Overview

We are proposing to make changes to 33 bus routes, including alterations to night services and the introduction of a new route. These routes run across London, but the majority of changes take place in inner and central London.

These proposed changes would help to make the bus network simpler and more efficient and would ensure our resources are invested in the right locations.

These proposals are subject to a public consultation and we are keen to hear your thoughts on how these changes could impact on you.

The closing date for comments is Friday 9 November 2018.

Contents

What is proposed?

How will passengers be affected?

When would these changes start?

Have your say

What is proposed?

The way people travel around London is constantly changing. We need to have a public transport system that adapts to varying demand, while supporting economic growth and allowing Londoners to live, work and enjoy life in the Capital.

Buses play a unique role in the life of London. They are the most accessible form of public transport and they provide the widest and densest network of travel options for distances that are too long to walk or cycle. Good reliable bus services are fundamental to how our customers move around the city.

The bus network is crucial to London’s continued economic and social development, and will be vital in meeting the Mayor’s Transport Strategy target of 80 per cent of journeys being made using sustainable transport options by 2041.

In 2016 the Mayor introduced the Hopper fare which has already helped millions of passengers make affordable bus journeys across London. The Hopper fare allows Londoners to make multiple journeys within one hour at no extra cost.

The Mayor’s Transport Strategy also stated the importance of making the most of the flexibility of the bus network to reduce and remove existing services where they are no longer required in central and inner London and use this capacity to provide new or improved services in outer London.

Our investment in walking and cycling infrastructure, as well as improvements to the Overground and Tube network, is starting to change how our customers use the bus network.

Our customers are now finding that they have a number of new travel options that are quicker, easier and more accessible when compared to their existing bus journeys. This change in bus use is most pronounced in Central London and the map below illustrates how many people are using our buses and how this has changed considerably during the period 2014/15 – 2017/18.

Map 1 Change in bus capacity utilisation by Borough, 2014/15 – 2017/18

We are taking steps to address this decline in bus use in Central London. One way to address this is to improve our customer experience by tackling bus journey times and reliability. In Central London we are looking to prioritise buses on our roads. These measures will help make bus services better to use, but we recognise that more needs to be done to re-shape and improve the bus network in Central London.

To further address the fall in demand and improve customer experience we need to tackle specific challenges that exist with the bus network. These challenges include:

Parts of the network are inefficient - We are not currently making the best use of the bus network with some parts of Central London experiencing an over supply of buses when compared to customer demand. For example there are over 100 buses an hour travelling through Kingsway, with many buses running with significant excess capacity. Some services are unreliable – By running too many excess buses we add to the problem of congestion on London’s roads. Congestion not only slows down bus journey times but can also make our services less reliable. When services are slow and unreliable customers will look for alternative means of transport. Our network can be over complicated - where we have multiple routes serving the same area our customers can find it difficult to understand their best travel option. Customers need to understand which route offers them the fastest and most reliable service to their destination. Our resources are not deployed where they are needed most – One of the strengths of the bus network is that it can be adaptable and flexible when the needs of our customers change. This flexibility will allow us to reduce or remove services where demand is falling, while affording us the opportunity to re-shape the network where we see an increase in demand e.g. in Outer London where growth in housing is on the rise.

To start to address these challenges we are proposing to make changes to 34 bus routes, including alterations to a small number of night services and the introduction of a new route. These routes run across London, but the majority of changes take place in inner and central London.

These proposed changes would help to make the bus network simpler and more efficient and would ensure our resources are invested in the right locations.

These proposals are subject to a public consultation and we are keen to hear your thoughts on how these changes could impact on you. You can respond to the consultation and let us know your views on the proposed changes by completing the questionnaire on this website.

You can also submit a response by writing to us via email or post. Our email address is consultations@tfl.gov.uk and our postal address is FREEPOST TFL CONSULTATIONS.

The closing date for comments is Friday 9 November 2018.

Please get in touch using the details above if you would like this information in alternative formats.

The following sections describe our proposals in more detail.

How will passengers be affected?

