Harry Beck presented the first diagram of the Underground map, basing his design on an electrical circuit. Members of the public spent entire nights sleeping on the platforms to avoid the bombs which were falling on the Capital above them. In , it was the first year that one billion used the underground in just one year. The tube has come a long way in years, with the most recent development being Crossrail. The new Elizabeth line, named after the queen, will stretch over 60 miles from Reading and Heathrow in the West, through the central tunnels and across to Shenfield and Abbey Wood in the East.
London TravelWatch, a body appointed by and reporting to the Assembly, deals with complaints about transport in London. See the Wikipedia page [1]. Author- User: Sameboat. Until there was a twelfth line, the East London Line , but this closed for conversion work and was transferred to the London Overground when it reopened in Prior to its transfer to the London Underground in , the Waterloo and City line was operated by British Rail and its mainline predecessors.
The line fist began appearing on most tube maps, from the mids. Lines on the Underground can be classified into two types: subsurface and deep-level. The subsurface lines were dug by the cut-and-cover method, with the tracks running about 5 m 16 ft 5 in below the surface. The deep-level or tube lines, bored using a tunnelling shield, run about 20 m 65 ft 7 in below the surface although this varies considerably , with each track in a separate tunnel.
These tunnels can have a diameter as small as 3. Lines of both types usually emerge onto the surface outside the central area. While the tube lines are for the most part self-contained, the subsurface lines are part of an interconnected network: each shares track with at least two other lines. The subsurface arrangement is similar to the New York City Subway, which also runs separate "lines" over shared tracks. P stock in red with R Stock at Upminster.
Photographed by SPSmiler. The Underground uses rolling stock built between and Stock on subsurface lines is identified by a letter such as A Stock, used on the Metropolitan line , while tube stock is identified by the year in which it was designed for example, Stock, used on the Jubilee line. All lines are worked by a single type of stock except the District line, which uses both C and D Stock. Two types of stock are currently being developed — Stock for the Victoria line and S stock for the subsurface lines, with the Metropolitan line A Stock being replaced first.
Rollout of both is expected to begin about In addition to the Electric Multiple Units described above, there is engineering stock, such as ballast trains and brake vans, identified by a letter prefix then a number. The Underground is one of the few networks in the world that uses a four-rail system.
The additional rail carries the electrical return that on third-rail and overhead networks is provided by the running rails. The Deep Tube Programme, is investigating into replacing the trains for the Bakerloo and Piccadilly lines. It is also looking for trains with better energy conservation and regenerative braking.
The number of below ground stations will rise from to once new stations are built at Nine Elms, Battersea Park and Watford High Street which is already on the London Overground. The number of overground stations will rise from to with the opening of the Cassiobridge, Watford JCN and Watford Vicarage Road stations along with the closure of the little used current Watford tube station.
North Acton station is in a cutting. Southgate station is in it's own short tunnelled section. Posters may be observed on the Underground network advising that passengers carry a bottle of water to help keep cool. There are many planned improvements to the London Underground. A new station opened on the Piccadilly line at Heathrow Airport Terminal 5 on 27 March and is the first extension of the London Underground since Each line is being upgraded to improve capacity and reliability, with new computerised signalling, automatic train operation ATO , track replacement and station refurbishment, and, where needed, new rolling stock.
A trial programme for a groundwater cooling system in Victoria station took place in and ; it aimed to determine whether such a system would be feasible and effective if in widespread use. Although not part of London Underground, the Crossrail scheme will provide a new route across central London integrated with the tube network. The long proposed Chelsea-Hackney line, which is planned to begin operation in , may be part of the London Underground, which would mean it would give the network a new Northeast to South cross London line to provide more interchanges with other lines and relieve overcrowding on other lines.
However it is still on the drawing board. It was first proposed in and has been in planning since then. Therefore, the line may be either part of the London Underground network or the National Rail network. There are advantages and disadvantages for both. The Croxley Rail Link proposal envisages diverting the Metropolitan line Watford branch to Watford Junction station along a disused railway track. The project awaits funding from Hertfordshire County Council and the Department for Transport, and remains at the proposal stage.
The Underground uses TfL's Travelcard zones to calculate fares. Greater London is divided into 6 zones; Zone 1 is the most central, with a boundary just beyond the Circle line, and Zone 6 is the outermost and includes London Heathrow Airport. Stations on the Metropolitan line outside Greater London are in Zones Watford Junction is outside these zones and special fares apply.
There are staffed ticket offices, some open for limited periods only, and ticket machines usable at any time. Some machines that sell a limited range of tickets accept coins only, other touch-screen machines accept coins and banknotes, and usually give change. These machines also accept major credit and debit cards: some newer machines accept cards only.
More recently, TfL has introduced the Oyster card, a smartcard with an embedded contactless RFID chip, that travellers can obtain, charge with credit, and use to pay for travel. The Oyster card is cheaper to operate than cash ticketing or the older-style magnetic-strip-based Travelcards, and the Underground is encouraging passengers to use Oyster cards instead of Travelcards and cash on buses by implementing significant price differences.
Oyster-based Travelcards can be used on National Rail throughout London. Pay as you go is available on a restricted, but increasing, number of routes. For tourists or other non-residents, not needing to travel in the morning peak period, the all day travelcard is the best ticketing option available.
