Routeing Through London to c2c

[mrcheek]

A quick question on routeing, since I am not sure if this is valid. I have checked the Routeing Guide online, but its a bit complicated isnt it?

Anyway, I am travelling from Weston-super-Mare to Chafford Hundred lakeside.

Getting to London is easy. Its getting through London that throws up a myriad of options

The various journey planners I have used all seem to want to make things difficult, making me use the Underground, or make long walks between stations, or effectively double back by some distance

But surely the best route from Paddington has to be Elizabeth Line to Romford, then LO to Upminster, then c2c to Chafford Hundred. No Underground connections! No long walks! And all fairly easy connections if I remember correctly.

Is anyone able to confirm if this is a valid route? As I say, from my amateur interpretation of the Routeing Guide, its fine. But Ive never used the guide before so I could be completely wrong....

 

[jfollows]

Totally valid.
Not really the routeing guide, instead you need to look up something I saved at https://www.railforums.co.uk/threads/maltese-cross-at-kentish-town.252095/#post-6330217 which shows the stations that can be used for a cross-London transfer, indicated by a maltese cross on the ticket. Elizabeth Line or Thameslink or Underground are all valid for this purpose. Essentially you stay on the Elizabeth line at Liverpool Street and the routeing switches to London-Chafford Hundred on national rail services.

EDIT Valid routes from London to Chafford Hundred are shown by maps CO & TS at https://data.atoc.org/routeing-maps, the former showing the route you want to take. Essentially London to Upminster from Liverpool Street or Fenchurch Street, then on to Chafford Hundred.

PS You can also go via Grays if the mood takes you, it is a permitted route.

 

[Gaelan]

Yes.

The only valid route for Bristol-Upminster (the routing points for Weston-super-Mare to Chafford Hundred; you could also use Grays as a routing point but that's not relevant here) is via London, so we break the journey into three separate components: Weston to London, across London (the "maltese cross" part) and London to Chafford Hundred.

Weston to Paddington is obviously valid. Across London, you're allowed to use any of Underground, Thameslink, or Elizabeth Line to get between two London stations listed here; this gets us as far as Liverpool Street, assuming we can find a suitable route onward from Liverpool Street.

The permitted maps from London Group to Upminster are CO and TS; the former map includes the EL route to Romford and the LO line from Romford to Upmister.

From Upminster, it's "local journey" rules to Chafford Hundred.

 

[mrcheek]

Totally valid.
Not really the routeing guide, instead you need to look up something I saved at https://www.railforums.co.uk/threads/maltese-cross-at-kentish-town.252095/#post-6330217 which shows the stations that can be used for a cross-London transfer, indicated by a maltese cross on the ticket. Elizabeth Line or Thameslink or Underground are all valid for this purpose.

EDIT Valid routes from London to Chafford Hundred are shown by maps CO & TS at https://data.atoc.org/routeing-maps, the former showing the route you want to take. Essentially London to Upminster from Liverpool Street or Fenchurch Street, then on to Chafford Hundred.

PS You can also go via Grays if the mood takes you, it is a permitted route.

many thanks for that!

I found the CO and TS maps, which led me to think it should be ok. But, in actual fact, the Routeing Guide was perhaps simpler to use than I had assumed, which made me think I might have missed something!

Anyway, somebody needs to tell the Journey Planners about this, since its a much better route than any they recommend!

 

[JonathanH]

But surely the best route from Paddington has to be Elizabeth Line to Romford, then LO to Upminster, then c2c to Chafford Hundred. No Underground connections! No long walks! And all fairly easy connections if I remember correctly.

When c2c are running into Liverpool Street at the weekend, changing at Stratford for Upminster is an even better route.

 

[Gaelan]

Anyway, somebody needs to tell the Journey Planners about this, since its a much better route than any they recommend!

The tricky bit is that "on paper" the tube route is better: it's faster, fewer changes (GWR + Circle/District Line + c2c vs GWR + EL + LO + c2c, not counting any changes necessary to get from Weston to Paddington), and the same price.

You could reasonably argue that the Elizabeth line and Overground are nicer than the tube, but whether that's the case - and if so whether it's worth extra time and an extra change - are rather subjective, and that trade-off is going to vary by person and their circumstances.

Ideally the journey planners would simply display both routes, but that's still tricky, as you don't want to overwhelm the user with a ton of niche alternatives; you still need some sort of objective criteria to determine what makes an alternative "sufficiently interesting" to be worth showing, which is tricky.

As a workaround, most journey planners will let you specify a "via" point; if you specify Romford here, you'll get the route you suggest. (This is also a useful way to verify if a non-obvious route is permitted by the routing guide! If a journey planner will sell it to you on a single ticket, it's valid.)

 

[JBuchananGB]

TFL journey planner suggests Lizzie to Whitechapel, District to Barking then C2C. Via Romford seem like long way round, and the interchanges at Romford and Upminster are quite long. (Romford has ramps though)

 

[Fenchurch SP]

I would take the Hammersmith and City line to Barking where it will almost certainly be a cross platform interchange for the Chafford train.

 

[yorkie]

A quick question on routeing, since I am not sure if this is valid. I have checked the Routeing Guide online, but its a bit complicated isnt it?

It's not aimed at regular passengers; booking engines apply these rules.

Anyway, I am travelling from Weston-super-Mare to Chafford Hundred lakeside.

Getting to London is easy. Its getting through London that throws up a myriad of options

The various journey planners I have used all seem to want to make things difficult, making me use the Underground, or make long walks between stations, or effectively double back by some distance

Our site (powered by Trainsplit) allows you to exclude walks, or exclude the Underground etc.

But surely the best route from Paddington has to be Elizabeth Line to Romford, then LO to Upminster, then c2c to Chafford Hundred. No Underground connections! No long walks! And all fairly easy connections if I remember correctly.

We also allow you to specify changing at Romford; we allow up to 3 vias/avoids.

Is anyone able to confirm if this is a valid route? As I say, from my amateur interpretation of the Routeing Guide, its fine. But Ive never used the guide before so I could be completely wrong....

It is, but next time you can use a journey planner to work it out for you; if it's not valid on a through fare, Trainsplit will offer a valid combination of tickets for the desired itinerary. However you can turn splits off, which means if you don't get any fares returned you know it isn't a valid route on a through fare.

 

[Tetchytyke]

Anyway, somebody needs to tell the Journey Planners about this, since its a much better route than any they recommend!

That will depend on the exact times you travel. Romford to Upminster is only 2tph, and Upminster to Chafford Hundred direct is only 2tph. If you just miss a connection (or worse, both connections) that is a lot of waiting around.

Personally I’d go with what the TfL journey planner suggests for Paddington to Chafford Hundred: either Lizzy Line to Whitechapel then the District/H&C to Barking then c2c, or Bakerloo Line to Baker Street then Jubilee to West Ham then c2c. I’d probably go with the former as West Ham isn’t the nicest station to wait at.

 

[Haywain]

That will depend on the exact times you travel. Romford to Upminster is only 2tph, and Upminster to Chafford Hundred direct is only 2tph. If you just miss a connection (or worse, both connections) that is a lot of waiting around.

It's also worth mentioning that while Romford has step-free access, the TfL maps indicate that this isn't the case at Upminster when arriving from Romford. For many people this would make it, at best, a sub-optimal change point.