The Zones

There are lots of people who commute to Vauxhall SWT who would be very cross if it was not (partly) in Zone 2

It would be like putting South Wimbledon firmly in Zone 4!
Stations on zone borders are literally the best of both worlds and only benefit us, the paying people! There should be more of them not less!!

I seem to remember that many years ago they were in zones A, B, C and D like the north end of the Met.

I seem to recall that Epping moved into zone 6 when the line to Ongar was closed.

Yes, it was nothing to do with the Ongar closure, and was ALL the stations in Essex

I have managed to find a photo of the pre-Ongar closure version of the Central line in car diagram. It is not my photo: Flickr link . It shows Loughton in zone 6, with the stations beyond: Debden to Ongar as outside the zones.

It seems that some research may be required to note the slowly changing zone boundaries.

That was my point - how much would LU have had to charge to make the branch pay its way?

While digging around on the web a few months ago I found a briefing paper prepared by the House of Commons library for Ed Davey MP. It is about Train Fares but includes a history of the zonal system in London and how and when boundaries have changed over the years.

Unfortunately it is a word document buried in the depths of Mr Davey's website with no easy link to it. I also cannot attach it here as that appears to be against the rules.

For those who are interested to read it then go a Google Search on the term "2007/6/105-BTS" which is the report's reference number. The report was dated 12 July 2007 so a little out of date but not many zone changes have happened since then. The main ones relate to London Overground being part of TfL (Willesden Junction and Hampstead Heath changing zones) and then the East London Line reopening and extending (Shoreditch High Street).

I'm impressed with the concept. Are there any blatant 'weasel-zone' stations, where the geographical boundary has been clearly distorted to exclude a popular journey from a cheaper rate?

(The main-line railways used to do this with fares; a longer journey costing less than a more popular shorter one.)

Dartford being 1 stop outside the zones is arguably another example. I've also heard complaints about Woolwich Arsenal being Z4 rather than Z3 (like Woolwich Dockyard) but I'm not sure that zoning is an example of this or not.

Interestingly enough, Vauxhall's new(ish) SWT platform signs actually have Zone 1 but stickers over the top with 1/2 so you never know what the plans are!

Really? Looking at the map I see Zones 5 and 6 squeezed into a very thin layer along the northern border, with most tube lines not even getting into Zone 6 at all: (the Jubilee and Piccadilly each have two stations in Zone 5, and each branch of the Northern has just one. Compare that with the SW corner, where there can be as many as five stations in Zone 6 on one branch.

Closer in, because the central zone is not circular but elongate (a legacy of it having developed along the river and being hemmed in by the high ground either side) it is true you can go further east west through the central zone than you can north-south, but once out of the central zone I don't think the distances across each zone are significantly less in the north than in other directions. Simply comparing the number of stations north and south of the Thames in e.g Zone 3 on the Northern Line may not be helpful as station spacings are not constant (and the southern limb of the Northern Line runs at a marked angle to the radial direction) - it would be very interesting to see the zones overlaid on a geographic map.

Putting Bromley North one zone further in than Bromley South is probably a deliberate ploy to encourage use of the former.

The Wikimedia one only shows tube lines, but Londonist's is exactly what I wanted. It does tend to support my contention that the zones are largely concentric and of (roughly) equal thickness all the way round, but Zone 6 gets vaishingly thin in the north and has a large bulge inwards in the SW. The slight ellipticity of the zones, meaning their north/south extent is shorter than east/west, is more to do with the shape of the central zone than a stretching of the outer zones.