COPENHAGEN - Cityringen (M3)

This is a follow-up to my report from 2013 when I last visited Copenhagen. This time I came to join the celebrations for the opening of the Cityringen, or metro line M3, which happened on 29 September 2019, luckily without any last-minute delay as had occured in Aarhus two years ago.

Osterport station - trains largely identical to M1/M2 trains

As a metro enthusiast, I was quite excited about this inauguration as with its 15.5 km and 17 stations, the ring line can be considered a major metro project for European standards, and something like this doesn't happen too often nowadays (besides some extensions in Moscow, the last was Barcelona's L9-South with 20 km in 2016 and probably next will be Thessaloniki, which is likely to become the continent's last new metro at all, and new tangential lines in Paris).

The construction of the Cityringen went quite smoothly as it seems, without major problems or delays and within a reasonable time frame of some 6-7 years, when virtually the entire inner city had to suffer from the construction sites, of course. These were limited to station areas as all the tunnels were excavated as single-track tubes. They often run beneath built-up areas and thus the line would be difficult to follow on the surface unless you are very familiar with the city. Talking about tube construction, as with the "old" lines, the alignment is very good and trains run at a good speed and take all curves very smoothly. At times they shake a bit, but to an acceptable degree. Accelerating and braking is also quite prefectly programmed, so no complaints on that side from my part.

Gammel Strand station - Cityringen has just opened (29 Sept 2019)

With a friend from the U.S. who happened to be in town we managed to get down into Gammel Strand station with the first crowd at 16:00 on Sunday, when the skies had cleared a bit after heavy rainfall had delayed the speeches at Radhuspladsen (including the Queen of Denmark!). We were surprised how well Metro managed the crowds, so trains ran at an acceptable load, though the windows got steamy soon so you could hardly see anything out the front or rear windows. We got off at a few stations, but didn't venture to go outside because we saw that they kept people from entering to avoid overcrowding, but I think in the end all got their chance to take a first ride (by the way, all metro and S-tog lines were free to use on that day!). Later we met up with a local expert and continued our first-day explorations, and surprisingly, all went smoothly, I didn't observe any disruptions or major delays typical for such occasions.

The stations basically follow the design of the old lines, but with some differences. But I have to admit that I was a bit disappointed when I saw the first stations as I had expected more colour, but in the end the use of coloured panels instead of the old concrete slabs is limited. There are several red stations, denoting interchange with S-tog services, one in green (Frederiksberg Allé) and a few with bricks rather than panels, but many have colourless plastic panels which are quite similar to the old stations:

Enghave Plads station - pleasant brick cladding

Frederiksberg Allé station - the only "green" station

Norrebros Runndel station

Norrebro station - all S-tog interchanges are red

Skjolds Plads station - similar to M1/M2 stations

Vibenshus Runddel station - decent colour, but hardly perceivable from platform level

Poul Henningsens Plads station - grey but with different pattern

Osterport station - busy S-tog interchange

Otherwise the station boxes are identical, with two flights of double escalators up and down - but unfortunately both up escalators still start at the same end position of each platform instead of having one at either end. I also found that the direction of the escalators is not well signed, especially on mezzanine level you basically have to look at the moving steps to see if they go up and down as there are no signs saying "to trains" or "ai treni" above the down escalators. Regular users will certainly get familiar and know that down is normally the escalator further away from the entrance. The issue I criticised in 2013 about the lack of escalators from the mezzanine to the surface has only been solved in a few places, notably in the richer municipality of Frederiksberg, where the entrances have therefore also been covered (in the case of Frederiksberg Allé built over with a new building) - by the way, the choice of the names Frederiksberg and Frederiksberg Allé for two adjacent stations is certainly not very ideal!

