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25 things we (genuinely) learnt from TfL FoI requests in March 2025 1) Only two refurbished Central line trains have so far entered service. Three more are planned to enter service by January 2026. The overall programme is planned to complete in 2029. 2) Seat cushions on Victoria line trains are made up from moquette, firebarrier, anti-vandal mesh and graphite foam. 3) There are no current plans to re-open the Waterloo and City line on Saturdays. 4) TfL currently owns 998 New Routemaster vehicles because two have been withdrawn. LT174 was withdrawn in May 2022 after being involved in a fire and LT045 was withdrawn in July 2022 after being involved in an accident. 5) TfL's bus fleet includes 1750 single decker diesels and 1400 double decker diesels. 700 electric single deckers are in use, with about 300 more due to enter service over the next 12 months. 6) TfL is responsible for 6500 sets of traffic signals, of which 248 have fixed traffic light cameras. 7) Excluding schoolbuses, nightbuses and mobility buses, the ten buses most likely to run late are the 492, 273, 228, 42, 246, 225, H28, 223, S1 and 367. 8) Over the last year, the lift with the most outages was Lift 8 at Stratford station (103 outages) and the lift with the most time out of service was Lift 1 at Canary Wharf Crossrail station (3216 hours). 9) Since the closure of Hammersmith Bridge, traffic flow on Putney Bridge has remained stable, traffic flow on Kew Bridge has recovered to 2018 levels and traffic flow on both Chiswick and Wandsworth Bridges has experienced a steady decline. 10) Last year only one passenger travelled from Amersham to Emerson Park, from Enfield Town to North Dulwich or from Ickenham to Chessington North. 11) During 2023 there were 652 'soiled saloon' incidents on the Underground (spillages, vomit, glass, etc) which required the train to be cleaned or taken out of service. 32% of these were on the Northern line and 25% were on a Saturday. 12) TfL has no plans at present to stop printing the pocket tube map. The next is due to be issued in early July 2025 and will have a 12 month life span. 13) TfL hopes to proceed with the introduction of a permanent female voice on the refurbished Bakerloo and Central line fleet as soon as possible to replace the current test voice. This female voice "will better reflect our customer research findings". 14) In 2023 the Lost Property Office recorded one set of false teeth, six sex toys and 23 wigs. 15) In 2024 TfL enforcement officers reprimanded two individuals for singing or playing music without permission. In one case a warning was issued and in the other no further action was taken. Neither was prosecuted. 16) In 2024 passengers on the Central line made 1906 complaints about the temperature, more than on any other line. January was the peak month for complaints. 17) In the financial year 2023/24 the total sale of paper One Day Bus & Tram Passes from Tube stations was 84,661. They are now only available from Oyster Ticket Stops. 18) TfL are considering integrating Oyster with Apple wallets but do not yet have a viable business case. Card readers on buses and in stations would need to be updated. This project is in-flight but will take a further 3-4 years to deliver. There are no plans to integrate the 60+ card with Apple Pay. 19) £1.27m has been spent improving Walthamstow Bus Station after "the incident" that took place last year. 20) There are no plans at present to replace the diversity pedestrian green signals installed around Trafalgar Square. A thorough risk assessment deemed them safe for use as they only apply to the green aspect. 21) Seats across the Underground fleet are brushed and checked daily prior and post going into service. The seats are also further cleaned and hoovered every 28 days, with the Northern Line also receiving an annual steam clean due to the levels of dirt and dust being seen. 22) Celebrations marking TfL's 25th anniversary are expected to cost around £90k and will be funded via sponsorship. The cost to produce 40,000 pin badges was £23,965 +VAT and is covered through TfL's normal Employee Communications budget. 23) On the DLR, direct trains between Stratford International and Beckton only run on weekdays between 10am and 4pm and between 7.30pm and 11.30pm. 24) As far as TfL are aware, they did not exercise any compulsory powers of purchase pursuant to the Croxley Rail Link Order 2013. 25) The Silvertown Cycle Shuttle bus will have space for four standard bikes, one adaptive bike, four folding bikes and five folding e-bikes. If no adaptive bikes are present, up to four standard bikes can use its space.

