London Loop Line

From the Sydenham Society enewsletter:

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Goodbye to all direct trains between

Sydenham and Victoria?

During the pandemic, all trains on the direct “loop line” between London Bridge and Victoria (operated by Southern) were cancelled.

At the time, passengers may have been forgiven for believing that this was a temporary measure, designed to get us over the pandemic.

But the new timetable introduced in recent weeks by Southern tells a different story.

The “loop line” has disappeared permanently. In its place, passengers are advised to get a Southern train and change at Norwood Junction or travel to Crystal Palace on the Overground and change there.

This means inconvenient, long-drawn-out journeys with platform changes at an intermediate station. And it’s much slower - a journey between Sydenham and Gipsy Hill for example, (two stops up the line), now takes 21 minutes. You could walk between these two stations more quickly!

The Sydenham Society is organising a meeting with local MP Ellie Reeves to discuss this with Southern.

I’m all for putting pressure on Southern in anyway possible to get more of the London Bridge - Victoria service reinstated at the earliest opportunity. However I can’t help feeling it would be better if the @ForestHillSociety joined forces with the Sydenham Society for a joint meeting.with Ellie. The original loss of the service was raised with Ellie Reeves when she attended the FHS online AGM last year and she was going to write to Southern as she did with TfL about the number of weekends we were losing London Overground services to engineering work. Whilst she got a response from TfL I never heard of a response from Southern.

I note we have a peak time service to East Croydon again, or rather those services stop at Forest Hill now.

I wonder if the loop line was sacrificed for the services to / from East Croydon ?

Agree!
I’ve done the emailing as an individual to Southern, TFL, the Mayor Grant Schapps (I think the man was called who is an MP) but got nowhere.
We need someone to fight on our behalf as commuters because the service has been getting worse and worse.

But Peak time is actually a very short window.
I finished work at 6.45 today and just made the 19.10-had I not made that train it would have been a 30 min wait.
Peak should last until 8pm as more and more companies introduce flexible working and not every job is 9-5pm.
The West end is not 9-5 London is not a 9-5 city.
My colleague who lives in Eastbourne actually has a more regular train service than we do.

Regardless of what we all read in the nationals when it comes to rail franchises, Southern has to be the most gash company to travel with when it comes to commuting in London and the south east. Although more limited networks, I’ve always found South Eastern and Thameslink to be more reliable and less prone to weekend restrictions.

We discussed this at our Exec Committee meeting tonight. We’re working on it.

Good! It is outrageous I live in zone 3 and have to time leaving the office to make one of the two trains an hour I have home.

Given how overcrowded Canada Water gets at rush hour it is ridiculous to push more people that way. It is also a more stressful and longer journey.

I participated in a virtual conference this week where TfL Commissioner Andy Byford was a speaker. I asked about this in context would TfL seek to take over this line. It is a prime candidate to roll into TfL.

He responded that while TfL would like to take over the inner commuter lines, this was not a priority for them and they would not be pursuing this at this time.

I had to get the train home from Canada Water the other evening as I just missed the 19.40 and after an 11 hour working day couldn’t face waiting 30 mins at London Bridge.
Even at 19.50 on a Tuesday the Southbound overground platform was REALLY crowded
so much so I wondered if trains were cancelled or something.
Its deeply unpleasant.
And in the case of the interchange to the northbound Jubilee it feels unsafe.

Funny as they’re all owned by the same company, Govia.

Even worse: a morning change at Crystal Palace from Forest Hill en route to Clapham Junction/Victoria now has a 30+ minute wait rather than the 5-10 mins from previous timetable. So not only no direct trains, but the changeover is a nightmare too.

If you are going to Clapham Junction or Victoria I would give up on going via Crystal Palace. It is quicker to travel to East Croydon and change onto a fast train. back up to them. It is quicker than the direct train via Crystal Palace when it actually runs.

And coming back if you get the the Bognor train at Victoria at 05 and 35 past the hour there is a good connection at East Croydon back to Forest Hill.

This Evening I reached London Bridge at 18.05 and saw the trains to FH were 18.10 then 18.40 so it appears that in the evening (rush hour) they’re only every half hour.
downright depressing.
I emailed southern but zero response to my complaint.

