CROYDON COMMENTARY: As Inside Croydon revealed earlier this week, the tram network’s ageing rolling stock won’t be replaced until the 2030s.
But as CHRISTIAN WOLMAR, pictured left, explains, TfL’s draft business plan actually reflects the transport authority’s achievements over the last quarter-century
The publication of the draft business plan for Transport for London is an opportune moment to put the capital’s transport system in perspective.
Before looking at the future as addressed in the plan, which covers the period to 2029-2030, it is worth recalling the radical changes that have taken place in the quarter of a century of existence of Transport for London.
The very creation of Transport for London was a momentous achievement of the Labour government which, in 1997, had inherited an absolutely chaotic situation in the capital.
One of Margaret Thatcher’s most ridiculous moves was to abolish the Greater London Council and not replace it with a body that had any responsibility over the whole of London. This was not only motivated by revenge as Ken Livingstone, the leader of the GLC, stuck anti-government signs on the roof of County Hall on the opposite side of the Thames from Parliament, but it was also was absolutely reckless, given that every sizeable city in the world has some coherent system of governance.
Real achievement: the Elizabeth line has been backed by Labour and Tory Mayors of London
Therefore, the achievements of TfL since its creation in 2000 are remarkable, not least because it took on such an unprecedented wide range of activities, making it far more powerful than its precursor, London Transport, as it is also in charge of the major road network, London Overground, river transport, taxi licensing and much more.
TfL is a genuinely integrated organisation that has overseen a radical transformation in the capital’s transport system.
Probably most importantly, TfL revived the London bus network, which had developed an awful reputation for delays and cancellations. Now, some of those improvements are under threat because TfL’s subsidy for the service has increased to more than £1billion per year as result of reduced passenger numbers following the pandemic.
Probably the most significant achievement has been the improvements to heavy rail service. The Elizabeth line, with patronage exceeding 800,000 on peak days, has been a remarkable success.
It would not have happened had it not been for strong support from successive mayors including, to be fair, Boris Johnson. That was a grand projet, an emblematic scheme, but it is the more modest London Overground services that have exemplified what a unified, city-wide transport body can do.
Vision and commitment: and some confusing Overground line names
The Overground, including the Windrush line from West Croydon and Norwood Junction, has emerged from a jumble of underused or abandoned railway lines to become a key part of London’s transport system, blessed now with new (and at times confusing) names serving areas such as Hackney, Brent and Lewisham that has contributed to their regeneration.
That took vision and commitment, which has been rewarded by ever-increasing patronage.
The other remarkable transformation has been the boom in cycling, which has also been supported by successive London Mayors. It is hard to imagine now, but in the 1980s when I first started cycling to work in Waterloo, I used to chat to any other cyclist I met because we were such a rare breed.
Now every traffic light in central London seems to have a cohort of cyclists waiting to go through and there are now safe lanes on many key routes. Moreover, this growth is likely to be sustained as it is underpinned by the growth in dockless bike hire, which means many of these bikers are new to cycling.
There is a tension between this cycling boom and bus services, with the emphasis on cycling being blamed, perhaps unfairly, for the slowdown in bus times. Andrew Bosi, of the Friends of Capital Transport Campaign, is worried about the potential bus cuts and argues that “the bus lanes cut by Boris Johnson should be reinstated”. There is mention in the TfL business plan of more priority bus routes, though no detail on what this might mean.
Five-year plan: TfL’s draft business plan
The business plan intends to build on TfL’s record of success and contains some good measures, although it is constrained by the lack of funds available for investment.
Crossrail2 is barely mentioned, and there is no sign of the much-needed new trains for the Piccadilly Line. The West London Orbital and the Dockland Light Railway extension to Thamesmead have central government support, but not money.
Nor is there any immediate sign of the much-needed new trams for Croydon which are now nearing 30 years in service.