Frederiksberg station - covered escalators up to the surface

My major criticism is for the wayfinding system. Showing directions on circular metro lines is always a challenge, but there have been good solutions, notably on Madrid's L6. On Cityringen it is badly implemented, although the electronic next-train indicators handle it quite well by showing "via Frederiksberg" or "via Osterport" or whatever is the next major interchange in either direction. This is complemented by a running line of all stations served from that side of the platform:

Large screens show directions

There are accoustic announcements, in Danish and English, saying that the next train from "Spor/track 1" or "2" goes via so and so, but the track number is hardly visible, certainly not when you come down the escalator, and then you still have to search for it. What is completely missing, and not just on Cityringen but also on the old lines, is a partial strip map for each side of the platform. The funny thing is that this is a global convention from China to the USA, virtually on all metros of the world, but not in Copenhagen. So when you come down the escalators, there needs to be a strip map showing which stations can be reached most rapidly from the right side, and which stations from the left side. On most metro systems the stations of the line not served from that platform are shown in grey. 

Strip maps as displayed at end of platform, without indicating which side of the platform

There is a strip map even in Copenhagen, but it shows the entire line and not as a circle, but as a straight line, and does not hint to the respective side of the platform. This can easily be retrofitted and I hope it will be done soon. In fact those partial strip maps should also be added to the respective platform screen doors so people can be sure they are waiting at the correct side. Apart from that, all stations have a nice metro map with the Cityringen shown as a proper circle and future-proofed with M4, saying that the northern branch to Orientkaj is about to open in 2020:

Talking about maps and information, only at certain stations of the metro system, a "Welcome to Copenhagen" brochure is available and only in English and only about the metro, otherwise I'm still missing a proper customer service centre, I have not seen any although now many staff were still around on M3 to help passengers. Luckily I grabbed a few small metro maps on opening day, as later during normal service I didn't see them anywhere.

Strip map inside trains (with line M3 "starting" at Trianglen), not future-proof for southern M4 branch

To improve orientation for passengers on the train, additional station name signs would be useful on the otherwise empty inner walls, so passengers can see through the train window easily where they are as the signs on the platform are hardly visible from the train, most of the obstructed by the escalators. This could easily be done by adding simple stickers as the area is quite vandalism-safe.

As said before, the stations are largely identical to the older ones, but now have two lifts to guarantee their availability. Some stations have secondary entrances, but only via a bicycle storage room, even the centrally located Radhuspladsen station! These bike rooms are colourful and are mostly painted in a strong orange.

Two lifts at each station, and most with skylights

Lovely logo, here at Nuuks Plads

A much brighter logo sits now next to all stations, which has also been implemented at some older stations. The only station with a significantly different layout is Marmorkirken where the platforms are on different levels on top of each other due to the limited space available:

Marmorkirken - bi-level station

There are two lifts, one at either end of the platforms, plus numerous sets of escalators, two in each direction, and connecting 4 levels, so that adds up to at least 16 escalators if I have counted correctly.

The interchanges with other lines only deserve an "ok". Cityringen crosses the old lines twice: at Frederiksberg this is quite ok, you walk up one level from M1/M2 and walk around the corner and down a few levels to M3 - what's weird here is that all escalators, up and down, point away from you instead of resulting in a logical flow from one line to the other. I doubt that the southern exit at that station is more important than the interchange.

At Kongens Nytorv the situation is not ideal either but "ok". Unfortunately, it was a historic mistake to not make this station future-proof as an interchange from the start. The old station is pretty deep, so the new station had to be placed almost at sub-surface level, but of course, the tube tunnels require a certain depth. So from the old line you also have to come up all the way to the mezzanine (two long escalators), then walk a bit longer than at Frederiksberg through a vast mezzanine and then down one level (for which three sets of escalators have been installed). 

Kongens Nytorv - mezzanine and transfer corridor

Kongens Nytorv - wider platform than usual

There are no direct lifts from the surface to the Cityringen platform, you need to change lifts at mezzanine level. But what I found more disappointing at the most central station is the lack of other entrances and the bad layout of the only one existing. When I arrived at Kongens Nytorv on foot from Marmorkirken via Store Kongensgade, I was expecting an entrance at that corner of this large square, but none in sight, so you have to cross a major road to get to the entrance and then walk back to the platform. Once down on the platform I realised that there was actually a rear exit (the sign only said "Exit" - funnily they only use the English word on this line and not "Udgang"), but no indication to where this exit leads. 

