Evening all,

It frequently strikes me, when considering the geography of the terra
incognita called 'South London', that there is an amazingly large region
with no railway stations in the Walworth area. If you draw a line through
Elephant & Castle, Kennington, Oval, Stockwell, Brixton, Loughborough
Junction, Denmark Hill, Peckham Rye, Queen's Road Peckham, South
Bermondsey, Bermondsey, Borough, and back to Elephant, you have an area
within which there are no other railway stations of any sort (other than
disused, anyway) [1]. That's a huge area, about equal to the area
encircled by the Inner Ring Road, and densely populated. It's shocking
there's no railway service there - but perhaps not suprising when you
consider that it's also largely a very deprived area. When the stations on
the Holborn line were open, it was a lot smaller, but still pretty huge.

Anyway, are there any other notable rail deserts like this? There's one
around Dulwich, but a lot of that's open ground, so it probably has fewer
people in it. There's another huge one in the Thames Gateway, south of the
District line, north of the Beckton branch of the DLR, east of the
Stratford branch (a year ago, east of the NLL), and west of, crumbs,
Dagenham Dock? Twice the size of the Walworth desert, although currently
containing a lot of industrial land. Most of the outer suburbs of London
are like this, i suppose - the surprising thing about the Walworth one is
that it's so central.

I'm trying to figure out how to program a computer to find these
automatically. And then overlay them on a population density map or
something.

tom

[1] You can of course draw arbitrarily large shapes like that wherever you
like, by avoiding stations, but this is no such trick - as evidenced by
the fact that the polygon you've drawn is convex, at least roughly.

--
Come on thunder; come on thunder.

On Oct 25, 6:17 pm, Tom Anderson wrote:

If a girl ever told me that she lived at Thornton Heath our
relationship ended with the full stop that ended that sentence. Apart
from the fact that the area is like a cross between Threads and The
Equalizer, the only way to get there is by abseiling down from a
rented Zeppelin.

Mottingham, famous only for its obviously fictional name, is another
can't-get-in, can't-get-out area.

On Thu, 25 Oct 2007 18:17:04 +0100, Tom Anderson
wrote:

Evening all,

It frequently strikes me, when considering the geography of the terra
incognita called 'South London', that there is an amazingly large region
with no railway stations in the Walworth area. If you draw a line through
Elephant & Castle, Kennington, Oval, Stockwell, Brixton, Loughborough
Junction, Denmark Hill, Peckham Rye, Queen's Road Peckham, South
Bermondsey, Bermondsey, Borough, and back to Elephant, you have an area
within which there are no other railway stations of any sort (other than
disused, anyway) [1]. That's a huge area, about equal to the area
encircled by the Inner Ring Road, and densely populated. It's shocking
there's no railway service there - but perhaps not suprising when you
consider that it's also largely a very deprived area. When the stations on
the Holborn line were open, it was a lot smaller, but still pretty huge.

Anyway, are there any other notable rail deserts like this? There's one
around Dulwich, but a lot of that's open ground, so it probably has fewer
people in it. There's another huge one in the Thames Gateway, south of the
District line, north of the Beckton branch of the DLR, east of the
Stratford branch (a year ago, east of the NLL), and west of, crumbs,
Dagenham Dock? Twice the size of the Walworth desert, although currently
containing a lot of industrial land. Most of the outer suburbs of London
are like this, i suppose - the surprising thing about the Walworth one is
that it's so central.

Isn't this down to the tram network that existed in South London,
which limited penetration by the Underground and also overground
railways?

Maybe a tram map from c.1900 might help?
--
Terry Harper
Website Coordinator, The Omnibus Society
http://www.omnibussoc.org

On Oct 25, 9:26 pm, Terry Harper wrote:
On Thu, 25 Oct 2007 18:17:04 +0100, Tom Anderson



wrote:
Evening all,

It frequently strikes me, when considering the geography of the terra
incognita called 'South London', that there is an amazingly large region
with no railway stations in the Walworth area. If you draw a line through
Elephant & Castle, Kennington, Oval, Stockwell, Brixton, Loughborough
Junction, Denmark Hill, Peckham Rye, Queen's Road Peckham, South
Bermondsey, Bermondsey, Borough, and back to Elephant, you have an area
within which there are no other railway stations of any sort (other than
disused, anyway) [1]. That's a huge area, about equal to the area
encircled by the Inner Ring Road, and densely populated. It's shocking
there's no railway service there - but perhaps not suprising when you
consider that it's also largely a very deprived area. When the stations on
the Holborn line were open, it was a lot smaller, but still pretty huge.

Anyway, are there any other notable rail deserts like this? There's one
around Dulwich, but a lot of that's open ground, so it probably has fewer
people in it. There's another huge one in the Thames Gateway, south of the
District line, north of the Beckton branch of the DLR, east of the
Stratford branch (a year ago, east of the NLL), and west of, crumbs,
Dagenham Dock? Twice the size of the Walworth desert, although currently
containing a lot of industrial land. Most of the outer suburbs of London
are like this, i suppose - the surprising thing about the Walworth one is
that it's so central.

Isn't this down to the tram network that existed in South London,
which limited penetration by the Underground and also overground
railways?

Maybe a tram map from c.1900 might help?

It's also an area that will benefit from the Crossriver tram if that
ever gets off the ground. Though a station at Camberwell Green (and
perhaps another at Walworth) on the Blackfriars line would also be
welcome.

That area is actually pretty well served by buses, though. I lived
down there for four years and so got out of the habit of getting the
tube that even though I now live in King's Cross, which is hardly
short of tubes, I still tend to either bus it or walk everywhere.