In all seriousness, does anyone who emails Southern expect a productive response? I don’t bother because I appreciate that whichever poor sod who’s been lumbered with such a task has their hands tied by the threat of any litigation launched against their employer [Southern] if they make a mistake or PR blunder. Get used to the bottle neck at Canada Water, friends.

Max - I posted all the details when the new timetable came in so everyone would know that there was only going to be 2 trains an hour on weekdays from London Bridge including the evening peak . Here’s the details again:

London Bridge - Forest Hill (Weekdays)
The 0628, 0658, 0728, 0758, 0828, 0858, 0928, 1728, 1758, 1828, 1858, 1928 and 1958 will no longer operate. There will only be a half-hourly service at 10 and 40 minutes past each hour from 0610 to 2340 plus 2328, 2358 and 0035

.

It is indeed a very depressing backwards step. As someone fortunate enough to life the Catford side of Forest Hill I’ve started to use the trains back there in an evening. There’s 4 trains an hour and 2 of those only stop at Ladywell before Catford Bridge. Peak time overground, both morning and evening is just too busy.

I usually come home from Charing Cross. There are two trains an hour from Charing Cross to Catford Bridge. They are fast from London Bridge to Ladywell. Very nice!

There are four trains an hour from London Bridge to Catford Bridge. I get the bus back home. There are five busses that come my way. But those who live near Forest Hill station will probably need the 185 bus.

Thanks! I think I mis-understood thinking there would still be 4 trains per hour during peak times-obviously wishful thinking on my part.!

This is really poor and I agree with the sentiment about having to plan journeys a lot more.

Was the Victoria to LB service operational at all during various Covid lockdowns over the last 18 months? I’ve seen comments to say it was and also those saying it wasn’t.

Southern seem to blame staff shortages and lower passenger numbers based on their 6th September timetable announcement.

It’s very disappointing that Southern are running such a poor service… However if you do need to get to Victoria there are some rush hour direct services from Crofton Park into Victoria (it only stops at Denmark Hill and takes about 15-20mins). The train was fairly empty this morning.

The Victoria - London Bridge service which pre-Covid operated every 30 minutes 6 days a week (Monday - Saturday) hasn’t operated in full since Southern introduced an emergency timetable which from memory was quite soon after we went into the first lockdown.

In July 20 Southern added a few weekday morning and evening peak time services between Crystal Palace and London Bridge in each direction but these were removed from the timetable in February 21. In May 21 a few weekday morning and evening peak time services between Victoria and London Bridge in each direction were added to the the timetable in addition to a full Saturday service. Whilst the few Monday-Friday services were removed in the latest timetable change the full Saturday service is still operating.

Southern have been wanting to get rid of this service and save themselves some pennies for ages, let’s be honest.

When I used to get this route to and from work 5 years ago it was bloody dire at the best of times. It was always either cancelled or delayed. When it was delayed they made the passengers between Forest Hill and NCG suffer by chucking them off at Crystal Palace and then make them wait in the cold another 20mins for the next OG. Often they would chuck people off at Crystal Palace just as the OG was leaving the station just to thoroughly piss them off.

With the lack of tube lines in SE London you’d think TfL would bother to put more bus routes on or more frequent OG’s through FH.

Update on this - FHSoc have teamed up with SydSoc and we will be meeting with our MP and Southern to discuss this within the next few days.

As a side note, given there’s no fuel either, it’s 6.5 miles to Victoria, and there’s a lovely cycle route that takes you through Dulwich Park, Dulwich LTN aka Burbage Road, Railton Rd LTN, Brixton–>Stockwell bus lane and then Stockwell to Vauxhaul bus lane and then cycle lanes around Vauxhall pretty much all the way to Victoria. It’s my commute, and if anyone would like to buddy up and try it, I’d be happy to arrange a ride along with you. It’s a fairly leisurely 30-40 mins, quicker than trains or cars.

I should probably add to this that if anyone has any input in terms of constructive proposals to make on the matter then do feel free to contact me.

My thoughts are that at a high level, a loop line is critical for South London given that the other options are driving around the South Circular which is a joke, not in a funny way (especially in a fuel crisis), there are also no safe cycle routes around the centre, most transport is designed to go in/out. The only other option is the bus.

In terms of rail infrastructure I expect most of it is fixed cost so there’s a very small marginal cost of running extra trains - if a large portion of rail funding comes from fares then running fewer trains in fact reduces revenue so it makes no sense not to run these trains. If that’s not the case, then I would be interested in a real economic breakdown of running more trains on existing maintained track when the stations etc are already staffed.

