London Overground for south London
This month's Londoner has a short article on Transport for London's ambitions to add services in south London to the London Overground network:
Following the successful takeover of the three Silverlink overground rail services in north London – that has delivered safer trains and increased revenue – Transport for London have asked the government for responsibility for national rail services in south London, too.At last month's board meeting TfL discussed "taking a greater role" in running Southern services in London when the franchise is renewed next year, but not necessarily taking them over. Plans for a takeover were reported by the Times last year, in an article featuring a suspiciously similar quote from Ken as the Londoner have used.
8 comments:
"by the Telegraph"... by the Times :-)
Fixed. Thanks!
The trains on the NLL are still regularly late and over crowded. But, things do seem to have improved since TfL took over.
I can use my Oyster PAG.
They have switched on the electronic signs.
There are station staff you can talk to - and ask what is happening
There are more ticket machines and the office is open longer.
Now if only they would extend the line to Kingston....
New trains are on there way but running a bit late, shame really...
Next plan is to extend the platforms and make the 3 car into 4 car..
TfL couldn't take over Southeastern services to Dartford too soon for my liking. I bet that's not in the pipeline any time soon though.
Interestingly, Tory-controlled Bexley council have recently started a campaign (bizarrely named) 'Jump on Board' which features a map that makes the point I've often made about transport in this borough. All the new schemes stop short of our border, some by a matter of metres at Abbey Wood station.
They have a point with their campaign in relation to TfL-funded services, which obviously we subsidise as much as any other borough, but it's a bit misleading to complain about Fastrack, which I believe is an initiative of neighbouring Kent County Council, who've poured millions into it.
The actual aims of the campaign are interesting too - several things are already planned to occur, which makes them rather easy to claim victory over! Wanting Crossrail built through Bexley seems optimistic though, given the report you highlighted a few weeks back about why that wouldn't be happening for the foreseeable future.
All of which is somewhat tangential to my original point, but since Southeastern is our only option for fast transportation in this area (the buses have improved but are of course necessarily slow), it would be rather nice to have them brought up to TfL standards. I won't hold my breath, though.
From the article: "Fares would also be set at a level to attract passengers rather than maximise profits and sharp fare rises, such as the 20 per cent increase on South West Trains last May, would be ruled out."
I thought that the SWT increases were part of a move towards zonal fares, with some stations (near to Waterloo distance-wise, but in zones 5&6) being heavily hit. I know that for season tickets there was a huge increase in places so that the fares match those of other zone 5/6 stations. Such fare rises couldn't happen again, due to zonal fare pricing, but they happened because of the shift to it.
Bring it on, and as said by paul, please bring SouthEastern into the tent too. Slightly tricky given the length of their franchise I know but I think it would make a massive difference to have TfL running the metro rail lines.
The Bexley campaign's interesting. I seem to recall that TfL spent money putting bus lanes through Welling in an attempt to improve the bus services in the borough, which the incoming (present) Tory council ripped out as almost their first action in office.
The Council are being a bit disingenious though. It should be noted that both Crossrail and GWT will serve those parts of Abbey Wood and Thamesmead, the halves of which lying in Bexley form the poorest part of the borough.
TfL sadly has no control over SouthEastern rail but has (successfully) lobbied for the lengthening of trains to 12 cars, which makes it all the more odd that the Council's campaign for them. I look forward to them claiming their "success" at some point in the near future when they claim credit for the extra carriages.
(I do agree with extending Crossrail to Dartford or Ebbsfleet though!)
The comment about SWT's '20% rise' is hardly relevant, it was made clear at the time it occured that it applied to CDR fares inbound to London from outside the zonal area only.
"The changes do not affect either Standard Class peak-time commuter and Season ticket fares or journeys in the direction away from London Waterloo where the ticket structure and prices remain unchanged. Nor do they apply to any travel entirely within the Greater London area covered by the present zonal ticketing system."
Headline writers never concern themselves with detail, so 'the 20% rise'has passed into the record...
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