Happy Birthday to TfL, who are 25 years old today. Celebrations started in January with a panoply of posters highlighting past successes, also scattered silver roundels reminding Londoners that Every Journey Matters. But the actual birthday is today, a founding date shared with the Greater London Authority because they're 25 too. Greater London Authority Act finally kick in. Ken's levers at this time were few and his budget small, but all the powers and public scrutiny we now take for granted started here. building's since been sold off as housing - to be more precise 169 flats and a health club - and I wonder if the current occupant of Room AG16 realises how historic their apartment is. Agenda and the Minutes for that inaugural meeting, and indeed of every Board meeting since. London's transport had been centrally controlled since 1933 when the London Passenger Transport Board was formed, followed sequentially by the London Transport Executive, London Transport Board and London Regional Transport. To the general public they were long known simply as London Transport. 25 years ago saw a switch to the more user-friendly Transport for London, a name recognising that the Mayor and Board were working on behalf of Londoners. What's interesting here is the italicisation of 'for' in the name Transport for London, this on every mention in the minutes and even in the three-letter acronym. It's always TfL, never TfL, a really powerful branding statement which at some point in the subsequent years was summarily ditched. TfL is no longer quite so for London as on the day it was born. It's clear that those present recognised this was a new dawn for London's transport, both in terms of public accountability and the potential for improving the lives of Londoners. That said there were in fact two meetings on that first day, a public one and a private one, because there will always be sensitive topics better not shared. Traffic Director for London   Dial-a-Ride The biggest omission from that list, if you look carefully, was London Underground Limited. It would be 2003 before this was finally transferred across to TfL control. The tube was held back to allow the government time to set up a public–private partnership model separating out trains and infrastructure, a PPP model they knew Ken Livingstone would vehemently oppose. This he did but it went through anyway, at least until infracos failed to deliver and by 2010 everything would be back in house. Bob Kiley was appointed in the top role. Fares would be a focus of the second Board meeting on July 27th. Ken took issue with the government's assumption that fares should increase 1% in real terms in January 2001, instead sticking to inflation-based rises on the tube and a fares freeze on the buses. He also expressed an aspiration to introduce a flat fare for all buses across London, rather than £1 for journeys in Zone 1 and 70p elsewhere. Meanwhile a decision was made to end the right of senior TfL staff to a company car, "with appropriate compensation in negotiation with the individuals affected". From a lowly start in a Westminster meeting room to today's back-slapping celebrations, the last 25 years have seen TfL grow from a fledgling organisation still finding its feet to a world-class brand-obsessed innovator delivering better transport to millions. It's been quite the journey, but then Every Journey Matters.

45 45 Squared 23) GOLDEN SQUARE, W1 Borough of Westminster, 60m×60m central well-ish-known one for a change. Golden Square is one of Soho's largest public spaces, mainly due to a lack of public spaces rather than being particularly large. It lies east of Regent Street and south of Carnaby Street but is visible from neither, and as with most of Greater London it was once all fields. That field was called Geldings Close, presumably for its horsey occupants, and was first licenced for housing in 1673. Two landowners claimed the freehold and disagreed majorly on how to proceed, with a compromise plan eventually emerging from the office of Christopher Wren. The resulting square was eventually split between them, not quite symmetrically, and the connecting roads named James Street and John Street in their memory. » a very full history here (and on the six subsequent pages) Golden Square in 1720, but the subsequent growth of Mayfair lured these away and numbers dropped to two in 1730 and one in 1740. Next came the diplomatic envoys, hence a blue plaque at Number 23 recalls this being the Portuguese Embassy in the early 18th century, then a kind of reverse gentrification took place... first artists, then craftsmen, then boarding houses. By the time Dickens described it in the second chapter of Nicholas Nickleby it was a place of swarthy moustached men and itinerant glee-singers based round a mournful statue. Although a few members of the graver professions live about Golden Square, it is not exactly in anybody's way to or from anywhere. It is one of the squares that have been; a quarter of the town that has gone down in the world, and taken to letting lodgings. Many of its first and second floors are let, furnished, to single gentlemen; and it takes boarders besides. It is a great resort of foreigners. The dark-complexioned men who wear large rings, and heavy watch-guards, and bushy whiskers, and who congregate under the Opera