Jonn

In message . com,
Offramp writes
On Oct 25, 6:17 pm, Tom Anderson wrote:

If a girl ever told me that she lived at Thornton Heath our
relationship ended with the full stop that ended that sentence. Apart
from the fact that the area is like a cross between Threads and The
Equalizer,
A phrase I seem to recall coining many years ago to describe my one and
only visit to Wembley Central.......

the only way to get there is by abseiling down from a
rented Zeppelin.
When I was studying in London, I stayed in Thornton Heath. The rail
service was pretty good (fantastic for a non-Londoner) and buses did
everything I needed, too. It was the pubs that put me off the area,
not the transport!
--
Ian Jelf, MITG
Birmingham, UK

Registered Blue Badge Tourist Guide for London and the Heart of England
http://www.bluebadge.demon.co.uk

Offramp wrote:
On Oct 25, 6:17 pm, Tom Anderson wrote:

If a girl ever told me that she lived at Thornton Heath our
relationship ended with the full stop that ended that sentence.
Apart from the fact that the area is like a cross between Threads
and The Equalizer, the only way to get there is by abseiling down
from a rented Zeppelin.

Is this a different Thornton Heath from the one in South London that has
8 trains per hour in each direction?

--
Richard J.
(to e-mail me, swap uk and yon in address)

Tom Anderson wrote:

Anyway, are there any other notable rail deserts like this?
There's one around Dulwich, but a lot of that's open ground,
so it probably has fewer people in it.

That one partly exists because of the closure of the Crystal Palace High
Level branch.

The obvious (to me) one is around Roehampton Vale. Admittedly it's mostly
parkland, but if you live in the middle you are a long way from a station.

Yeading is another one.

On 25 Oct, 18:17, Tom Anderson wrote:
incognita called 'South London', that there is an amazingly large region
with no railway stations in the Walworth area. If you draw a line through
Elephant & Castle, Kennington, Oval, Stockwell, Brixton, Loughborough
Junction, Denmark Hill, Peckham Rye, Queen's Road Peckham, South
Bermondsey, Bermondsey, Borough, and back to Elephant, you have an area
within which there are no other railway stations of any sort (other than
disused, anyway)

The Aylesbury Estate? Notorious for being a railway ghetto. The Cross
River Tram has a branch straight through this area.

Anyway, are there any other notable rail deserts like this? There's one
around Dulwich, but a lot of that's open ground, so it probably has fewer
people in it. There's another huge one in the Thames Gateway, south of the
District line, north of the Beckton branch of the DLR, east of the
Stratford branch (a year ago, east of the NLL), and west of, crumbs,
Dagenham Dock?

Chelsea. If you're standing on Albert or Battersea Bridge you're a
good mile from any sort of station.

I'm trying to figure out how to program a computer to find these
automatically. And then overlay them on a population density map or
something.

If you have the NR and tube station overlays (from Keyhole BBS) loaded
into Google Earth, it's pretty easy to see where the gaps are. I see a
big one south of Woolwich, a big hole north of the Olympic site (where
Lea Bridge used to be). There's a huge one around Richmond Park. The
East London Line extension cuts through the middle of a big hole too.

U

--
http://londonconnections.blogspot.com/
A blog about transport projects in London

On Oct 26, 5:40 am, Mr Thant
wrote:
On 25 Oct, 18:17, Tom Anderson wrote:

incognita called 'South London', that there is an amazingly large region
with no railway stations in the Walworth area. If you draw a line through
Elephant & Castle, Kennington, Oval, Stockwell, Brixton, Loughborough
Junction, Denmark Hill, Peckham Rye, Queen's Road Peckham, South
Bermondsey, Bermondsey, Borough, and back to Elephant, you have an area
within which there are no other railway stations of any sort (other than
disused, anyway)

The Aylesbury Estate? Notorious for being a railway ghetto. The Cross
River Tram has a branch straight through this area.


The Aylesbury is in the area described above.


Anyway, are there any other notable rail deserts like this? There's one
around Dulwich, but a lot of that's open ground, so it probably has fewer
people in it. There's another huge one in the Thames Gateway, south of the
District line, north of the Beckton branch of the DLR, east of the
Stratford branch (a year ago, east of the NLL), and west of, crumbs,
Dagenham Dock?

Chelsea. If you're standing on Albert or Battersea Bridge you're a
good mile from any sort of station.

I'm trying to figure out how to program a computer to find these
automatically. And then overlay them on a population density map or
something.

If you have the NR and tube station overlays (from Keyhole BBS) loaded
into Google Earth, it's pretty easy to see where the gaps are. I see a
big one south of Woolwich, a big hole north of the Olympic site (where
Lea Bridge used to be). There's a huge one around Richmond Park. The
East London Line extension cuts through the middle of a big hole too.


Northern Havering is pretty poorly served, too. Rise Park, Noaks Hill
and Harold Hill are all a good mile or two from either the Shenfield
line or the Hainult branch.

Jonn

On Oct 25, 11:51 pm, Ian Jelf wrote:
In message . com,
Offramp writesOn Oct 25, 6:17 pm, Tom Anderson wrote:

Thornton Heath ... is like a cross between Threads and The
Equalizer ...

A phrase I seem to recall coining many years ago to describe my one and
only visit to Wembley Central.......

And far too good to be reserved for a single usage. I have mentioned
the phrase before as one that I liked, probably here.
If I did a guide to London then that phrase would be the description
of a 'no-star' rating for an area.