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Fenchurch Street Underground

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MikeWh

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A friend of mine from Hull was making a journey to Southend today. The itinerary was split into Hull to King's Cross, King's Cross to Fenchurch Street by Underground, and Fenchurch Street to Southend. By chance we spoke while they were on the first leg and they seemed quite surprised to learn that there isn't an Underground station at Fenchurch Street. Obviously it meant Tower Hill, but shouldn't the itinerary spell that out, including the fact that a walk is required between the two stations?

Also, but slightly less of an issue in this direction, shouldn't King's Cross Underground be referred to as King's Cross St Pancras?

Finally, is it acceptable to change from Underground to C2C at West Ham?
 
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yorkie

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A friend of mine from Hull was making a journey to Southend today. The itinerary was split into Hull to King's Cross, King's Cross to Fenchurch Street by Underground, and Fenchurch Street to Southend. By chance we spoke while they were on the first leg and they seemed quite surprised to learn that there isn't an Underground station at Fenchurch Street. Obviously it meant Tower Hill, but shouldn't the itinerary spell that out, including the fact that a walk is required between the two stations?

Also, but slightly less of an issue in this direction, shouldn't King's Cross Underground be referred to as King's Cross St Pancras?
I don't think the data goes into that level of detail; I think the assumption would be for anyone unfamiliar with LU to seek staff assistance
Finally, is it acceptable to change from Underground to C2C at West Ham?
Absolutely yes.
 

Starmill

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The fixed link in the timetable data is unfortunately to and from London Fenchurch Street itself, so this won't show correctly on a journey planner.
 

MikeWh

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Thanks both. I'm glad I was able to avoid a panic at Kings Cross then.
 

miklcct

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The fixed link in the timetable data is unfortunately to and from London Fenchurch Street itself, so this won't show correctly on a journey planner.
So this shows how user-unfriendly the system is. A proper journey planner should show which underground line one should take to make the cross-London transfer, or which bus route for a fixed bus link.
 

plugwash

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A friend of mine from Hull was making a journey to Southend today. The itinerary was split into Hull to King's Cross, King's Cross to Fenchurch Street by Underground, and Fenchurch Street to Southend. By chance we spoke while they were on the first leg and they seemed quite surprised to learn that there isn't an Underground station at Fenchurch Street. Obviously it meant Tower Hill, but shouldn't the itinerary spell that out, including the fact that a walk is required between the two stations? Also, but slightly less of an issue in this direction, shouldn't King's Cross Underground be referred to as King's Cross St Pancras?
Afaict the fixed links in the timetable data are defined between the National rail stations and are just defined with a type, a duration and a validity time. So unfortunately they don't take any account of the fact that some interchanges require walking to another nearby station or taking multiple tube trains, this sometimes leads to sub optimal Journey planning, where chosing different rail stations to interchange at could make the journey simpler but the planner engines have no way of knowing that.

For some tube fixed links (for example Kings Cross to Euston) National rail enquires seems to give instructions on which tube line to use, but it doesn't seem to do so for Kings cross to Fenchurch St.

This is the sort of thing I really feel the railway could do better at.

Finally, is it acceptable to change from Underground to C2C at West Ham?
West ham is on the list of allowed interchanges for a "Maltese cross" ticket https://www.nationalrail.co.uk/times_fares/ticket_types/Travelling-to-london.aspx , so are barking and upminster further down the line.

It doesn't however appear to have a "fixed link" to/from Kings cross in the timetable data (despite having direct underground services from there) so I don't think a planner will ever give you an itinerary by that route. The fixed links defined from "West ham" seem plain strange to me, there is one defined to Paddington, yet there is not one defined to Kings Cross or St pancras despite those stations being closer and on the same underground line.
 
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MikeWh

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So this shows how user-unfriendly the system is. A proper journey planner should show which underground line one should take to make the cross-London transfer, or which bus route for a fixed bus link.
I agree.
 

XAM2175

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At a bare minimum the fixed link should be changed to show something like "Fenchurch St (walk from Tower Hill Underground)"
 

Haywain

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At a bare minimum the fixed link should be changed to show something like "Fenchurch St (walk from Tower Hill Underground)"
Tower Hill might be the closest to Fenchurch Street, but Aldgate is also very convenient. And if you make this change what do you do about Euston, for which Euston Square is the better interchange in some cases?
 

Mcr Warrior

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It's maybe slightly further, but not too far from Monument station to Fenchurch St. Station (mostly via Fenchurch Street, appropriately enough, and fairly straightforward!)
 

Hadders

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What about Baker Street for Marylebone.

