please empty your brain below
it's not good for the post-landing nausea as it skirts around the airport for the first few minutes, but very useful for me, when I fly into Heathrow to get to my mum's place 2 minutes walk from Worcester Park station.
My mum always gets annoyed with the WP locals who cheekily take the X26 to go shopping in Kingston, but it takes half the time that the regular bus does.

Wayne | 15.07.10 - 12:58 p.m. | #

> two quid bus fare

and only 1.20 on Oyster - a total bargain for Croydon to Heathrow!

Larry Lard | 15.07.10 - 1:42 p.m. | #

I used to get the old 726 a bit when it was a proper Green Line and went to Dartford. That bit of the route would probably do quite well if it was still there, and extended onto Bluewater.

darryl853 | Homepage | 15.07.10 - 7:06 p.m. | #

Kingston Upon Tims? Must have been a New Zealander!

Great Aunt Annie | 15.07.10 - 11:46 p.m. | #

Your account of a trip on the X26 from Heathrow almost exactly matches my experience a few weeks ago - even down to the suburban shoppers boarding at Bentalls in Kingston and people standing up for Croydon 15 minutes early. I was pleasantly surprised to see how busy the service was and also how it actually kept moving at a decent pace.

PC | 15.07.10 - 11:59 p.m. | #

The excellent value of a £1.20 fare for a journey from Heathrow to Croydon explains why there aren't more orbital express buses. On a normal bus journeys are much shorter typically with a high churn of passengers and therefore for an hour of fuel and driver's wages there is much higher income. As it is bus routes tend to lose money so buses people spend 90 minutes on, esp with many free pass holders, don't make great financial sense. Not saying you are wrong and there shouldn't be any more, I think they can be very useful, but that's the key obstacle. More express buses could require special fares to make them viable but that is itself tricky

SELondoner | 16.07.10 - 8:42 a.m. | #

Fantastically useful route, that one. Pretty much the only way to get to Heathrow from the south London burbs by public transport. Going into town and back out takes a lot longer, even with all the plodding about the bus does. And of course the value proposition is pretty good.

Apparently the half-hourly service (it used to be hourly) isn't frequented enough to meet the criteria to keep it going, but it got a reprieve on the basis that it's an essential service for a lot of people. In my experience, it's just got busier since then and might even qualify for an every-20-minutes service these days.

Chz | 16.07.10 - 8:52 a.m. | #











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