One innovation is the idea of London having its own bus company to provide services directly, rather than franchising them all out, reversing a privatisation forced on London by the Tory government of the 1990s. However, that does sit rather oddly with the recent decision to contract out London Overground services, rather than operating them in-house.
The business plan is full of good intentions but there is a rather surprising acceptance of the limitations of trying to predict the future, even over the relatively short period, as the section on forecasting admits: “We continue to face significant forecasting challenges despite London’s transport network entering a phase of post-pandemic normality.”
In other words, goodness knows what is going to happen.
London is a world-class city and has excellent transport links.
Transformed: Paris has become a city of cyclists
But somehow it lacks the vision of a city like Paris where, with central government support, it is building three Metro lines and several tram extensions. The mayor in the French capital has more power than her equivalent in London, and she has used it wisely, transforming Paris in a decade from a cycling desert to one of the best cities in the world for bike riders.
London, in contrast, has the feeling it is muddling through, rather than having an overall vision. That is not the Mayor’s fault but rather the fact that the government that created TfL did not have the courage to give it genuine autonomy which would have provided a financial freedom that central government does not want to allow.
If forced to predict, I would say that there will be quite a sharp period of growth in railway use, both Tube and above ground, that bus use will recover, though only slowly, and that cycling will continue to increase rapidly – those last two points, by the way, are related because I suspect a lot of the fall in bus use is because people are jumping on bikes, especially the dockless hire cycles which, despite the parking issues, will remain a major attraction.
London needs its transport system more than ever – it is just a shame that the finances are never quite available for a real step change in the city’s infrastructure.
- It is more than a decade since Christian Wolmar put forward the idea for the Mayor of London to pedestrianise Oxford Street. Wolmar is a columnist for Rail magazine. His latest book is Liberation Line, the story of the men who rebuilt the railways after D Day: click here to find out more
Read more: TfL report confirms decade delay over Croydon’s new trams
Read more: What might have been: how Croydon Trams should have grown
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My experience supports Christian Wolmar’s view that rail travel is steadily recovering: even the 12 coach Thameslink trains which pass through Croydon and for many years seemed under-used are now full at times.
Promoting cycling is naturally desirable from an environmental point of view, but cyclists would be more popular if more of them observed the Highway Code. Furthermore, the way in which TfL has widened pavements and introduced cycle lanes has in some roads left insufficient room for buses to overtake them, leaving double deckers full of passengers crawling behind a slowly moving push-bike.
I am also not convinced of the desirability of pedestrianising Oxford Street, following the slow decline of North End as bus stops were moved further and further away from it! In the West End the number of buses and stops is also being progressively reduced to the inconvenience of shoppers.
Christian Wolmar will be giving his talk on the construction of the Trans-Siberian Railway at the Phoenix Retirement Association in the Phoenix Centre, Crystal Palace, at 2.30pm on 9th March.
The shutting of Oxford street will be a disaster as it has been in North end. IMO its an exercise in forcing shopping habits and customers to change and move footfall to Westfield, Blue Water etc. How are cyclists going to buy and have their bags hitting their feet after shopping and who is going to walk 500meteres to a distanct bustop with vegetables. When the New Oxford Street Allders the existing stores were fearful but turned out happy as customers gave up walking from Oxford Circus to the distant Marble Arch. Just see how the South end grocers has done so well since the Surrey Street bus stop was moved.
Worst mistake ever by Westminster Council and duped by moneyed tongues just as others have been. Grants department store suffered when its bus stops moved opposite Allders as an earlier example.
Hey Gavin, are you going to stand again for election as Mayor of Croydon?
TfL is very proud of itself, but I nominate it’s stupid ‘Every Journey Matters’ as the most inappropriate slogan ever. No, as we know, lots of journey’s simply do not matter at all – most of them by car admittedly
Bernard, motorists would be more popular if more of them observed the Highway Code and judges decided to permanently ban those that use their cars to commit murder.
Your claim that cycle lanes means bus drivers can’t overtake people cycling is at odds with observable reality