Kongens Nytorv - corridor leading to secondary exit

So I walked out that way, up one level where it suddenly turned direction and after some 100m of granite-clad tunnel, it leads to an exit next to the opera house, well, more or less across the street from the main entrance! So many questions starting with "why" came to my mind! Why is there no proper second mezzanine on the north side of the Cityringen station with an exit towards Store Kongensgade and another one towards Nyhavn, the busy restaurant area, and instead a misleading exit towards Tordenskjoldsgade - misleading because if you enter the station complex here and actually want to take an M1/M2 train, it will take you on a long detour. This entrance should lead into the large mezzanine directly! This is really weird as Kongens Nytorv has been a contruction site for the last 25 years and now it is badly done! At least the fixed stairs from the mezzanine to the surface have been completely rebuilt and are now much less steep than they used to be - so maybe my criticism has helped...

As for interchanges between M1/M2 and M3, these options are not announced accoustically like "Change here for lines M1 and M2!", neither are there any announcements like "Change here for the S-tog/S-train".

Norrebro - open-air interchange with elevated S-tog

At Norrebro the interchange between metro and S-Tog will be as good as is possible in that situation, with two sets of escalators as well as lifts being added to the elevated S-tog side platforms, and here also escalators have been installed between the surface and the mezzanine in the metro station. As with the other S-tog/metro interchanges, the facility has not been finished yet.

At Osterport, a connecting pedestrian tunnel is still under construcion, but in the meantime, metro passengers have to use a set of temporary stairs to come to the surface and walk around the construction site to get to the railway station. To comfort them, metro staff are handing out vouchers for free coffee at 7-Eleven... Just as we will see at the Central Station, the lifts are located at the "wrong" end of the station for people changing to S-tog or other trains services.

Kobenhavn H - metro entrance at rear side of railway station, with tiny logo

Kobenhavn H - on the left, future interchange tunnel to S-tog and other trains

The location of the metro station at Kobenhavn H is far from ideal. It is certainly at the back side of the station, and maybe not the best side either. From a logical point of view, it should really have been located on the eastern side where there is a main entrance to the railway station, possibly with an access directly within the station concourse as any world traveller would it expect to be. To serve the area west of the station, possibly an additional station would have been needed. But complaining about this now doesn't help us anyway. When the later planned direct transfer tunnel is completed, interchange between metro and trains will be quite ok, though through a very narrow tunnel. Until then you have to leave the metro station and hope that many people head for the railway station, because from where you surface you don't see any sign at all where the railway station is or where to access it. The rear entrance is very small for a major railway station and has no sign whatsoever, just the usual crowd of people thrown out of the station by the police hanging around there... What's also surprising at this location is the tiny logo indicating the metro station, only denoting secondary bicycle entrances at other stations. And again, the lifts are at the other end of the station, so for passengers coming to the surface with their luggage using the lifts, the orientation will even be less easy.

All in all, Copenhagen has certainly grown up with the opening of this line. I still remember that Copenhagen was something like the largest non-metro city in Western Europe when I started in the mid-1990s, and now it is very well covered by a swift system. And it seems to be very popular among the local population, forgotten are the initial troubles and it is perceived as a very reliable system. Maybe even victim of its own success, the Metro company now has increased fares, i.e. to use the metro you have to pay a surcharge on certain tickets, and monthly pass holders have to decide whether the metro is included or not. This is certainly a wrong step as Copenhagen has always had good fare integration and breaking this is a step backwards. But maybe the Metro company actually wants to dissuade people from using their trains to avoid overcrowding as trains do get pretty full during rush hour. The next logical step would therefore be to increase capacity, this could maybe be done by adding a fourth car, but possibly some stations wouldn't be able to handle the crowds anyway. Notably Kongens Nytorv which has always been a busy station as it serves the Old Town, and now as a transfer station it will even have to handle more people. Now a train arrives about every 90 to 120 seconds during peak hours in either direction, not really enough time to empty the platform before the next train discharges its passengers. Norreport station may be relieved a bit as many passengers will now change to Cityringen instead of the S-tog.

