On May 18, 11:22*pm, MIG wrote:

On 18 May, 20:11, Tom Anderson wrote:

On Mon, 18 May 2009, 1506 wrote:

[snip]

IMHO extending the East London Line to Queens Park makes sense. *And,
moreover extending them on to Watford makes better sense.

How so? How would it help the good people of the Boroughs of Brent and
Harrow get to work? Presumably, most of them who currently commute to work
along that line work in central London, somewhere the N/ELL conspicuously
does not go. So what would they do? Get off at Camden Road and traipse
down to Camden Town? That'll be fun! Or maybe hang on to Highbury &
Islington and change, onto the Vic for the west end (because that's got
*loads* of spare capacity, and getting into town by taking two sides of a
triangle makes perfect sense) or the Northern City for the city (at least
that's only overcrowded, and not going in the wrong direction too). Or
just go to Shoreditch and walk - as long as they work on the north side of
the city.

No, sorry, extending the ELL to Watford makes no sense at all.

It would be easier then extending the Bakerloo to Watford.

Being easy isn't a good enough reason to do something - where's Andrew
Heenan when you (finally) need him?!

The route could be third rail throughout, except for the short joint
Bakerloo stretch.

Watford to west Croydon by way of Whitechapel trains could open up a
world of travel and interchange possibilities.

Not a single one of which would be quicker than a London-crossing
alternative.

I am wondering if all new projects should be opposed at the moment, on
the grounds that the most important services are already there, but
risk being cut to pay for the new.

If the price of the nice-to-haves, like orbital routes, is to withdraw
the crucial radial routes, then they aren't worth it.

Er, extending the ELL to Watford via Queen's Park isn't being proposed
- not even remotely - so trying to use random comments in a usenet
discussion as a peg to hang dissatisfaction on what's happening
elsewhere does seem to be stretching it a bit.