These are available from any underground station. Travel cards for multiple days are also available. In addition to automatic and staffed ticket gates, the Underground is patrolled by both uniformed and plain-clothes ticket inspectors with hand-held Oyster card readers.
In addition, an Oyster card user who has failed to touch in at the start of their journey and who is detected mid-journey i.
While the Conditions of Carriage require period Travelcard holders to touch in and touch out at the start and end of their journey, any Oystercard user who has a valid period Travelcard covering their entire journey is not liable to pay a Penalty fare where they have not touched in. Neither the Conditions of Carriage or Schedule 17 of the Greater London Authority Act , which shows how and when Penalty fares can be issued, would allow the issuing of a Penalty fare to a traveler who had already paid the correct fare for their journey.
According to statistics obtained under the Freedom of Information Act, the average commuter on the Metropolitan line wasted three days, 10 hours and 25 minutes in due to delays not including missed connections. Between 17 September and 14 October , figures show that train services were delayed by more than 15 minutes.
Passengers are entitled to a refund if their journey is delayed by 15 minutes or more due to circumstances within the control of TfL. The Underground does not run 24 hours a day except at New Year and major public events - such as the Queen's Golden Jubilee in and the Opening and Closing Ceremonies of the London Olympics in because most lines have only two tracks one in each direction and therefore need to close at night for planned maintenance work.
First trains start operating around , running until around Unlike systems such as the New York City Subway, few parts of the Underground have express tracks that allow trains to be routed around maintenance sites. Recently, greater use has been made of weekend closures of parts of the system for scheduled engineering work. Accessibility by people with mobility issues was not considered when most of the system was built, and most older stations are inaccessible to disabled people.
More recent stations were designed for accessibility, but retrofitting accessibility features to old stations is at best prohibitively expensive and technically extremely difficult, and often impossible. Even when there are already escalators or lifts, there are often steps between the lift or escalator landings and the platforms. Most stations on the surface have at least a short flight of stairs to gain access from street level, and the great majority of below-ground stations require use of stairs or some of the system's escalators each going at a speed of ft 44 m per minute, approximately 1.
There are also some lengthy walks and further flights of steps required to gain access to platforms. The emergency stairs at Covent Garden station have steps the equivalent climbing a storey building to reach the exit, so passengers are advised to use the lifts as climbing the steps can be dangerous. The escalators in Underground stations include some of the longest in Europe, and all are custom-built. The longest escalator is at Angel station, 60 m ft long, with a vertical rise of Convention and signage stipulate that people using escalators on the Underground stand on the right-hand side so as not to obstruct those who walk past them on the left.
TfL produces a map indicating which stations are accessible, and since line maps indicate with a wheelchair symbol those stations that provide step-free access from street level. Step height from platform to train is up to mm Only the Jubilee Line Extension is completely accessible. TfL plans that by there should be a network of over fully accessible stations, consists of those recently built or rebuilt, and a handful of suburban stations that happen to have level access, along with selected 'key stations', which will be rebuilt.
Overcrowding on the Underground has been of concern for years and is very much the norm for most commuters especially during the morning and evening rush hours. Stations which particularly have a problem include Camden Town station and Covent Garden, which have access restrictions at certain times. Restrictions are introduced at other stations when necessary.
Several stations have been rebuilt to deal with overcrowding issues, with Clapham Common and Clapham North on the Northern line being the last remaining stations with a single narrow platform with tracks on both sides. At particularly busy occasions, such as football matches, British Transport Police may be present to help with overcrowding. On 24 September King's Cross underground station was totally closed due to "overcrowding".
According to a House of Commons report, commuters face a "daily trauma" and are forced to travel in "intolerable conditions". Wooden escalators at Greenford tube station in , similar to those that caught fire at King's Cross. The escalator was eventually decommissioned on 10 March to give the station step-free access. Accidents on the Underground network, which carries around a billion passengers a year, are rare. There is one fatal accident for every million journeys. There are several safety warnings given to passengers, such as the 'mind the gap' announcement and the regular announcements for passengers to keep behind the yellow line.
Relatively few accidents are caused by overcrowding on the platforms, and staff monitor platforms and passageways at busy times prevent people entering the system if they become overcrowded. Most fatalities on the network are suicides. Most platforms at deep tube stations have pits beneath the track, originally constructed to aid drainage of water from the platforms, but they also help prevent death or serious injury when a passenger falls or jumps in front of a train.
The subsequent public inquiry determined that the fire had started due to a lit match being dropped onto the escalator a 48 year old wooden escalator serving the Piccadilly line and 15 minutes after being reported, as the first members of the London Fire Brigade were investigating, the fire flashed over, filling the underground ticket office with heat and smoke.
It had suddenly increased in intensity over those 15 minuets due to a previously unknown trench effect. All wooden escalators were replaced in the years following the King's Cross fire in and smoking was banned by Not registered? Register here. Or that the network has stations and 11 lines? Love it or hate it, the Tube network is essential for connecting Londoners, and there are number of surprising facts in its history.
The newest line to be built is the Jubilee Line, with the first section opening in and extending to the London Docklands in It will come as no surprise that Angel station has the longest escalator at 60 metres. This is nearly 15 times as long as the shortest escalator at Stratford, which measures just 4. The network is km long, with the longest continuous tunnel measuring
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