Carlsberg S-tog station replaced Enghave station in 2016

While the metro is now the popular means of transport in Copenhagen, the S-tog is losing terrain as it is aging. Many trains carry graffiti and also stations are not always in good shape. The system is currently being upgraded with CBTC which may ultimately lead to driverless operation, which would be a first on a suburban rail system derived from a mainline railway (like the Berlin S-Bahn, the Copenhagen S-tog is completely separate from the rest of the Danish rail system and has a different voltage). The super-wide trains are still fun to ride, but the bundled route along the central corridor is a bottleneck. So the CBTC system is supposed to allow a more stable timetable. At Copenhagen Central Station, the S-tog has two tracks in each direction, but at the other stations just one. Norreport is a special problem, as it is supposed to be the busiest station in Denmark, but with just two S-tog and two regional train platforms. It is also the ugliest and most neglected station, I'm afraid, and for such a busy station, there is no customer service centre anywhere, although new buildings were added at surface level. At the Central Station, DSB maintains a rather small traditional ticket office, and as for some reason I couldn't buy my return ticket online (DB said it was too late) I had to queue there to get my ticket to Berlin - I felt like in a Renfe station back in the 1980s... As the S-tog is run by DSB, I imagine that they also handle questions about the S-tog. There is someone at the door who in most cases sends you to the self-service ticket machines, though. These are easy to use and also sell City Pass tickets, the day passes for all means of transport, available as a "small" or "large" City Pass, not a very intuitive distinction. The "small" one is the real City Pass as it covers the city as such plus the airport, while the "large" one should really be called "Region Pass" instead, or "City+Region Pass" or so. Both passes are available for from 24 hours to up to 120 hours!

As for my complaint about a non-existing face to the integrated transport system, there is one now, though only to a limited extent! It is called DOT which stands for Din Offentlige Transport (Your Public Transport). They have a website with some useful info and their logo is everywhere on all vehicles, also metro and S-tog trains, but it's not really a transport authority nor does it have an information office.

LINKS

Copenhagen at UrbanRail.Net

Copenhagen Metro (Official Website)

DOT

Transport in LONDON

Like probably any urban rail enthusiast, I have been to London many times, so with this post, instead of trying to give an overview, I'm just writing down a few impressions I gained during my most recent visit a couple of weeks ago, from 11 to 17 July 2015.

- Fares

First of all, and most urgently, I need to discourage anybody wishing to explore London's rail systems to use an Oyster Card! This "smart" card is not really intelligent enough to understand rail enthusiasts' weird travel patterns! I got one the first day because I thought that with the daily capping it offers I might have to pay less compared to a traditional travelcard. But although I tried to check in and out as requested, the system gets completely confused when you do that too often, so in the end on one single day I had accumulated five or more "unresolved journeys"! And for each of them, they deduct 5.70 GBP. When I started wondering what had happened to all that money I had put on the card in the morning, I went to see a young lady who assisted passengers at North Greenwich station, and she was also quite surprised. But as I explained things in a plausible way, she refunded one of those misdeductions, but she said that they were only able to do one directly, for anything else, I'd have to ring the Oyster hotline. A local friend helped me with that in the evening, as I feared that it would ruin me even more if I called with my foreign phone, being kept in the waiting loop forever. We did get through quite quickly, though, but they said, I need to call back in the morning because they cannot deal with "unresolved journeys" before the day is over. So I did that using my phone the next morning, luckily no wait at all, and all pretty easy, apparently they are used to that kind of thing, maybe not to the extreme of my misdeductions. But to get the money back on the card, I would actually have to use it again, and I had to specify a Tube station where I would use it. As on the last day I was planning to take the Piccadilly Line anyway to Heathrow, I chose Earl's Court where I was staying. But to avoid any more trouble of that kind, on the following days, I purchased an old-fashioned One-Day Travelcard, just as I did 15 or 20 years ago, and had no more trouble walking in and out of stations whenever I wanted to. Theoretically, you could get the money on the Oyster Card back, if you fancy standing in the queue at Heathrow for half an hour. This way, I got credit for my next visit, some 26 GBP! But the sad thing about this issue is that I'm not the only one with this problem, in fact it seems to be very common - funnily, the Evening Standard, which is freely distributed on trains, had a story (I think it was on 14 July) that TfL actually makes millions of extra money because of this problem, as many people do not realise it or do not bother to claim the money back! So apparently it is part of the system. A real rip-off!

