Getting to Heathrow - cheap vs expensive

talldave · 11 Apr 2024

As we were making a school holiday plane spotting trip to Heathrow yesterday, we decided to split up and compare the cheap route vs the expensive route by train from Crystal Palace to T5. I took the £3.70 avoiding Zone 1 route - four trains - whilst the others took the £13.30 Elizabeth Line - two train - route.

Timing from train moving off at Crystal Palace to reaching Café Nero in T5 departures, the expensive route was 1h 25m and the cheap route was 1h 39m. Cheap route with luggage would be a hassle, and I got rained on too, but in value for money terms, it's great. If you're returning same day, as we were, then daily capping makes the difference less significant. Although we all came back via the cheap route so the others could have the four train, pink reader, getting rained on, 1h 39m experience!

Of course we spent £1.75 on the bus getting to the station. And for the cheapest possible non-train route, we could have got to Heathrow for that £1.75 using two buses. However, the return journey costs £3.50 and you spend most of your day on a bus!

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Wandering Pom · 11 Apr 2024

As a matter of interest, which way does the cheap route go? My geography of suburban London is a bit hazy; I can think of several possibilities but all of them seem quite slow.

Joe Paxton · 11 Apr 2024

talldave said:
As we were making a school holiday plane spotting trip to Heathrow yesterday, we decided to split up and compare the cheap route vs the expensive route by train from Crystal Palace to T5. I took the £3.70 avoiding Zone 1 route - four trains - whilst the others took the £13.30 Elizabeth Line - two train - route.

Timing from train moving off at Crystal Palace to reaching Café Nero in T5 departures, the expensive route was 1h 25m and the cheap route was 1h 39m. Cheap route with luggage would be a hassle, and I got rained on too, but in value for money terms, it's great. If you're returning same day, as we were, then daily capping makes the difference less significant. Although we all came back via the cheap route so the others could have the four train, pink reader, getting rained on, 1h 39m experience!

Of course we spent £1.75 on the bus getting to the station. And for the cheapest possible non-train route, we could have got to Heathrow for that £1.75 using two buses. However, the return journey costs £3.50 and you spend most of your day on a bus!

Re the daily capping, it's a great shame the cheaper zones 2-6 daily cap (and associated Day Travelcard) which used to exist got withdrawn, all the way back in 2011.

Bletchleyite · 11 Apr 2024

Joe Paxton said:
Re the daily capping, it's a great shame the cheaper zones 2-6 daily cap (and associated Day Travelcard) which used to exist got withdrawn, all the way back in 2011.

While that was a long way before COVID, I can't see as much sense in cheaper "avoiding zone 1" fares any more as since COVID zone 1 doesn't have the overcrowding problem it did.

talldave · 11 Apr 2024

Wandering Pom said:
As a matter of interest, which way does the cheap route go? My geography of suburban London is a bit hazy; I can think of several possibilities but all of them seem quite slow.

I took:
Crystal Palace - Clapham Junction (Southern)
Clapham Junction - West Brompton (Overground)
West Brompton - Earls Court (District Line)
Earls Court - Heathrow T5 (Piccadilly Line)

I tapped pink readers at Clapham Junction and West Brompton, although I think the latter alone would be sufficient to validate the cheaper routing.

I had to wait almost 10 minutes at Earls Court for a T5 train. I was initially tempted to jump on a T4, T2&3 train thinking I could then do a Heathrow Express transfer between T2&3 and T5, but I'm glad I didn't because I later saw something on the train that suggests trains lurk at T4 for several minutes, so that option would have added a stack of time. Had the first train to arrive at Earls Court been a T5 one, I think I could have achieved 1h 30m.

Mcv378 · 11 Apr 2024

talldave said:
I took:
Crystal Palace - Clapham Junction (Southern)
Clapham Junction - West Brompton (Overground)
West Brompton - Earls Court (District Line)
Earls Court - Heathrow T5 (Piccadilly Line)

I tapped pink readers at Clapham Junction and West Brompton, although I think the latter alone would be sufficient to validate the cheaper routing.

I had to wait almost 10 minutes at Earls Court for a T5 train. I was initially tempted to jump on a T4, T2&3 train thinking I could then do a Heathrow Express transfer between T2&3 and T5, but I'm glad I didn't because I later saw something on the train that suggests trains lurk at T4 for several minutes, so that option would have added a stack of time. Had the first train to arrive at Earls Court been a T5 one, I think I could have achieved 1h 30m.

When touching in or out at Heathrow it charges a peak fare.

Touching out then touching back in at Hatton Cross gives you the off peak fare (obviously dependant on the time of day) and your onward fare to Heathrow will be free.

Wandering Pom · 11 Apr 2024

talldave said:
I took:
Crystal Palace - Clapham Junction (Southern)
Clapham Junction - West Brompton (Overground)
West Brompton - Earls Court (District Line)
Earls Court - Heathrow T5 (Piccadilly Line)

I tapped pink readers at Clapham Junction and West Brompton, although I think the latter alone would be sufficient to validate the cheaper routing.

