Shoreditch High Street

As have been reported it has now been announced that the new station at Shoreditch High Street has been confirmed as a Zone 1 station. Rumor has been abound that the station was going to be put into Zone 1. I recently contacted TfL press office to ask about this and was give the following information;

“Thank you for your feedback form.
Shoreditch High Street is a new station on the extended East London line and I can confirm that for fares purposes the station will be classed as a Zone 1 station.”

This means that using the line, as was initially though, as away to divert traffic away from the crowded lines in Zone 1 to provide relief on the Underground is now less of an incentive. The old Shoreditch station on the East London Line was in Zone 2 and it was thought that the whole line from Highbury & Islington to Brockley/New Cross should be inside Zone 2.

In fact the 2010 Tube map that TfL released in November 2006 showed the entire Overground network include the second phase of the East London Line Extension (ELLX) to Clapham Junction. This clearly showed that to travel from Clapham Junction all the way round to Highbury & Islington would have kept you in Zone 2, therefore giving you a cheap ticket to cross London without using Zone 1.

As well as increasing fares for TfL to gain there is also the fact this simplifies Oyster usage as the system doesn't have to work out which way you went as now a cross London journey using the ELLX means a Zone 1 trip.

The re-zoning of Shoreditch High Street also means there is potential now for the system to charge wrong for journeys made with Oyster as Clapham Junction to Highbury & Islington is still possible using only Zone 2 if you go via Willesden Junction and use the West London and North London Lines. Whether or not there is enough of an incentive to do this when you could use a single train remains to be seen.

What has been said about the zoning of this station is that it was a condition laid down my the DfT for funding of the ELLX phase 2 from Surrey Quays to Clapham Junction, which if true could be a good reason why TfL accepted it to allow the South London Lines adding to the Overground network. So in the end there is worthwhile benefits to this.

DLR - Western Leg

I occurred to me that the western leg of the DLR (that's Bank/Tower Gateway to Poplar) is going to be crippled this summer. Lets start with Shadwell which lost its East London Line connection and now has replacement bus services, hardly great for mass numbers. Next is Tower Gateway which closes shortly for a year, so they lose connection to Circle and District lines. Now we find that Bank/Monument is also being no interchange till august. So basically west from Limehouse the ONLY interchange the DLR has is with the Northern at Bank officially. Cue a summer of chaos on the DLR. 

March 2008 Tube Map

Another month and another Tube map from TfL. Seems like they like to print these maps off like mad. The basic changes are

Victoria Line closure boxes are changed to enclude more detail so anyone getting these maps knows the Victoria Line closes 10pm monday-friday night untill november 2008.

Terminal 5 on the Piccadilly line is now a full line and no longer under construction. Red text states opens 27 March 2008.

East London Line replacement bus service ELP is removed and replaced with a white outline (just like National Rail services used to be done) with the number 381. This is due to the replacement bus service being dropped as I have reported before.

Basically the rest is the same as February's map and contains the same mistakes in a few places as the November 2007 map in reguards to the LO lines. Hopefully when the scanner gets fixed I can show off the maps rather than just write about them.

On a final note theres no more posts now until next weekend as Im away! Can't wait!

East London Line Buses Update

It now seems that there has been a change to the East London Line Replacement Bus Service, tho not as big as I thought. Basically Rotherhithe is to lose its special bus service (basically its pointless). However the other three are staying for the moment. Least it will help tidy the map at bit. Tho Im wondering if the March 08 map is already in print, if so they might have to do a new April map to show this (, as a pointer, the zone change to 7-9 instead of A-D still havent been replaced on the Metropolitan's A stock. In fact there still trains showing the line before they introduced A-D a few years ago!). Time will tell tho.

No East London Line replacement buses?

ELL/ELR February 2008
Originally uploaded by MackenzieBlu

There's a rumour going around that TfL are going to be dropping the East London Line replacement buses from this saturday. Its been said that the load figures are as low as 200 people a day. Not bad for a lowly used Tube's replacement service that actually doesn't do much. Many its a case of people using local buses rather than taking the alternate buses to link to Tube? Althoug it doesn't show it on the Tube map but Elverson Road (DLR) is walkable from New Cross (and New Cross Gate is a short walk from New Cross Gate). Surrey Quays is the other side of the shopping center from Canada Water. That basically takes care of the need for the ELC bus with people wanting to go into London use National Rail services from New Cross/New Cross Gate, Jubilee from Surrey Quays. Whitechapel, Shadwell & Canada Water are Tube stations so no replacement needed there. That leaves Rotherhithe & Wapping without a link. Rotherhithe has the 381 which links it to Canada Water and Bermondsey Tube stations and is a disable access bus with frequent services. Wapping has the frequent disable acess 100 bus connectioning it to Tower Hill/Gateway, Aldgate and St Paul's among many places. So basically there is no need for these replacement bus services really. But only time will tell.