In many places, the Oyster Card system is indeed absurd and stupid. If such a system is implemented, then it should be done properly, i.e. anywhere you cross a fare border, you should be obliged to check your card by means of barriers, but in London there is an excessive number of situations where it is not really clear what you need to do, especially as not all railway stations have ticket gates, not even all Tube stations! Wimbledon is one of those weird stations, with tram, train and Tube within one station complex, ticket gates for people coming from outside, but quite unclear whether you need to check out when coming from the tram and changing to District Line etc...

So, all in all, I would classify the Oyster Card system as badly implemented, too complex, and if they want an electronic system, they should simply reduce the price of the day passes, so that you can load a travelcard for zones 1-2, for example, off-peak, for a reasonable price, say 6-7 GBP instead of 12 for the whole 6 zones normal visitors would not really need.

Well, London is generally completely overpriced, but fares are too. I don't really understand the point why very occasional Tube riders in zones 1 and 2 are punished with having to pay 4.80 GBP, which is 6.80 EUR!!, the price of a day pass in "normal" European cities. I think it is o.k. to charge a slightly higher price to encourage people to use passes, but not to that extreme! And I doubt that this policy helps to reduce overcrowding in zone 1! It just helps to get a negative opinion of a transport system.

- Tube Stations & Lines

This leads us to the next point: overcrowding! The London Underground is always a great means of transport to explore, but more than in any other city I'm always happy I don't have to use it on a daily basis. Sure, London invented urban underground trains, but I still think that building those small-profile deep level tube lines was the most erroneous decision ever taken in the history of urban rail in the last 150 years! (Maybe the tiny VAL trains in France are the second...) No doubt, this is history and can't be changed much now, although I also cannot understand why the Victoria Line was built to that same standard, and why they didn't finally break this tradition with the Jubilee Line?? The Victoria Line is, however, quite fascinating. The new trains are slightly better, I mean, in respect of room inside the train, but still not really a relief for a tall person and considering the overcrowding it suffers most of the day on the central section. It is, however, probably the most frequently running metro line in Western Europe, and probably the fastest! Often, you can already see the next train approaching while the previous is leaving the station. The Jubilee Line is also quite swift and frequent, in fact while "waiting" at North Greenwich in the evening, I actually thought that it runs too often! And most trains run through to Stanmore! Generally, I sometimes had the impression that on some sections trains run too frequently, like to Epping, way out of the city with the trains even travelling through open countryside, where a train every 15 minutes or so would probably be enough. So, all in all, I could imagine more trains on the central sections and fewer travelling through to the ends of a line during off-peak hours. Although the Tube generally feels safe, it feels a bit weird if you're the only passenger on such a branch.

- Circle Line

It's a pity the Circle Line is no longer a circular line! And what is quite surprising is that at Edgware Road the current set-up hasn't actually eliminated any track conflict as just west of that station, only two tracks are available, so a Circle Line train departing from Edgware Road via Victoria will run over the same section again after finishing a full loop and heading towards Hammersmith. So, I'm not quite sure I understand why the Circle Line ceased to be a ring line.... Anyway, although I prefer the subsurface lines to the deep-level tube lines for the extra space they offer, the interlaced service with all these flat junctions is not really what a typical modern metro should be like. But I guess there is not much that can be done to change the situation, possibly east of Earl's Court there would be room enough to rebuild the junction, which might allow trains to proceed much faster from Earl's Court whereas now they are often held there for several minutes queuing to pass that junction.

- Tube trains

I really enjoyed the new S stock now in service on most subsurface lines, except on the District where there are still some older D stock trains. The new trains are very spacious, have pleasant air-conditioning and overall offer a comfortable ride. So for me, they have even increased the gap in comfort between the subsurface lines and the deep-level tube lines. The only thing I'd dare to criticise is the type of pattern on the seats...

- Trams

Doing preparation work for my forthcoming Tram Atlas Britain & Ireland, I revisited, of course, the Croydon Tramlink. Well, now officially called London Tramlink, nothing has been achieved in creating a larger network, which is quite surprising as the tram is really popular and quite a good service. Using several old railway routes, it is one of the fastest tramways in Europe, I think, even the "Downtown Croydon" portion is travelled through at reasonable speed. Unlike some other British tramways, the track is properly laid, both on the street-running sections and the light-rail style routes, with no excessively slow segments in curves or at junctions. 