We are planning to reshape the bus network to make it simpler and more efficient. We propose to do this by:

Restructuring routes

Curtailing i.e. shortening routes

Withdrawing 3 routes, or

Increasing or decreasing the frequency of the routes in scope

We are also proposing to introduce one new route.

Where we propose to shorten or withdraw a route, customers will need to change on to an alternative service to reach their intended destination. This can be done at no extra cost due to the Hopper fare, as long as the change is made within one hour of departure. We anticipate that only a small proportion of interchanges would fall outside of an hour, well under 1% of trips.

A summary of the routes in scope and the change that we propose can be seen below:

The impact of these changes would be an overall reduction in central and inner London bus kilometres of around 9 per cent. We anticipate that there would be a marginal increase in customer journey times of around 1 per cent. There may be greater increases for some of our customers and we would like to hear about any issues with your journey in your consultation response.

Where we propose a curtailment, route restructuring or withdrawal, some customers will need to change bus to reach their destination. We have designed these proposals to keep the number of these customer interchanges to a minimum.

To help ensure customers can interchange safely we:

Carefully plan interchanges and bus stop arrangements to make changing bus as simple as possible;

Focus any new route interchanges at locations that already provide good passenger facilities e.g. shelter, quality of information, and pavements wide enough to accommodate additional customers;

Work with boroughs to enhance signage, wayfinding and the public realm at existing and new interchanges if required; and

Brief bus drivers to ensure they are able to assist customers where new interchanges have been introduced.

We recognise that customers who would need to interchange may have some specific views on how this will impact on their journeys. We are keen to understand any journey specific issues that may arise. This feedback can be shared through the consultation process.

Overall, the routes that we propose changing cover nearly 500km of road in London. Of this, just 0.4 per cent of these roads (around 2km) would no longer be served by buses as a result of our proposed changes.

Impact on protected groups

We have undertaken an Equality Impact Assessment (EqIA). The EqIA examines what impact (positive or negative) all of the proposed route changes have on customers with characteristics protected by the Equality Act.

We consider the impacts of bus service change proposals on equality groups throughout the planning process, ensuring, where possible, effective mitigations are in place where no viable alternative is available. This EqIA can be found here.

We would like to hear your view on our EqIA and the mitigations it suggests. A question on the EqIA is included in our consultation survey.

Many of the proposed changes are connected so we have grouped them to make it easier to understand what is proposed. Using the links below you can find out more about each proposal.

Tottenham Court Road

Route 14

Route 134

King's Road, Piccadilly, Shaftesbury Ave nue

Route 9 and Route N9

Route 11

Route 19

Route 22

Route 311

Whitehall and Westminster Bridge

Route 3

Route 53

Waterloo to Fleet Street

Route 4

Route 172

Route 341

Euston Road

Route 59

Route 476

Marylebone Road

Route 205 and Route N205

Kingsway

Route 171

Kingsland Road

Route 67

Route 149

Route 242

Blackfriars and London Bridge

Route 35

Route 40

Route 45

Route 46

Route 76

Route 100

Route 388

Route 343

Route RV1

London Bridge and Hackney Road

Route 26

Route 48

Route 55

Holloway Road

Route 271 (night service)

When would these changes start?

If we decide following consultation to go ahead with these proposals then they could be introduced in spring 2019.

Have your say

We would like to know what you think about our proposals for the central London bus network

We will analyse and consider all of the responses received to the consultation, and publish our response in due course. We make our final decisions based on feedback received through the consultation alongside technical constraints and requirements, including financial, legal, safety and technical issues.

The timing and implementation of all the proposed changes are, of course, subject to the outcome of this consultation, further approvals and the availability of funding.

Please give us your views by completing the online survey below by Friday 9 November 2018.

Alternatively, you can:

Email us at consultations@tfl.gov.uk

or write to us at FREEPOST TFL CONSULTATIONS

You can also request paper copies of all the consultation materials and a response form by emailing consultations@tfl.gov.uk, writing to FREEPOST TFL CONSULTATIONS, or calling 0343 222 1155. Please get in touch using the details above if you would like information in alternative formats.