25 things we learnt from TfL FoI requests in March 2025 1) On average the seat moquette on a New Routemaster bus lasts 7.3 years before replacement. Used moquette is recycled by foreign aid charities. 2) Only 0.003% of Elizabeth Line journeys result in Delay Repay payments even though 1.7% would be eligible. 3) In 2024 the bus routes generating the most advertising revenue through the use of full-coverage vinyl wraps were the 137 (£465,000), the 8 (£427,500) and the 103 (£388,000). 4) For fare payment, Oyster cards were overtaken by contactless cards in February 2018, by smartphones in August 2022 and by smartwatches in December 2024. 5) The thickness of the printed tube map has decreased from 0.17mm in June 2016 to 0.09mm in December 2024. 6) Only three Croydon trams have been officially named - Dame Janet Wiseman, Femi Mahmood and Henry Banks CBE. 7) The oldest passenger lift still in use on the Underground is Lift 3 at Caledonian Road which was installed on 17th October 1936. The newest is the mezzanine lift at Paddington's new Bakerloo line entrance. 8) There are 5017 ULEZ cameras in London, of which 143 have each raised more than £1m in fines. 9) According to traffic counts, the busiest Cycleways over the last twelve months have been C3, C5, C2, C6, CS7, C57, C1, C4, C58 and C90. 10) Since April 2024 there have been 612 incidents involving bus lanes blocked by dockless e-bikes causing a total of 185,263 lost passenger hours. 11) Last year 7% of contactless journeys were incomplete (either no touch-in, no touch-out or both). 12) The middle carriage of a 5-car Overground train is 18mm wider than the other carriages to accommodate air cooling power systems. 13) For taxi drivers learning The Knowledge the most northerly Point of interest is Wood Green Highway, the most easterly is Trinity Buoy Wharf, the most southerly is Streatham Masonic Lodge, and the most westerly is Acton Waitrose. 14) During the financial year 2021/22 there were 16,738 incidents of roadworks on London's roads, 32% of which have subsequently been re-dug by the same utility company. 15) In 2023 the tube station with the highest recorded number of mouse sightings on its platforms was Piccadilly Circus. The peak time of day for sightings was between 10pm and 11pm. 16) Colours considered for the six new Overground lines, but not used, include Primrose Yellow (Pantone 115), Robin's Egg (Pantone 304), Heliotrope (Pantone 513), Laundry Grey (Pantone 421), Lobster Cardinal (Pantone 184) and Hepzibah's Shawl (Pantone 437). 17) Potholes on London bus routes are repaired on average 16 weeks before potholes on other roads. 18) The widest gap between the train and the platform on the London Underground is 279mm at Tower Hill (westbound). The narrowest is 3mm at Colindale (northbound). 19) The bus route with the greatest difference in air quality between its termini is the 14 (Russell Square 22.7µg/m3 NO2, Putney Heath 3.6µg/m3 NO2). 20) In 2024 the Woolwich Ferry operated 18,851 northbound river crossings and 15,964 southbound river crossings. 21) 17% of TfL office staff work from home at least two days a week, and 23% at least three days a week. 22) The Silvertown Tunnel contains eighteen '20' speed limit signs and sixteen '30' speed limit signs because the limit changes midway as traffic passes between the boroughs of Newham and Greenwich. 23) 56% of Underground tunnels now have 4G mobile coverage. This is anticipated to double by 2029. 24) The passenger display screens inside the 94 new Piccadilly line trains will be limited to showing adverts no more than 33% of the time. 25) A scrolling London bus map is expected to be added to the TfL Go app in March 2026.

One of the key drivers behind London’s bus network is that 95% of the population should live within 400m of a bus route. There are indeed very few residential holes, at least with any significant population, as I documented in a past post called “Where in London is furthest from a bus route?”. Now two significant developments are filling two of those holes, one potentially via a new consultation, the other extending yesterday into unbussed territory. Hurrah for the SL12 and 434. not loopy, merely attaching to the existing network at the Gants Hill roundabout before bearing off to Romford and swooshing down towards Rainham. The first half shadows route 66 along Eastern Avenue but stops less often, and the second creates a fast north-south link the borough sorely lacks. It's all good, just so long as nobody cuts the frequency of the existing 66 and makes life worse for the people of Redbridge. And best of all, or perhaps most remarkably, it helps fills the London's largest busless hole on the godforsaken Rainham Marshes. Meanwhile, south of Purley, another peripheral gap has just being plugged. The heights of Kenley have never seen a bus service before, not because it's difficult to get a bus up there but because it's difficult to get it out again. In 2020 TfL proposed a solution by diverting new route 439 up to the top and weaving it round quiet suburban avenues to turn it round, taking one hill in and one hill out. They eventually decided to send the existing 434 up there instead, then discovered it was harder than they thought to get it round all the corners which delayed things by twelve months. The final solution has required the painting of yellow lines round several awkward bends on Wattendon Road, whose residents could never have imagined a red bus weaving between their parked cars when they bought their outlying bungalows. Now here it is. here where nobody will see either. See how the 407 runs along one side of the railway, the 439 runs along the other and the 434 now dawdles invisibly around the heights. It'll be noticed and welcomed eventually, another hole filled.