In article ,
John Williamson wrote:
On 10/07/2018 11:15, Mike Bristow wrote:

You think that trips made outside the peak are going to be *slower*?

Okay, you made a trip in the rush hour going against the traffic, and
claim that it was made at a good speed. You quote 45 minutes from the
Green Man to the Albert Hall. Fine, that's a fact I can accept.

Against the traffic is a fair point from the Green Man to Bow, or
perhaps Poplar; but rapidly becomes less true from there on.

The same journey in the other direction at the same time (RAH - Green
Man) would probably take almost two hours. That gives an average time of
90 minutes or so to cover at most 10 miles.

The last time I drove that sort of route with the flow was probably
from Paddington eastbound; I don't think the traffic was much slower.

The route was different (via the Mile End Road) so it's hard to
make an exact comparison; and it was quite a long time ago so my
memory isn't as clear, so take a pinch of salt or three.

On my side of town, I regularly travel from Heathrow to hotels in the
centre of town, and travelling with the main traffic flow in the rush
hour takes about 100 minutes (Using all available bus lanes), where
travelling against it takes 40 minutes or so without using a bus lane.

Gosh; that sort of difference suprises me. But I don't drive as
often as you do.

On occasion, even outside the rush hour, the trip either way can take
well over an hour.

Oh, yes; I've been lucky recently. If there is the wrong sort of
incident it all goes to pot very quickly (in some locations, anyway).

In my experience, bearing in mind I drive in London at all times of the
day and night, the TfL average speeds I quoted earlier in the thread
are, if anything, optimistic.

Optimistic I wouldn't argue with; I've not seen the detailed
methodology. But total nonsense they aren't - and certainly as you
get further out, average speed do increase quite noticably.

--
Mike Bristow