I suspect that the issue really is the crossing over of trains across the two fast tracks through Forest Hill. This problem was solved at New Cross Gate by building the flyover. It may be that without trains crossing over eventually they will be able to schedule extra and more lucrative long distance and fast trains through to London Bridge.

To get from Forest Hill to Crystal Palace there is a flyover. Just after Sydenham the line branches off, climbs up then goes over a bridge over all four lines. There’s no physical limitation to it in either direction and they still have their original timetabled path (which is why currently you have up to 8 minutes between trains). It’s purely Southern withdrawing the service for whatever excuse they have.

I’ve been told it’s lack of drivers (my OH works for the railways - not Southern!).

I suspect this is not a profitable line, or not profitable enough. All transport companies will have seen huge loss of revenue during Covid, and will for a long time have a large deficit as less people travel into the office due to full time or hybrid working from home.

Good luck getting it, but of course if you did and it wasn’t profitable it would make things potentially harder.

I think it will be important to find the right points to argue, and those with greater legal understanding of the requirements on franchises will be best placed to assist, but I’d hope there is some stipulation over services they must run, and I think that might be the way to go. I don’t the profit angle is the one for this line, so I think it will need to obligations, public pressure, and maybe relief of pressure on other lines into London.

This is true, however you can get to Victoria by on the Overground, Jubilee and District lines in around 40 minutes which is not far off the Rail time from what I remember. So I think the argument here would be around relieving pressure on those lines, or increasing it without the Rail service, however I am unsure how busy those lines are during peak time post Covid.

As an aside I went into London on Friday and it was still fairly empty compared to pre-covid, so I expect companies will have to cut some services as they numbers are just not there, or they will need far more subsidies to keep certain lines running.

Good luck.

Clausy, what is the cycle route like to Dulwich park? Do you go along the south circular? I’m in the Perry Vale area and dislike hills/busy roads!

The London Loop is a very useful line for those with mobility or health issues, for whom changing lines (and even platforms at CP and Clapham Junction) is a worrying challenge.

That route is extremely busy at the times I travel into work - the jubilee line which has everybody already onboard from East London is the main culprit.

But it’s not the fact of just getting to Victoria it’s all the other lines in between Victoria and FH on the Southern route that we now can’t get to and it also reduces the amount of trains that go to London Bridge the other direction via FH. I used to have the option of getting the train home from London Bridge if I didn’t fancy the OG (which has been a lot recently because of how busy the OG is) and now I would have to wait 20minutes for the next train to FH. It has reduced a lot of travel options for FH commuters.

says our concerns are

I guess we can cross him off our list. Who appoints TFL Commissioners?

I think the tfl commissioner was appointed by the Mayor and the Board of TfL by a competitive application/ interview process.

In fairness he said that ‘taking over the line’ was not a priority. TfL board has very limited powers at present over Southern Rail or other services controlled or tendered by department of transport.

I’m not sure taking over the line should be a priority, even if it is my preferred option. TfL should prioritise the services they run, not those we would like them to run.

Well I suppose given the current finances of TfL they’ve got enough issues managing their current network so aren’t in a position to even think about taking on new routes. However as the government has effectively renationalised the railways during the pandemic and announced the creation of state-owned Great British Railways who will replace Network Rail in 2023 and control the contracting of all the railways in England maybe their is some hope for the future! The contracting will be modelled on TfL’s operation of contracting the services on all the London Overground routes.

It is a little difficult to talk about the franchising and relationship between DfT and TfL and the southern metro services without straying into politics. There was a thread about it on this site but as it strayed into politics I think it has been removed.

I would cover some of things I said in that thread but I don’t like it when sensible discussion is removed from the forum for being too political, so I’ll say no more on the subject other than, this is a politcal decision not a transport industry decision.

Looks like some good news about the London Bridge - Victoria peak hour services. As reported on the East Dulwich fourm, Helen Hayes MP received a letter from Southern which included the following: “In the next timetable change from Monday 13 December, we are planning to reintroduce the London Bridge to London Victoria service group in peak hours…”
https://www.eastdulwichforum.co.uk/forum/read.php?5,2222568,page=2

Those with the most effective representation get the best services

Was in the City this afternoon and thought easiest route home was direct train from London Bridge. Would have worked nicely only there weren’t any! Couldn’t see any disruption listed so didn’t seem like they were timetabled even. Can anyone confirm please?