So it is really a pity that no other lines have been built since, and that not even the existing system has been extended as often proposed. Interestingly, Tramlink is the only tram system in the U.K. to use route numbers, but, very half-heartedly! Funnily, the number is visible on the front display of the trams, but not on maps! See official map here! 

- Docklands Light Railway

Always fun to ride those driverless trains, but again, typically British, a very confusing and entangled system of routes not properly depicted anywhere. Like on Overground and National Rail (see below) I consider the introduction of route numbers very urgent! Here they could be prefixed with a D (although the District Line could also do with some numbering!), e.g. D1 Bank - Lewisham, D2 Bank - Beckton (oh, this route doesn't exist? Well, how would one know from the current Tube map?? At least, the DLR-only map depicts different routings with separate strokes, altough no differentiated with line colours)

- London Overground

The London Overground is without doubt one of the greatest achievements in London transport history for many decades. Living in Berlin and close to the S-Bahn ring line, I had always missed something similar in London, where you had to make all trips via the overcrowded city centre. Although on many sections, the implementation of Overground was just a rebranding, I was sure from the start that this would be successful, and the fact that they keep extending the train length is the best sign that it has been successful. In fact, I did not really understand why they didn't start with long trains from the beginning! What I don't like, however, is this British obsession (sorry!) NOT to use line numbering. By now, the Overground system has developed into a large network of different services, but like on DLR, impossible to find out which routings trains normally take, although there seem to be more or less regular types of services which should really be distinguished by line numbers, preferably S1, S2, etc... (ha ha) and different colours at least on Overground exclusive maps. My conviction is that line numbers do not hurt those who don't like line numbers, but they help those who like them!

It is a pity, however, that what appears to be a circular line, is split into three different lines. So, to take a full circle, one would have to change trains twice. As it was new to me, I spent some time at Clapham Junction to observe the service there, but unfortunately passengers lose a lot of time there because the Overground trains from both direction enter and leave the station more or less simultaneously, but then stay in the station for some 10 minutes. So anybody using Overground to "circle" around the southwestern part of London, e.g. from Shepherd's Bush to Clapham High Street, will need to hang around Clapham Junction for a while. I'm aware that designing a perfect timetable in this complex rail system (after all, Overground mixes too much with other services, especially in South London), a staggered timetable would be the better option here, I mean that on a 15-minute headway, the trains should enter and leave the station with 7 1/2 minutes between them, this would be time enough to change trains with the necessary buffer in case of delays and make the rest of the waiting time much shorter. Talking about the South London service, there are really two stations missing, one at Brixton (or do they fear the Victoria Line may get even more overcrowded?) and one at the intersection with Thameslink at Loughborough Junction where you can see the Thameslink station right below the Overground route! No doubt, it would cost a lot, but the network effect would improve significantly.

The two new routes added to Overground in May, to Enfield/Chesthunt and Chingford have been restyled, both trains and stations. I only rode the line to Chingford and the train was not really busy, actually more so on the outer section with lots of people joining at Walthamstow Central coming from the Victoria Line. Contrary to the older Overground lines, the Chingford train skips some stations which are only served by the Enfield/Chesthunt trains. I think one of the characteristics of a good urban S-Bahn system should remain that trains stop at every station for simplicity's sake!

- TfL Rail

The rebranded service to Shenfield is indeed very busy, and considering that large crowds join at Stratford changing from the Central Line, taking these trains, which already run every 10 minutes, directly into the city centre via Crossrail was a very good decision. Not only will this provide a direct one-seat ride for East Londoners, but also relieve the central part of the Central Line significantly. I'm looking forward to 2019 or so, when London will finally offer the first proper RER-style service! But they should do something about Shenfield station to bring it into the zonal system to avoid confusion. I don't know why, but Epping on the Central Line is in zone 6, lying beyond the M25, and Shenfield, just a few miles further out, would be in zone 10, and Brentford, almost the same distance from Central London as Epping is classified as zone 9! What kind of lobbying does Epping have and those places along TfL Rail don't?

