TfL cuts another 5 buses an hour from Waterloo Bridge
Transport for London has quietly announced a series of cuts to bus services between Elephant & Castle and Holborn via Waterloo Bridge, with a warning of further changes in store.
Starting this weekend, the daytime service on route 68 which links West Norwood with Euston has been reduced from 7 or 8 buses per hour to 6 buses per hour (a 10-minute frequency).
From 6 November the service on route 188 between North Greenwich and Russell Square will be cut from 7 or 8 buses an hour to 6 per hour.
The following week, route 168 from Old Kent Road Tesco to Hampstead Heath will also have its service pared back from 8 buses per hour to 7 per hour.
These cuts follow previous reductions to two other routes serving Waterloo Bridge – the 59 and 521 – in September this year.
"A programme to reduce the frequency of bus services is being implemented as a reflection of the reduced use of the bus network in central and inner London over previous years," Transport for London commissioner Andy Byford wrote in his most recent report to the organisation's board.
"These reductions are mainly of one to two buses per hour per route, but there have been more substantial reductions on routes 507 and 521, which act as feeders to and from the National Rail services at London Bridge, Victoria and Waterloo main line stations due to reductions in demand, which have been further exacerbated by the pandemic.
"We are also looking at more substantial structural alterations to bus routes in inner and central London, with any such changes being subject to full stakeholder and public consultation and an equality impact assessment."