It wasn’t listed I only guessed as much when I arrived at FH for my usual London Bridge service yesterday and saw none were listed on the board
It was only when I checked Chris R 's post re: weekend travel (which thank heavens are posted weekly but stupidly I forgot to check on Friday) that I saw the Southern service wasn’t running all weekend.

Ah thanks @maxrocks, that explains it, must look out for that. Strange not mentioned via National Rail app.

Update: FHSoc and SydSoc arranged a meeting with MP Ellie Reeves and representatives from Southern Rail including the Customer Services Director, and timetabling reps on Friday 5th to discuss ongoing concerns about the service.

News about the latest updates to the timetable’s planned changes here:

Its staying the same as at the present time from what I gather from this…Why oh why do they consider the evening rush-hour ends at 6.30?
they could extend until 7.30 at least!
I had high hopes for things returning to 4 trains an hour -of course the service is only 60% full because with a 30min wait if you miss a train (happens to me every evening) most people just opt for the overground.

As far as I know it’s not running weekdays at all at present and ‘rush hour’ would cover probably 70-80% of daily people traffic (they sent me some train usage stats, so I will dig these out when I have time to share). To be clear the hours are ball park - I assume rush hours are the same as the old bus lane times 7-10 and 4-7 so whatever services fit inside there.

Their normal staff absence rate (including holiday & sickness) is just under 10% and they’re at over 20% now, so it’s really mostly a driver supply issue on their side. Priority is to get services back as soon as practical but any drivers who have been out for a while need to be retrained/retested and lead times on new drivers are apparently around 18 months so it’s worse than the lorry driver issues.

Thanks for sharing.

Back from January for weekday rush hours and all day weekends is better than nothing.

Hopefully a second phase return happens in 2022 for those who need the line during the week in the day.

Thanks for the update Claus. It’s disappointing news from Southern although I can’t say I’m surprised given their track record the past 19 months!

As far as I can remember (and I’ve lived in Forest Hill over 30 years) the Victoria service has only ever been a Monday-Saturday service. At least though we have the Sunday only service between London Bridge and Crystal Palace, which is why unless there are engineering works we currently have 4 trains an hour from Forest Hill to London Bridge at weekends but only 2 trains an hour weekdays! However how do they expect passenger numbers to increase when they’re still not providing services that previously existed that customers would go back to using if they did! As @maxrocks has already indicated why would anyone wait up to 30 minutes at London Bridge to get home when they can get home quicker using the tube and Overground. I’ve also seen posts from local people for whom it’s quicker to use South Eastern from London Bridge to Catford Bridge and then buses than waiting for the next Southern service.

Southern’s advice is to travel to Norwood Junction and change there for trains to Victoria

I don’t understand their thought process. The only direct trains that operate between Norwood Junction and Victoria are the same services that we can connect to at Crystal Palace! Why would anyone want to change at Norwood Junction with a total journey time of 58 minutes from Forest Hill and no step free access between the relevant platforms when changing at Crystal Palace has a total journey time of 49 minutes and step free access between platforms (as long as the lifts aren’t out of service)? I guess they might only be considering their own Southern connections. The direct service has never been the quickest way of getting to/from Victoria but for many of us especially those with mobility issues or travelling with luggage it was just more convenient and comfortable. Without the direct service I’m finding it easier and quicker to change at East Croydon when I need to get to Victoria but then I’m lucky I have a 60+ Oystercard which covers all zones so I don’t have to worry that I’m travelling through zones 4 and 5 when Forest Hill to Victoria should only be a zone 1-3 journey.

In a previous post someone had said their Dulwich MP had been advised by Southern some additional Victoria services would be added from the December timetable which starts on December 12th. I know Victoria is going to be closed to all Southern services from December 25th to January 3rd which based on previous closures this year will probably mean we will lose all our London Bridge services completely for that period which would include the Victoria service. But that doesn’t explain why the additional Victoria services can’t be reinstated for the 2 weeks before December 25th.

