Forum Topic

TFL Plan a Journey. Youve gotta laugh

Went on TFL Plan a Journey just to get departure time from South Acton Station, a one minute walk from my house, to Willesden Junction, a 15min journey. Suggested route was 'Walk to Acton Town 15mins, District Line to Ealing Broadway, Central Line to North Acton, 266 Bus to Willesden Junction, 47mins. Another good one that often comes up is, South Acton to Richmond.' Change at Kew Gardens, District Line to Richmond, when the train you're on is already going to Richmond. Moral of the story is, always have an A-Z on hand when using TFL Plan a Journey.

stephen gould ● 1811d7 Comments

Yes it does sometimes come up with bizarre routes, I’ve always assumed this is because it finds a route for the particular time of your search rather than the most sensible route. Whatever the reason you do have to be careful using it.

Michael David Rowe ● 1811d

Drives me mad, I think it seems to opt for tube as it's preferred mode of transport.It's really annoying when you're effectively just wanting a timetable update.If I already know my preferred mode I go into the options and untick tube & bus.

Tessa Russell ● 1811d

I don't have any problems with the North London Line from South Acton.There are bizarre decisions, though. If you ask for a route from Acton Town to Finsbury Park, for example, instead of telling you to get on a Piccadilly train and hunker down till you get there, it wants you to change to the Victoria Line at Green Park, presumably to save two minutes.

Susan Kelly ● 1810d

Absolutely, it tells you what the fastest way to get to your destination would be if you left home right now.  If you change your departure time by a few minutes then it may come up with a different option, which may be the route you expect/intend to use.  Alternatively you can select options to narrow down the search results to ones which involve the least walking, least number of changes, only using the tube/Overground/bus/National Rail/tram etc.  That certainly helps to eliminate some of the stranger route options.It also builds in quite a bit of time for walking to/between bus stops, stations etc and generally I find that I can do these parts of the journey more quickly and therefore other route options become available.

Adam ONeill ● 1810d

I have recently started using the app, TFL Go, and been quite impressed.  It even connected me to South Eastern Rail.  Some apps in the past didn’t seem to know about mainline railways.

Alastair Banton ● 1810d

I use the Citymapper app. It's free with no adverts and it's given me the quickest route. You can use it for different cities too.

Basil Finnis ● 1810d

I use Citymapper too and find it very reliable. When it gives an odd recommendation it usually turns out to be because of disruption on the normal route. The data is probably the same as the TfL Go map.

Mark Evans ● 1810d