What names would you give to the Overground lines?

[Peter Sarf]

Frankly your claim that people knew the names you prefer is the issue. Many people outside the bloody insular enthusiast community do not know those names and just referred to the Overground. TfL aren't going to change their minds no matter how much you whinge, deal with it!

I think North London Line and East London line were fairly well known outside enthusiast circles judging by conversations I had. They were a bit tenuous of course at the ends of the routes - but already known.
As for the Lea Valley that seemed well known and also made sense.

Will be interesting to see how commonly used the new names will become over time. I would expect them to end up as well known as the tube line names of course but how soon we will have to see.

As an aside I still see people referring to the blue line or the red line etc. Blue is a bit tricky as that could be Victoria or Piccadilly !. So some will never use the names.

With the advent of journey planners I see more people having no awareness of route names or inferences of route. For busses it is service numbers. But for rail it seems to end up being change at station-name-1 for a service towards station-name-2 OR change at station-name-1 for a service on line-name-1 - in the second case the line name does not have to be meaningful and just has to be reflected on signage BUT it is useful to have meaningful names if people are not relying on a journey planner.

 

[Wolfie]

I think North London Line and East London line were fairly well known outside enthusiast circles judging by conversations I had. They were a bit tenuous of course at the ends of the routes - but already known.
As for the Lea Valley that seemed well known and also made sense.

Will be interesting to see how commonly used the new names will become over time. I would expect them to end up as well known as the tube line names of course but how soon we will have to see.

As an aside I still see people referring to the blue line or the red line etc. Blue is a bit tricky as that could be Victoria or Piccadilly !. So some will never use the names.

With the advent of journey planners I see more people having no awareness of route names or inferences of route. For busses it is service numbers. But for rail it seems to end up being change at station-name-1 for a service towards station-name-2 OR change at station-name-1 for a service on line-name-1 - in the second case the line name does not have to be meaningful and just has to be reflected on signage BUT it is useful to have meaningful names if people are not relying on a journey planner.

A considered response with a number of highly valid points, thank you.

Re your penultimate para that is particularly true of foreign tourists.

I agree about the North London line - although l suspect that TfL may have had concerns about confusion with the Northern line. Not so much so the East London line - only the core was known as that when it was a tube line.