Colonnade, and about the box-office in the season, between four and five in the afternoon, when they give away the orders,--all live in Golden Square, or within a street of it. It's not like that now. What changed at the end of the nineteenth century was the arrival of the woollen and worsted trade, attracted by proximity to London's tailors, who began to replace the original domestic buildings by larger office and warehouse blocks. And when they moved on Golden Square started to fill with media and creative types, so for example the north side now hosts outdoor overlords Clear Channel and the global HQ of advertising gurus M&C Saatchi. As an example of this inexorable transition Number 22 was first owned by a colonel, later a printseller, then became the showroom for a Huddersfield woollen mill and now houses The Film and TV Charity. Meanwhile Number 1's first owner was a lord, later a harpsichord maker, then a plate glass workshop and most recently Bauer Media, purveyors of Magic, Kiss, Absolute and Greatest Hits. The subjugation of UK local radio, it turns out, was plotted from the corner of Golden Square. George II, never a monarch Britain particularly liked, which it's said was donated to the square after a buyer accidentally bought it at auction. The beds of Damascena roses underneath are much more recent, planted in 2018 as "a gift to London from Bulgarian Londoners", and soften the ambience somewhat. Beyond that are empty urns, empty plinths and empty pingpong tables, hardly the most inspiring collection, and around the edge a ring of bogstandard benches just the right length to sleep on. I may not have seen the square at its best - I got the bin lorry and the minion affixing 'Parking Suspension' notices ahead of Pride - but I suspect it merely merits bronze status, not truly Golden.

20 things we learnt from TfL FoI requests in June 2025 1) Between April 2021 and March 2025, a fire alarm was activated at tube stations on 1102 occasions. 2) The final cost of installing lifts at Harrow-on-the-Hill station was £18.8m. This figure includes design and construction works. 3) Tube train doors do not open automatically. Train drivers press the door open buttons once the train has come to a complete stop at a platform. If the opening sequence were to begin prior to the train coming to a complete stop it could lead to unsafe situations. 4) The cycle lights where Bow Road meets the Bow Roundabout are connected to a Kerbside Detector, a (Radar) Stop Line Detector, a Push Button Unit and an In-Road Detector SCOOT Loop. 5) North Yorkshire police do not qualify for free travel on the TfL network. 6) Bermondsey, Cockfosters, Greenford, Hendon Central, Kilburn, Mill Hill East, Nine Elms, Oakwood, Old Street, Southfields, Tottenham Hale and Wimbledon Park are the tube stations with only one lift. 7) Five tube stations do not have push-button Passenger Help Points. 8) During the Notting Hill Carnival 14 cycle hire docking stations are suspended (a total of 314 docking points). 9) Meal vouchers with a value of £6 are issued to Train Operators on the Jubilee line during large Wembley Stadium events where 60,000 or more attend. The vouchers can only be used on selected items at staff canteens. Last year's total voucher spend was £23,000. 10) The three escalators at Woowich station broke down 67 times last year, just ahead of the three escalators at Whitechapel (65 times). 11) Since October 2024 the daily rate at Epping Car Park has increased twice from £7.50 to £10 and then to £12. Apparently the October increase "closed the gap on market pricing" while the most recent increase "sets a standard by which we can annually review and adjust the amounts." 12) The three DLR routes that don't operate at weekends are Stratford–Lewisham, Stratford International-Beckton and Canning Town–Beckton. The only 3-car route is Bank-Lewisham. 13) There are approximately 14,000 cameras in London Underground stations and 7500 cameras onboard the trains. 14) TfL have not recorded any Birkin bags being handed into their lost property department over the past five years. 15) The ticket machines at Bow Road station can sell tickets to 803 National Rail destinations (ranging alphabetically from Abbey Wood to Yalding). 16) In the last financial year, TfL's Track Network Service cast 2436 Aluminothermic welds, 2192 MMA weld repairs and 200 Head Wash welds. TfL do not own any mobile flash-butt machines, instead manufacturing flash-butt welds inhouse at Ruislip depot. 17) The next tube map release is planned for Monday 7th July 2025. 18) Someone requested a pdf copy of the final edition of the paper TfL cycle maps that were published up to 2018. TfL's FOI Case Officer replied "I can confirm that we hold the information you require", then shared a zipfile of irrelevant cycle superhighway diagrams, sigh. 19) In the last financial year TfL issued 13,118 penalty fares on the Underground and prosecuted 3691 passengers. On the Overground they issued 12,527 penalty fares and made 3044 prosecutions. 20) Remember that TfL will only answer appropriate questions. If you ask "Do you not care about the residents having to walk through Canning Town station at night? It is so unsafe and smells like piss all the time?" TfL will reply "This is not a request for recorded information under the terms of the Freedom of Information Act."

