12 things we learnt from TfL FoI requests in April 2026
1) The three panellists who select Poems on the Underground are Judith Chernaik (novelist, poet and critic), Imtiaz Dharker (British-Pakistani poet, artist and filmmaker) and George Szirtes (a Hungarian-British poet). 2) Initial design work for a station at Surrey Canal on the Windrush Line has now started, but as yet the required third party funding for construction has not been secured, and this would not be before 2027. 3) The underground line attracting the most noise complaints in 2023 was the Jubilee, in 2024 the Victoria, in 2025 the Northern and so far this year the Central. 4) TfL are trialling new bus shelters at 22 locations. Three are on Blackfriars Road near TfL HQ. The locations outside zone 1 are Barking station, Hampstead High Street, Harlington High Street, Kentish Town Rd, Lower Clapton Road, Maida Vale, Malden Road, Mitcham Road, Romford station, St Mary's Road, Sidcup High Street, Stockwell Road, Thornton Heath station and West Croydon station. 5) Subways which have been decommissioned since 2007 include seven at Elephant & Castle, four at Bricklayers Arms, three down Park Lane, two at Bressenden Place, also Despard Road, Foxhole Road, Lea Bridge Road, Monument Way, Neathouse Place, Old Marylebone Road, Whitechapel High Street and the Lucozade Factory. 6) The tube station with the most lift/escalator faults last year was Waterloo with 451. These took an average of 35 hours and 40 minutes to repair. 7) Don't ask TfL questions about really old stuff because "our records from 2001 to 2003 are not complete as all paper records has been disposed of, therefore we do not hold a lot of relevant documentation". 8) During the first three months of 2026 South Kenton station was left unstaffed on 42 different days. 11 of these were due to safety concerns following a ceiling leak. 9) TfL maintain six green-roofed bus shelters, five in Lewisham and one in Westminster. They have no plans to install more due to the high installation and maintenance costs and relatively low biodiversity benefit compared to other initiatives. 10) Twelve new DLR units are now at Beckton depot, even though none have been used in passenger service for the last six months. 11) The SE postcode area has 472 Oyster Retail Agents, ahead of E with 429 and N with 381. The postcode districts with just one Oyster Retail Agent are CM14, CR6, DA9, HP6, KT10, KT18, RM17, RM19, SL2 and WD3. 12) If you ask 'How many people got smacked round the head by bus wing mirrors in 2025?', TfL will refuse to respond because it would cost more than £450 to find out.
In this FoI we learn that construction costs for the whole Bow roundabout scheme were £1,882,513. We also learn that the London Borough of Newham took over management of the site on 30 March 2026.
Alas the new contraflow slip road under the flyover has never opened, despite being completed over 12 months ago, because it has potential low headroom issues.
It turns out that "the London Borough of Newham raised the risk of potential collision with the Bow flyover structure and requested a gantry was constructed to protect the structure". This was in July 2024, three months before roadworks began.
The FoI includes 40 pages of back and forth emails between TfL and Newham regarding the gantry issue. Newham said they weren't happy to proceed until they saw exactly where this gantry would go and what it would look like. They also weren't pleased that TfL's plans totally mucked up their long-term plans to add an eastbound bus lane here. TfL were mostly saying come on guys we really need to get this signed before time runs out.
TfL spent £29,861 to undertake a feasibility study into construction of the gantry, then a further £63,906 for detailed design. It would have cost £250,000 to build the gantry.
However they're not building it.
Instead "as an alternative to installing a gantry, it has been proposed to keep the slip road closed and implement a new road layout under an experimental traffic order." Implementing this "temporary permanent road layout" for six months will cost only £18,000.
In other words they intend to go ahead with Newham's bus lane proposal, the scheme the council had in mind before the roadworks started, and the slip road under the flyover will not open. Lorries exiting Marshgate Lane will have to continue turning left as they have done ever since the summer of 2024.
It seems that in TfL's keenness to get the roadworks started they built a slip road under the flyover that'll probably never be used. It took months to build because it has its own signalised junction and was the most significant part of the entire five month project. And it's all likely to be money down the drain, because it turns out a bus lane was a much better idea than a contraflow slip road all along.
The slip road under the Bow Flyover is thus, very probably, a complete white elephant. If you were inconvenienced while they were building it, it seems they were wasting your time.