Is it asking too much to expect passengers to consult a tube map?
 

Starmill

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What about Baker Street for Marylebone.

Is it asking too much to expect passengers to consult a tube map?
How would anybody know by looking at a tube map that London Marylebone is around the corner from Baker Street underground, or that London Fenchurch Street is around the corner from Tower Gateway DLR / Tower Hill underground and Aldgate underground?

Those are there on the rail and tube map, but this map is much less common.
 

185143

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What about Baker Street for Marylebone.

Is it asking too much to expect passengers to consult a tube map?
Err... yes!

If it's often too much to expect people to consult a departure board literally above them, or follow station signs then that's definitely too much to ask. :D
 

geoffk

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How would anybody know by looking at a tube map that London Marylebone is around the corner from Baker Street underground, or that London Fenchurch Street is around the corner from Tower Gateway DLR / Tower Hill underground and Aldgate underground?

Those are there on the rail and tube map, but this map is much less common.
I've sometimes used Lancaster Gate for Paddington but anyone unfamiliar with London would have no idea that they were very close just by looking at the Underground map. Of course the map scores highly on clarity but at the expense of distorting the central area.
 

bakerstreet

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Isn’t one of the issues that - as mentioned in the first post - the itinerary referred to a journey by tube from ‘King's Cross to Fenchurch Street’. Which would confuse a traveller unfamiliar with London who will not be able to locate Fenchurch St tube station on any tube map.
 

westv

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Tower Hill might be the closest to Fenchurch Street, but Aldgate is also very convenient. And if you make this change what do you do about Euston, for which Euston Square is the better interchange in some cases?
In some ways Aldgate is more convenient as you can use the Met which is far more frequent from Kings X than the Circle to Tower Hill.
 

bakerstreet

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So, it isn't really fair to say Fenchurch Street cannot be found on Tube maps - I think the information is clear enough
The point made was not that the words Fenchurch St couldn’t be found. but that the passenger wouldn’t find a tube station called Fenchurch St.

You have to look hard to find that tiny logo.

Passenger gets on a tube asks passenger does this stop at Fenchurch st? Answer no.

I know London and I know the Aldgate / Tower Hill walks well.

But I’ve also been a stranger in a city that I don’t. Haven’t you? And haven’t you ever been confused by locals assumptions of what you know?

I find it odd that we wouldn’t want the information given to at least be accurate and unambiguous.
 

MikeWh

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The point made was not that the words Fenchurch St couldn’t be found. but that the passenger wouldn’t find a tube station called Fenchurch St.

You have to look hard to find that tiny logo.

Passenger gets on a tube asks passenger does this stop at Fenchurch st? Answer no.

I know London and I know the Aldgate / Tower Hill walks well.

But I’ve also been a stranger in a city that I don’t. Haven’t you? And haven’t you ever been confused by locals assumptions of what you know?

I find it odd that we wouldn’t want the information given to at least be accurate and unambiguous.
This.


The annoying thing is that I'm sure that in the past the NRE journey planner used to detail which Underground lines to use.
 

Starmill

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This.


The annoying thing is that I'm sure that in the past the NRE journey planner used to detail which Underground lines to use.
It still does but it's not very reliable. I've just searched for Manchester to Three Bridges in the app as shown below, and it is telling me that I need the Victoria line from Euston underground to Victoria underground.
 

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MikeWh

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It still does but it's not very reliable. I've just searched for Manchester to Three Bridges in the app as shown below, and it is telling me that I need the Victoria line from Euston underground to Victoria underground.
Ah, that's what I remember. So Why can't it do it for other links?
 

Starmill

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Ah, that's what I remember. So Why can't it do it for other links?
Good question. Also it handles the same journey being possible on multiple underground lines quite poorly, it just repeats the same text consecutively.
 

Paul Kelly

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The annoying thing is that I'm sure that in the past the NRE journey planner used to detail which Underground lines to use.
It still does for many journeys, but for NRE only. I had trouble getting someone at RDG to understand that they haven't actually made this information available for other booking engines/journey planners to use! If it was more widely available perhaps errors and omissions would be reported by other retailers etc. and it would get better.
 

kieron

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It still does for many journeys, but for NRE only. I had trouble getting someone at RDG to understand that they haven't actually made this information available for other booking engines/journey planners to use! If it was more widely available perhaps errors and omissions would be reported by other retailers etc. and it would get better.
Is it worth it, though, when other people (such as traveline and TfL themselves) already have much more complete planners for journeys in London? If a rail site could forward you to a search from Kings Cross to Fenchurch Street on one of those, I suspect most passengers would be happy with that.
 
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