30 unblogged things I did in June Sun 1: My Dad hasn't had any answerphone messages for three weeks since BT switched him to Digital Voice, the internet-based phone connection. We tried to work out why this might be, and were surprised/shocked to discover that as part of the package you get transferred to a free BT Voicemail service. The only way to tell you have a message is to notice you have "an interrupted dial tone", i.e. you have to keep checking your phone just in case, then you have to dial 1571. This is inherently ineffective, especially when you're used to just walking into the room and seeing a red light flash. He told BT to turn this ridiculous freebie off which they promptly did, only to discover that 7 people had left a message during the hiatus and he will never ever know what they said. Madness. Mon 2: Supermarket update: I noticed that 9-packs of Kit-Kats were 'reduced to clear' so bought up several, having guessed what was inevitably coming next. True to form they returned to the shelves as 8-packs of Kit Kats but at the same price - i.e. a miserably cynical 12½% price rise. Shrinkflation strikes again. Tue 3: I stepped onto a train at one of London's least used stations, and I think that was my old boss sitting closest to the doorway but I wasn't sure and he didn't say anything. He didn't have his [Peach] with him otherwise I'd have been certain. We'd only have ended up discussing [Melon] anyway, so no great loss. Wed 4: At the library, Richard Osman's latest novel has finally reached the "there's always a copy on the shelf" stage rather than requiring a reservation. Only took 9 months. It's not as good as the Thursday Murder Club series either, sorry. Thu 5: BestMate'sOtherHalf now has four snakes living in a tank in the bedroom, and today I was proudly shown the skins they've just shed and how two of them aren't eating. Fri 6: While I was out today I thought "I wonder if this is one of the shortest platforms in London" but I wasn't sure how to check and I suspect that's a topic for another day. Sat 7: One of my neighbours decided to have a loud houseparty into the early hours, and I don't think it's a coincidence there was a brief power cut just before midnight. Sun 8: A bird very nearly walked onto my train in Epping but then walked off, and on some people's social media feeds this is what counts as top content. Mon 9: I've been told that an 11-year-old mains-powered smoke alarm is officially 'beyond its expiry date', despite not having an expiry date printed on it, and I beg to differ. Tue 10: Around lunchtime this blog received its 14 millionth visitor. And just 10½ months since the 13 millionth visitor, which'll be the fastest million yet, which is lovely. Thanks a million Wed 11: Amongst the slew of absolute tosh written about the so-called Strawberry Moon, yes it may be the lowest full moon in 19 years but that doesn't make it worth going out to look at. Every full moon reaches this height in the sky, every single one, before rising a bit higher. Even the BBC joined the insane urging to view this 'rare phenomenon', which it absolutely wasn't, and please could news desks employ folk with a basic understanding of science? Thu 12: The album from my nephew's wedding dropped today, not a luxury keepsake book but a scrollable online collection with over 1000 downloadable images. Everyone looks happy, beaming and natural, apart from the 30 shots I appear in which look entirely unlifelike... oh god, this is what getting inexorably older feels like. Fri 13: I finally finished last Christmas's chocolate-based presents which I've been eating one chunk at a time since the start of the year. I'm not sure they'd have survived the upcoming heatwaves anyway. Sat 14: I was on the Liberty line between Romford and Upminster when two inspectors boarded the train and checked everyone's tickets. So yes TfL are taking fare dodging seriously, but there must be far more productive places to check. Sun 15: One of my childhood homes is up for sale, much-extended, at a shocking price. My jaw dropped looking at the photos in the brochure (the new kitchen island is bigger than our kitchen) and wept looking at the garden (everything ripped out in favour of a tiered "low-maintenance entertainment space"). Mon 16: If you