please empty your brain below

So the Wimbledon-Sutton line survives but, with such an indirect route to Central London, for how much longer? At 8:00 in the morning South Merton to London Bridge via Tulse Hill is currently 46 minutes by train, the Northern Line is scheduled Morden to London Bridge in 29 minutes. Assuming that tram + Northern Line gives competitive journey times to Central London, this could completely kill the already low ridership of the Wimbledon-Sutton line. Perhaps the easiest solution is just to extend the Northern Line down to Sutton and forget the tram.
"Early assessment showed that potential London Underground extensions, such as an extension of the Northern line beyond Morden, would be too expensive and have a negative impact on existing passengers."

"TfL currently has no power to take over responsibility or directly influence the type of rail service provided on the Sutton Loop rail line."
Colliers Wood was where I went to school and Church Road was where I secured my first job as a paperboy, the traffic count in those days was a fraction of what it has now become, I still have a great deal of family living in very close proximity to the selected option for the route and had long ago decided that any visits to them would always if possible be made by public transport due to the almost constant slow moving traffic jams in the area, the thought of a brand new tram service excites me but the thought of even more traffic congestion does not.
Seems like an unnecessary project whose few benefits are largely cancelled out by the damage and disruption it will cause to the area.

An odd choice for investment given that the Croxley Rail Link, which at least on paper seems a better bet, would cost less but was shelved nonetheless. Does TfL really have money to burn or is linking Sutton to Tramlink such an overwhelming priority?

dg writes: The answer's in my final paragraph.
And how is building a new tram line through an area poorly served by rail and then railheading it onto the Northern Line NOT going to have a negative impact on existing passengers?

Did they actually give a figure for extending the Northern Line? Most of the infrastructure is there already.

There is no point trying to fix the Sutton Loop with heavy rail, because the Thameslink route is so indirect. Wimbledon to Blackfriars by Thameslink is 10.4 miles, and it's 10.2 miles by District Line. Even with the terrible average speed of the District Line route, 15.2 mph versus 19.4 for Thameslink, it's only 8 minutes slower, and the District Line runs a lot more frequently.
"We expect there to be a slight increase in the number of people accessing the Northern line at Colliers Wood station, but this is not expected to have a significant impact on passenger congestion at the station or on the Northern line."
That's garbage, they haven't thought it through
An extension of the Northern line from Morden to Sutton was ruled out during the second high level risk assessment in 2014, at which stage the long list was reduced from 72 options to 19 options.
Looks like the negative impact is on existing Northern Line users north of Morden rather than the ones south of them.

And about the loop, perhaps it would be better to
1. Connect it to the line to Waterloo, and retain the Blackfriars service up to Wimbledon only, or
2. Incorporate the whole Sutton-Wimbledon-Streatham section as a new end-to-end tram line.
Well, civil servants and planners do make stupid decisions from time to time.

Let's think about it this way ...

Extending the Northern Line down the Sutton loop, with its not particularly well-sited stations, is going to generate so much traffic that the line is going to get overloaded and cause distress to existing passengers.

Building a visible accessible frequent tram route through the heart of the residential area, and providing a convenient direct link with the Northern Line with easy fast connections to the City and West End is going to generate so few passengers that the Northern Line won't notice.

The tram sounds a bit rubbish to me, if they really expect that. Does not compute!
Sorry, I forgot to include the entire quote.

"We expect there to be a slight increase in the number of people accessing the Northern line at Colliers Wood station, but this is not expected to have a significant impact on passenger congestion at the station or on the Northern line. This is because without the Sutton Link, the majority of these passengers would already be using the Northern Line via buses to and from Morden station."
Having the tram run through Rosehill Park is the bizarre bit of the proposal after the route has gone through the Rose Hill roundabout (and don't forget the exit to a supermarket car park that adds to the six existing roads meeting here).

The reason it is not a benefit is that extra traffic lights would be needed at each side of the park to route trams this way with one direction cutting through the existing traffic flows on either side.

The park seems an ideal space for the proposed second new school in Sutton yet planning gets refused for this (a one month appeal starts next week), whilst approval was given for the first new school on the old Sutton Hospital site which was (and is) too small and set away from its intended catchment area. Councils' work in mysterious ways.
Why this concentration on access to Central London? That is going to be problematic, whatever happens, because all the lines are already at capacity.

What the Sutton scheme will facilitate, if it is ever built, is more and better local journeys. Just like the Croydon trams already do.
People want to get to Central London, and if you offer an improved method of getting to Central London, that is what people will do.