- Thameslink

Talking of RER-style service, certainly Thameslink has some touch of RER, too, but a bit like Paris' line C, slow and difficult to understand. Again, very confusing which train stops where, although on their timetable leaflets, Thameslink actually uses line numbers!!! Hurrah! When I wanted to travel just from St. Pancras International to Kentish Town, however, there was no way to find out which train would stop there, so I just had to wait until Kentish Town appeared in the list of calling points (which is quite a good feature at British railway stations and should be copied in other countries!). But all in all, Thameslink feels more like a typical National Rail regional service which may also be helpful for journeys within London. Hopefully it will be perceived more of an urban service when some more northern routes are linked at St. Pancras, increasing the number of trains running across London. The new Blackfriars station looks quite nice and spacious!

- National Rail

So while Crossrail was an excellent idea, not only Crossrail 2 should be built soon, but also Crossrail 3 and 4 and maybe 5! Well, Paris has 5 RER routes now (though line E is missing its western part, and lines B and D have to share their tracks between Châtelet and Gare du Nord) and London's major problem with overcrowding on the Tube lines certainly lies in the excessive number of passengers those National Rail services, whatever fancy colours their trains may currently be carrying, virtually spill into the Underground stations, most notably at Victoria and Waterloo, but at all the other termini, too. At Waterloo, a potential tunnel ramp with a low-level platform could actually be built where the International trains used to stop as this area has been lying idle for many years now! Trains could dive under the River Thames, provide interchange with Thameslink and several Tube lines at Blackfriars and St. Paul's before being connected, for example, at Moorgate and Liverpool Street to existing routes, at the latter ideally linking up with the new Overground services to Enfield/Chesthunt and Chingford. But given the extensive suburban and regional services in and around London, I guess there would be plenty of different options those consulting companies would be happy to study in detail. In the meantime, I would be happy if the existing services radiating from those termini were presented in a more structured way, again, introducing some sort of line numbering and proper maps, at least for each of those subnetworks. Starting with local services, all the "lines" departing from Waterloo, for example, could be labelled W1, W2, etc. with W1, for example, serving the Hounslow loop. And there should be a clear difference between trains serving Greater London and stopping at all stations, and trains going all the way down to the coast, which only serve major stations in Greater London. These stopping patterns may be quite clear for those passengers using the trains every day, but are completely confusing for anybody else. The most confusing are actually those shown in green and blue in the Southeast, well, those trains operated by Southeastern and Southern, an area also invaded by some Thameslink services. For the official London all-rail map click here! 

- Buses
As I labelled this post "Transport in London", I need to say a few words about the bus service too: without doubt the best in the U.K.! I know, many people in other British cities have tried to explain their bad bus services with deregulation etc., which luckily has not affected London (so wasn't it about time to discuss whether deregulation in the rest of Britain should be maintained?). Anyway, in London I always find it easy to catch a bus as there is sufficient information at the stops, and especially when exiting a Tube station, you will always find a map with all bus options, so I did use a few to ride between outer rail branches. 
Also, the new 'Boris' buses are quite nice, modern and at the same time iconic. And what also distinguishes London buses from the rest of the country is their second (or even third) door - I never really understood the concept of having just a single door next to the driver! Sure, a few more seats, better control of who's getting on, etc. But on busy lines, the change of passengers simply takes too long. What is a bit confusing in London, though, is to know on which buses you have to get on at the front and on which you can jump on at the rear, too. Also, the fact that you cannot buy a ticket on the bus makes it difficult for ocasional riders. I assume that they assume that by now every Londoner carries a pay-as-you-go Oyster Card with some credit on.

- Other fun rides

Besides the proper urban rail systems, I also got a chance to ride two more transport vehicles:

1) the Emirates Air Line, an aerial cable car in the Docklands area, special fare applies, but worth the fun as it offers a great view, including the DLR!

2) Ruislip Lido Railway: Andrew, a friend involved in the operation of this miniature railway, took me there and showed me around, located about 2 km north of Ruislip station on the Metropolitan Line. Find out more here!

So these were just a few thoughts that crossed my mind during my last visit. Feel free to clarify, contradict or confirm my statements, that's what the comment field below is for!

LINKS

Transport for London

London at UrbanRail.Net