'Missed opportunity' as TfL rejects Eltham to Woolwich Superloop bus

Transport for London has rejected calls to extend Eltham’s new Superloop bus to Woolwich, despite campaigns for a fast link between the two town centres.

Greenwich Council’s Labour leadership and Conservative councillors both said it was a “missed opportunity” to provide a limited-stop service from Eltham to the Elizabeth Line.

TfL said that providing new links in Clapham “offered more benefit” to passengers.

The limited-stop SL15 route will begin next year and will run between Clapham Junction and Eltham station, via Streatham Vale, Tulse Hill, West Dulwich, Forest Hill, Catford and Lee, mostly using the South Circular.

TfL confirmed on Tuesday that the single-decker route would run largely as planned after a consultation was held last autumn, although serving different stops in the Clapham Junction area to those originally proposed.

In Catford, an extra stop has been inserted at the junction of Brownhill Road and Torridon Road to serve the Corbett Estate and Hither Green. An extra stop has also been added in Streatham.

But TfL rebuffed calls from both Labour and Conservative politicians in Greenwich for a limited-stop link between Eltham and Woolwich. The two town centres are linked by the 161 bus, but the service takes a detour through Queen Elizabeth Hospital and is regularly held up in traffic queues nearby.

As it stands, passengers for Woolwich on the SL15 will need to change buses at the Yorkshire Grey roundabout and cross the busy Eltham Road to catch a 122 instead.

“Extending the route to Woolwich without shortening it from Clapham Junction would make SL15 very long and difficult to operate reliably,” TfL said in a document answering responses to the consultation.

“Direct connections between Eltham and Woolwich are already provided by bus routes 122 and 161. Whereas elsewhere on route SL15 there aremissing direct links – for example, Clapham Junction to Clapham Park. Focussing on providing these missing connections offers more benefit as it creates new, more unique direct links that do not currently exist, improving journey times across south London”

Councillors from both Labour and the Conservatives have long called for faster buses between Eltham and Woolwich, even before Sir Sadiq Khan launched the Superloop network three years ago. A motion backing the extension of the SL15 was passed at a council meeting in November.

Some 118 of 1,897 respondents to the consultation also called for a link to Woolwich – more than any other suggested change to the route – while the Forest Hill Society also supported a link to Woolwich, suggesting the route be amended so it ran from Brixton to Woolwich.

TfL’s rejection of a limited-stop Eltham to Woolwich link came just a week after The Greenwich Wire revealed plans to cut the frequency of the 286 between Eltham and Greenwich, one of the few north-south links in the borough.

“It’s a missed opportunity that there is no Superloop connection between Eltham and Woolwich,” Calum O’Byrne Mulligan, the council’s cabinet member for climate action, sustainability and transport. The SL15 route should link these two important town centres, and this is something on which there is unanimous support for in Greenwich, and we will continue to push for improved north-south links in our borough.

“Woolwich is already a major transport hub with the Elizabeth Line, DLR, national rail and multiple bus routes. A direct express bus to Eltham would make it far easier for residents to travel between the north and south of the borough.

“This is especially important given the planned reduction in frequency on the 286, which risks leaving residents in the south with fewer reliable travel options.

“We are committed to our target of 75 per cent of journeys in Greenwich being made by foot, cycle or public transport by 2041, which is already at 62 per cent. To achieve this, we need TfL to invest in better connections and improved services, and using the Superloop to do that between Eltham and Woolwich would have been a big step forwards.”

Matt Hartley, the Conservative leader, said: “What a missed opportunity for our borough. There really is only limited value in this bus route from Eltham to Clapham – strategically it is north-south transport links that we need, particularly given how important it is to spread the benefits of the Elizabeth Line as far we can, to Eltham and the south of the borough.

“We will keep pressing Transport for London for better north-south bus links for Eltham, Mottingham and New Eltham. As the cut to the 286 route shows, they seem determined to do the opposite at the moment.”

The route will run every 12 minutes on Monday to Saturday daytimes and every 15 minutes at other times, with “large 70-capacity single-deck buses” because of a low bridge at Tulse Hill. TfL rejected calls to reroute the service in this area so that double-deckers could run.