Looks to me as though the planners are assuming that the Sutton tram will not siphon demand away from heavy rail, and will not generate additional journeys to Central London, hence minimal impact on the Northern Line. Meanwhile, in a universe not too far away, various Overground projects seem to have achieved both, and Canada Water is becoming somewhat congested because, yes it makes it much easier to get to Dalston, but just a few people want to get to Central London instead.
"One of the objectives of the Sutton Link is to improve connectivity, improving local access and links to central London from less well connected places in Sutton and Merton, such as Rosehill."
Sutton is pretty poorly served today. And, as DG notes, Morden is a very busy bus hub. A large proportion of tube journeys from Morden are people transferring from the bus. TfL presumably have an idea how many of those come from Sutton.

Does the consultation actually pass any judgement about the bus (BRT) option other than its relative lack of popularity among respondents? Option 2 still could be some sort of busway?
It’s a pity the BRT (Bus Rapid Transit) option was less popular and appears to have been dropped.
The consultation confirms the preference is for a tram, as this has greater transport benefits (and greater potential for funding) than a Bus Rapid Transit scheme.
Observation at Wimbledon suggests that most people using the Thameslink service on the St Helier Line change at Wimbledon for the faster SWR or Underground services for central London.

Replacing the Thameslink service with a tram would have no particular advantage, but would need the two loose ends of the Thameslink loop to be provided with turnround facilities at Wimbledon and Sutton. There is little space available at either.

John B - Unlike Sutton, the proposed Croxley Rail link was not in Greater London.
This is no doubt a stupid question, but why is Thameslink running the slow and meandering suburban train service around the Sutton Loop, when its main services are the cross-London ones from Bedford and Luton and St Albans and Cambridge towards Gatwick and Brighton?

There are slower train services on the main lines, but perhaps they could turn back at Wimbledon, so a more frequent tram or light rail service could run around the loop to Sutton or Mitcham and back instead (or even Overground from West Croydon).

I expect it would be cheaper to use the existing infrastructure more efficiently, rather than spending £400m on a new line.
Well of course, a Northern Line extension would be a boon for house prices in that area, the tram less so.

Any new investment into trams should be welcomed, but this one is a strange case. The opportunities of linking it up with the current system are virtually -0-. It really does feel more like lip service is being paid to those who want to promote the tram in London. TfL fiddling while London burns.

Trams are ideal for filling the gap between buses & tubes by providing services where the (lots of) buses are full and the cost of building an underground line is prohibitive.

The investment into trams is badly needed on the radials into the centre, where they will make a real difference.. The Brixton, Kingsland, Mile End & Uxbridge Roads.. not through parks in suburban London.
Andrew - good question, as I understand it's basically politics that explains the service pattern. LondonReconnections.com has explored this at great length, in its typically engaging way.
Hopefully thought has been given on how this will link-up with CrossRail 2 (aka Charles Line)
If you read the consultation report, which was written by experts, you’ll see that due thought has been given on how this will link-up with CrossRail 2.
Would have been nice to show the Thameslink line on the "tube map" style view, even though the main tube map doesn't (anymore) (and kind-of should as a special case) (especially now that tfl rail is being included)
Would this new line’s trams be housed at the existing Therapia Lane depot or would new facilities need to be built?

dg writes: The latter (location as yet undecided).
Why not just do the Belgrave Walk to Sutton bit with junctions to Wimbledon and Croydon, Its not far to walk to the Northern Line if people really feel the need to get to South Wimbledon Tube.
...because it's a brisk ten minute walk to the Northern line from the nearest tram stop.
Thameslink has never been shown on the Tube Map south of Elephant & Castle. If the new Tramlink line ever does appear, it will probably be curled round parallel to the Croydon line to save space, like TfL Rail to Reading has been bent upwards.
£425m shouldn't be hard to find, what with the 'Brexit bonus' coming on stream. Let's hope a local MP will ask the Prime Minister to allocate this week's £350m of spare cash to the project, and the following week's money can finish the job and pay for a connecting tram to St Helier hospital.
Seems a bit short sighted missing the main interchange point of Morden.

Morden and Sutton are probably my least visited areas of London, but I struggle to see the point. The 164 bus doesn’t even run with double decks.

I would personally do some sort of upgrade to the Thameslink line. Maybe extending the Northern Line to West Sutton, then ramming it in a tunnel to a new station on Sutton Town Centre.
Extending the Northern line to Sutton isn't exactly 'simples'. You would be ploughing through Morden depot (you'd need to find stabling facilities to replace this) for one. Also, Thameslink does not terminate at Sutton - trains continue around the loop after a 1 minute dwell. There is no room to provide anywhere for the Northern line to turn around (bear in mind the current terminus at Morden has 3 platforms and Sutton would need a similar number!).

Lastly, the Wimbledon loop line isn't just slow - it runs around the boundary of the built-up area. That - to my mind - is a far bigger issue when it comes to explaining why passenger numbers are so low.
From the TfL Emergency Budget, July 2020:

"Sutton Tramlink – development work paused as transport case is poor and there remains a significant funding gap"

So, doesn't expect trams ever.










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