Boltar wrote

I'm sorry but terminating the JLE at stratford was down to nothing more
than
money or lack thereof, don't pretend there was any great plan.

The motivations for the JLE route were serving Canary Wharf from Waterloo,
serving Canary Wharf from Stratford (DLR did not have enough capacity), the
Dome aka O2, regenerating Bermondsey and Canada Water, and regenerating the
Canning Town area. There were plans for a branch from North Greenwich to
Thamesmead (there may even be passive provision for a junction) but no
funding for this at the time. Now Thamesmead will do better, with the Abbey
Wood branch of Crossrail.

Peter