Don’t forget the Victoria line construction predates the Jubilee line. Before that opened, the Bakerloo line effectively carried the traffic now split between the two and would have had more equal status with the Central…
One advantage of walking over that sort of distance is that the timing is almost entirely predictable. Another is that it’s “free” exercise. Alternatively, if you allow a bit extra time - it’s almost infinitely variable- allowing you to use your eyes and discover all kinds of fascinating features that the city has to offer.
At the time of construction the Bakerloo Line was incredibly important and incredibly overcrowded. This was before the Jubilee Line and so the Stanmore branch was the Bakerloo Line too. Remember that the Jubilee Line came into being as a relief for the Bakerloo.
Bakerloo has good interchange stations though. Baker Street and Marylebone North a few stops. Charing Cross and Waterloo South a few stops. I find the interchange effective if the bakerloo line isn’t working and I can just go back on the vic line to Euston. Maybe most people interchanging at Oxford Circus with Victoria Line are travelling north and south and maybe central line users can interchange at Euston or Warren Street to get a Northern Line and then Central line?
And don't forget Victoria to Paddington and vice versa. Much quicker than the Circle Line
Circle timed 14min
But rather more frequent trains on the Vic and Bakerloo than the Circle.
It is now possible to look up live running times to see whether a Circle line train is due, although that is easier in the northbound direction.
Extra travelling capacity
I worked in London for 30 years before journey planners were a thing.
A walk over Waterloo Bridge is going to take only a few minutes longer than using the tube, don't forget the time it takes to go between ground and platform level. Walking will be quicker if there is disruption. There is also the option of going via Kingsway and getting a bus for part of the journey. If it is a nice day then a stroll through Lincolns Inn Fields and taking in the view of the river will probably do wonders for your stress levels.
There is also a good bus service from outside Holborn station to Waterloo station.
And given where he’s based, if the OP is connecting between Thameslink and Tube through the Farringdon/Chancery Lane OSI, there are easier ways to do this.
My office is between Farringdon and Chancery Lane.
In which case, and myself working in an office in the same neck of the woods, I would encourage you to do as my many colleagues who commute through Waterloo do. Walk, use the bus, or take Thameslink to Blackfriars and walk from the south side of the station there. Some even use the Drain in preference to changing at Tottenham Court Road or Oxford Circus.
I tried to use the Drain once in the past and it was a better experience than the interchange at Oxford Circus. The journey planner I use suggested it because the SWR train I used did not call at Vauxhall.
Why is a 20 minute walk to work mad? Thousands, maybe millions, of people do that, in towns and cities all over the country
The issue, said this commuter, is adding that to the journey to the station, and then the commute itself.
Commuting in London has always involved lots of walking. T S Eliot wrote this in The Wasteland a century ago:
It's a free world; we may all choose what routes we like. The answer to some unpleasantnesses is to avoid them rather than attempt to engineer them out.
Must've imagined the huge numbers that have done that every day this week. And last week. And the week before that too.
