Forum Topic

TfL's Accessibility Survey and Turnham Green Station

As reported on this site TfL are currently doing a survey about accessibility on the tube and how they will choose which stations to make step free next.Chiswick is uniquely free of accessible stations on London Underground, Overground and mainline. Give its footfall, if the area were to get an accessible station it would be Turnham Green.The survey is easy to complete and at the end there is space for comments which you can make your case why you think Turnham Green (or another station in the area should be free).The survey is here: https://haveyoursay.tfl.gov.uk/tube-step-free-access

Mark Evans ● 1804d4 Comments

Quite right. This should get more interest given the widespread interest in accessibility and equality in Chiswick and on this forum.Gunnersbury really ought to be accessible too. It has become a PT hub with many people using it to access the bus network and, of course, the many businesses opposite. This would be a good thing for our Councillors to campaign for. Possibly even more important and probably more realistic than the standard vote-winning unicorn of getting the Piccadilly Line to stop at TG.

Paul Campbell ● 1803d

Local councillors from both Ealing and Hounslow have been lobbying on this issue for decades.TfL did look at during the time Chris Calvi-Freeman was running transport in Hounslow it but they seem now to have adopted a 'quick win' strategy by which they are primarily aiming to get the proportion of stations with step free access up without looking at how many people would benefit at each station.As has been pointed out, Chiswick has no step free access at all so lifts at Turnham Green would be a massive advance.It will help if people were to respond to this survey but for real progress to be made Hounslow Council would have to get behind a campaign and support the councillors who are already lobbying for this. As far as I am aware they are unwilling to give specific support to Turnham Green.

Francis Rowe ● 1803d

The revelations about TfL's financial status today render this discussion a bit moot as it looks very unlikely that TfL's step-free access programme will survive. I do know that some people have been lobbying hard for a lift at Turnham Green for some time now. Hounslow have had success elsewhere in the borough with Osterley recently upgraded and I believe Isleworth is likely to be made fully accessible in the not too distant future. Ealing has also seen big improvements because all the Crossrail stations are step free. Why Chiswick is the Cinderella in all this is probably a combination of politics and cost.The financing situation also has implications for the Piccadilly line stop at Turnham Green, the introduction of which was predicated on the signalling upgrade which is probably not going to happen now. I always thought the statistical case against introducing the stop put forward by TfL was a bit contrived but the numbers will have changed substantially since that was done. I have no idea if Turnham  Green has got relatively busier but the pressure to increase the regularity of service on the Piccadilly line has reduced. If I was connected with the local Conservative party I'd be writing to Andrew Gilligan today urging him to include a Turnham Green stop as a condition of the funding package being negotiated at the moment.

Mark Evans ● 1802d

Pre-Covid, Gunnersbury had more passengers than TG at the peak although TG had more overall.  To be determined if people return to work at Chiswick Business Park and the greater development at that end of Chiswick means Gunnersbury will overtake TG.I think step-free access was linked to Piccadilly line stopping which is linked to signalling upgrades and new trains for the Piccadilly line.The thinking pre-Covid was that the new trains and signalling would enable Piccadilly line stopping at TG and the District line service to Ealing Broadway would be stopped and replaced by a Piccadilly line service.  The District line trains would then be used to provide a higher frequency service on the Richmond and Wimbledon branches.For the new Piccadilly line trains there was talk of putting in platform edge doors.For step free access at TG, back of the envelope engineering, possibly sink a shaft through the platforms for lifts with lift doors facing the current stairs to the platforms.

Michael Robinson ● 1802d