have a 60+ Oyster card I can confirm there are only two stations within the zone of validity where the card doesn't open the ticket gates. They are a) Shenfield and b) Cheshunt. Both are run by Greater Anglia, whose staff will happily wave you through the gate if you ask, but no other train company is as cynical. Tue 17: As part of London Rivers Week they opened up the Clerks' Well in Clerkenwell to public view. It was only for three hours one Tuesday afternoon but scores of people visited the tiny vestibule to look down into history, and I hope the nice folk at Islington Museum have taken the hint and will do this more often. Wed 18: The bus stop at Seething Wells in Surbiton has a roundel flag and five tiles underneath, all of them non-TfL services, and I wondered if this is unique inside London. Thu 19: The new episode of Poetry Please, in which Roger McGough interviews Antony Szmierek, is the most delightful Radio 4/Radio 6Music cultural collision. Antony's going far. Fri 20: Eighteen months ago I started my quest to spot all the numberplate letter pairs from AA to YY. I'm delighted to say I've now spotted 518 out of 519, having finally seen UE on a black Toyota passing Bromley-by-Bow station. That just leaves UV and then I'm done, although based on experimental evidence the odds aren't looking good for a swift conclusion. Sat 21: Upminster's former pitch and putt was sold off by the council in 2021 and is now Kings Green, "a collection of exquisite detached homes set within a private community" where you can "step into a realm of opulence", and it seems that even when we do build on golf courses we waste the opportunity. Sun 22: They showed Saltburn on BBC1 this evening, the much-hyped jawdropping film previously only available on Amazon Prime. Why subscribe at £8.99 a month when all you have to do is wait 18 months and watch for nothing? Mon 23: I rewatched 28 Days Later tonight, now its sequel's sequel is in cinemas, and as well as being a great film it's also a excellent visual record of millennial central London. Tue 24: I think I saw Emma Thompson this afternoon, crossing City Island near the English National Ballet. You don't get many Dames in Canning Town. Wed 25: The shanty town under the Bow Flyover has been removed. I saw three ominous trucks parked alongside yesterday and now the entire rickety shelter has vanished, even the barbecue annexe in the middle of the roundabout. I'm amazed it lasted four months. Thu 26: According to the latest ONS data the population of Tower Hamlets is projected to increase by 20.4% between 2022 and 2032, the fastest increase in England. If true it'll then be the 4th most populous borough in London, up from 10th in 2021, up from 17th in 2011, up from 23rd in 2001, up from 28th in 1991. Bottom 5 to top 5 in four decades flat. Fri 27: I said last week that the intrusive building site at Stroudley Walk might lead to the premature demise of a local business and today coffee shop Posted threw in the towel. Officially they're 'hitting the pause button' until everything's 'looking fresh and fabulous again', but that could be ages and fingers crossed they return. Sat 28: The Atlantic World Gallery in the National Maritime Museum is being upgraded to show more stories of oppression, resistance, trauma and joy, rather than just a spin round the slave trade, and now ends with a 'reflective space' with books and beanbags. Sun 29: I love Glastonbury weekend, the huge slew of artists on TV for free without having to camp in a field and pee in a plastic loo. I watched the full sets by Supergrass, The 1975, Scissor Sisters, Pulp, The Prodigy, Ezra Collective, Rod Stewart, Self Esteem, Gary Numan, Lewis Capaldi, Caribou, Franz Ferdinand, Olivia Rodrigo, Loyle Carner, English Teacher, Charlie xcx, Four Tet and Kae Tempest, and quite a lot of Wet Leg, Japanese Breakfast and Black Country New Road. Roll on 2027. Mon 30: Yesterday's post, 'A Nice Walk', was actually about the Western Loop of the Jubilee Walkway. Paragraph 1 was Leicester Square, P2 was Trafalgar Square, P3 was St James's Park, P4 was Parliament Square, P5-7 were the South Bank from Lambeth Bridge to the Tate Modern, P8 was St Paul's/Fleet Street, P9 was Lincoln's Inn Fields and P10 was Covent Garden. It is a very nice walk.