Some great well informed points here and I agree with all of them.
This morning I had the misfortune of having to catch a train at around 8am to connect to the Jubilee (I usually travel around 30 mins later) the 8.03 (I think it was ) Overground was standing room only when I boarded and hideously (scarily in the light of Covid with many not in masks) Packed by the time we reached Brockley.
At Canada water the majority of us (myself included) streamed off the train to connect with the Jubilee-surely if there were more southern trains the overground and the poorly designed Canada water interchange would be less crammed leading to a safer and more comfortable journey for all concerned ?

I very much agree with you, but I guess the problem is that Southern is separate from TfL / Overground so putting on more local services to ease the Overground problems is not a priority for them. There concern being for the longer commuter routes into London, e.g. Redhill, Three Bridges etc.

My personal view is that the inner London Southern routes should be properly integrated into the rest of London Transport / TfL. But given the money problems that TfL has due to the pandemic, this is not likely.
Sorry not to be optomistic

They definitely said peak hour start on January 4th (Tuesday after bank holiday) to me which lines up with your Victoria closure over the holidays to Jan 3rd.

Agreed.

Also TfL should be putting on more frequent overground services considering it is the only TfL line for us.

I personally think that the H&Islington line to New Cross is pointless - the carriages are not even a quarter full. Won’t be a popular opinion to those who live there but it seems like a wasted route when you see how packed the platforms are at Canada Water for people who want to go to Clapham Junction/West Croydon/Crystal Palace and then that overground comes through and goes 2 stops!

The London Overground northbound departures from Forest Hill at 02, 17, 32 and 47 past each hour start at West Croydon so would usually be busier especially at peak times than the services that start at Crystal Palace which depart Forest Hill at 09, 24, 39 and 54 past each hour.

It is only a short walk from New Cross Gate to New Cross. Not too difficult.

The issue is that for people living in the west part of west Lewisham, trains from new cross which I assume service Catford stations, aren’t useful.

There’s a large chunk of west Lewisham which isn’t within a 10-15 min walk of a station on another line, and we are really screwed in the event that southern and the overground out of FH are down. Getting to a station on another line adds 30 mins to my journey.

People living within a 10 min walk of Crofton park or Catford are lucky in that they have workable alternative but that isn’t the case for everyone.

That applies to us-If the line is down I’m effectively pretty stuffed getting to work in the West End.
The other evening it took me over 90 minutes to get home because there was a problem with the line.
I wish that we at least had a direct bus route that connected to Canada water or London Bridge or New x gate.
More than once i’ve found myself stuck in London bridge or Canada water scratching my head as to the best route home and trust me after a long day at work aged over 60 thats the last thing I need!

The New Cross section of the Overground is used by people in Deptford and the areas round there as well as New Cross. It is useful.

The London Overground service to and from New Cross also enables connections to South Eastern services from New Cross as well.

The 47 bus at Catford goes past both Canada Water and London Bridge stations.

Sadiq asked for that back in his first term (integration of metro national lines) but was rebuffed from DfT. Shame as it makes sense.

Lucky for the people living in Catford, but we are no where near Catford and don’t have these alternative routes to hand in the event southern and overground fail to deliver the service.

I’m not saying new cross doesn’t serve anything or anyone, just that trains out of new cross to Catford aren’t a viable alternative to trains from Forest Hill.

But I live by the Horniman Museum !
Catford is no use to me and frankly I dont want to get a bus to catford then wait around for another bus to get me home -especially having finished work at 6.30 after a long day

Ditto!

I’m just trying to be helpful, if you’re stuck at CW or LB it’s an alternative.
We’d all like a frequent reliable service but until or unless that happens you have to work with what you’ve got.

That run from London Bridge, two stops away from Canada Water…

Oh absolutely appreciate that. I was just pointing out that the impact of no service out of FH affects people living to the west of west Lewisham far more than those the other side of the station that have crofton park and Catford as alternatives.

From Forest Hil to London Bridge, avoiding the crowded Jubilee line. only seems possible via Norwood Junction.

Well it’s 11th January and there is no news about the reinstatement of the weekday service?

Now Southern have brought in reduced timetables across the whole network due to staff shortages which has resulted in no meaningful weekday service from Forest Hill at all then I fear the return of the weekday Victoria service won’t be anytime soon!

No chance until the guidance to work from home is lifted. That will increase journeys / revenue. Though the wider question is whether Southern is really interested in a Metro route London Bridge to Victoria. It (in my opinion) belongs in TfL / Overground, but they do not have the money to run it. Sigh.