you have a couple of million to spare that is.
Mon 2: Today was the 90th anniversary of BBC Television commencing public broadcasting from Alexandra Palace, i.e. television was 90 years old today. There are many ways to commemorate the event, my favourite of which is always to watch Adele Dixon singing the opening song, The Magic Rays of Light.