A Nice Walk: A London Loop (6 miles) Sometimes you just want to go for a nice walk, nothing too taxing, leafy shade, river valleys, wildlife-adjacent, pretty views, a bit of heritage, a bit of a stroll, won't take all day. So here's a scenic loop some distance from the centre of London, not excessively arduous but a nice walk all the same. . Start your watch, we should be back here within three hours. Ahead is one of the finest green spaces on the walk, several acres with a full right to roam, although our designated path sticks to one side. I spy ducks, geese and swans and also get to dodge occasional fallen branches. Someone's put a lot of effort into their cottage garden with hollyhocks and sunflowers all ablaze, also pristine vegetable beds boasting runner beans, rhubarb and marrows. Mind the nettles beside the path. Now that's unfortunate - an old red phonebox with a jammed door and a broken glass pane through which has been posted an ugly pile of bottles and other litter. A waymarker atop a pole confirms I'm on the right track but also exudes an air of local irrelevance, also the map at its foot has faded since Neville installed it. Full steam ahead past plants with spiky fronds, also a squat conifer where bees hunt nectar deep in its bright pink flowers. I wouldn't have known that tree was a Mediterranean oak if it didn't have a plaque underneath. A family cycles by with what looks like a picnic scattered across their collective baskets. Occasionally there are raised benches to sit on, generally empty, but also an abandoned pushchair and what looks like a septic tank so best walk on. Someone's written "Big Dave Foxcroft - LEGEND" on the wall, also "Wilma is one of a kind" - she gets two mentions. For wildlife watchers a lone seagull sits on a post, a crow swoops off with a beakful of something, a butterfly emerges fom the undergrowth and the lamps have a patina of spider's web. Across the stream is a large house with what sounds like an alarm blaring non-stop. . This section of the walk is blessed with fine gardens flowering with some kind of large daisy, also something purple and heatherish, also deep holly but no barbecues please. The water's edge is littered with half-bricks and half-pipes, meanwhile the water ripples with occasional twigs and bottles. A phone mast is visible in a gap between the rooftops on the horizon. My favourite passing t-shirt is 'Made In The North, Forged In Gravy', just ahead of 'Catzilla Ate My Hamster'. The path broadens on the far side as it approaches a quiet road with a seemingly-unnecessary pedestrian crossing. The subsequent climb looks like it's approaching another churchyard but bears left prematurely past a cluster of Christmas trees to skirt the back door of the building instead. Spring's flowers may have faded but the hanging baskets here are a persistent riot of colour as the path drops gently into a separate river valley. Don't expect to see any water this time, not in the current climate. The pub by the crossroads offers a choice of proper roast or Vegan Wellington. The largest open space is of course pencilled in for commercial development, even out here. It is indeed a properly scenic spot but the majority of Londoners live nowhere nearby. Ian Visits blog I am fortuitously able to tell her. The path weaves more contortedly now, eventually entering a large field with holly hedges, shady oaks and group of friends enjoying a summer picnic. On the far side I pass a man dressed as a monk, also two sturdy men in Iron Maiden t-shirts, before crossing the busiest road on the walk so far. The whiff of sewage is intermittently apparent, also an outburst of shrubbery, also an ambulance sadly on call. Three agricultural carts have been repurposed and topped with potted plants which I consider to be very pleasant. Threading onwards passers-by now outnumber trees and hedgesparrows are less common. I have to hand it to the walk's creators, I don't think I've been down this alleyway before despite coming mighty close, although I don't like how it smells of wee. Initially I miss the penultimate alley because the waymarkers have failed again, or maybe I just wasn't looking carefully enough. On the final approach a lemon has made a bolt for freedom, also I swear those sunflowers are fake. And on returning to my starting point I see someone's now arranged a rows of deckchairs across the grass where I expected the information board would be so how would anyone know a walk starts here? They launched this circuit with such high hopes but I bet I'm the only person to have followed it today, which is a damned shame given the inherent glories of this corner of the capital.