I had to wait almost 10 minutes at Earls Court for a T5 train. I was initially tempted to jump on a T4, T2&3 train thinking I could then do a Heathrow Express transfer between T2&3 and T5, but I'm glad I didn't because I later saw something on the train that suggests trains lurk at T4 for several minutes, so that option would have added a stack of time. Had the first train to arrive at Earls Court been a T5 one, I think I could have achieved 1h 30m.

Thanks - I hadn't appreciated that Earl's Court is in Zones 1 and 2.

Trains via Heathrow Terminal 4 do usually lay over there for a few minutes - it's the only place available to put in some recovery time between the westbound and eastbound trips.

JonathanH · 11 Apr 2024

Bletchleyite said:
While that was a long way before COVID, I can't see as much sense in cheaper "avoiding zone 1" fares any more as since COVID zone 1 doesn't have the overcrowding problem it did.

That depends on how politically acceptable it is to remove the cheaper options for peripheral travel.

The paradox for me has always been that you can get cheaper point to point fares on Oyster / Contactless by avoiding Zone 1, but the cap for just travelling in Zones 1 and 2 is loads cheaper than making many peripheral journeys, as the capping is Zone 1 centric in every outer zone.

plugwash · 11 Apr 2024

It seems there are quite a lot of different different fares from Crystal palace to Heathrow terminal 5.

For journeys to the underground station:

The default fare is £5.60 at all times. This seems to be a zone 1-6 fare on the TFL scale with no off-peak discounts available. I presume this is based on taking the overground to somewhere like Canada Water, shadwell or whitechapel, using some combination of TFL services to cross central London and then using the Picadilly line to Heathrow.,

A lower fare of £5.30 peak and £3.70 off-peak applies if you touch a pink reader at West Brompton or Richmond. This seems to be a zones 2-6 mixed-mode fare.

And a higher fare of £9.90 peak and £6.70 off-peak applies if you change from NR to LU at one of the south London terminals, at Battersea or at Balham.

For journeys to the rail station on the lizzie:

The default fare is £13.30, I presume this is based on using the overground to Whitechapel and then the Lizzie to heathrow. You could also get this fare by using Southern to London bridge, Thameslink to Farringdon and then the lizzie.

There is an avoiding zone 1 fare at £10.30 peak and £8.70 off-peak. It seems to get this fare you either need to make an OSI at shepherds bush, touch on the pink reader at west brompton, or touch on the pink readers at richmond and ealing broadway.

And a higher fare of £15.60 peak and £14.40 off-peak applies if you change from NR to LU at one of the south London terminals, at Battersea or at Balham.

Watershed · 11 Apr 2024

talldave said:
I took:
Crystal Palace - Clapham Junction (Southern)
Clapham Junction - West Brompton (Overground)
West Brompton - Earls Court (District Line)
Earls Court - Heathrow T5 (Piccadilly Line)

I tapped pink readers at Clapham Junction and West Brompton, although I think the latter alone would be sufficient to validate the cheaper routing.

I had to wait almost 10 minutes at Earls Court for a T5 train. I was initially tempted to jump on a T4, T2&3 train thinking I could then do a Heathrow Express transfer between T2&3 and T5, but I'm glad I didn't because I later saw something on the train that suggests trains lurk at T4 for several minutes, so that option would have added a stack of time. Had the first train to arrive at Earls Court been a T5 one, I think I could have achieved 1h 30m.

Worth noting that if you're heading to T5 and the first train is for T4 (or to T2&3 and time isn't of the essence) you can 'step back' a train at Hatton Cross whilst touching out and back in. This reduces the fare slightly as Hatton Cross is in Zone 5 (so you pay for one zone less), and the fare from Hatton Cross to Heathrow is free. It also has the further benefit of avoiding the all-week peak fares that apply to Heathrow journeys if you travel to/from/via Zone 1.

It's unclear to me why journeys between Hatton Cross and Heathrow became free when the all-day peak changes came in, but I'm certainly not complaining!

Harpers Tate · 11 Apr 2024

Arriving at King's Cross/St.Pancras by train I did test using the Elizabeth (via Farringdon) to compare with just using the Pic direct. Cost about twice as much. Saved all of maybe 5 minutes. Unlikely to do so again.

talldave · 11 Apr 2024

plugwash said:
It seems there are quite a lot of different different fares from Crystal palace to Heathrow terminal 5.

...

It's a bit mind blowing trying to plough through and make any sense of them - thanks for your summary.

I find the TfL Single Fare Finder atrocious in terms of its search algorithm. As you type in the word "Heathrow" character by character, it offers you a varying list of suggestions to choose from which make absolutely no sense. After three letters you get all the Underground options, but it's not until 6 letters that "Rail Station" options start to appear - Terminal 5 on 6 letters but Terminals 2&3 and Terminal 4 don't appear until you've typed all 8 letters. And it's nothing to do with the length of list its able to present because after 5 letters, you're getting a list of 8 suggestions, 3 of which are Heathrow based, 5 of which aren't. Stations that start with "Heathrow" should have higher priority in the algorithm than those with "Heath" elsewhere in their name - but this isn't the case. it's embarrassingly bad.

I consider this to be sloppy specification and/or programming by TfL and is probably simply a consequence of the order in which stations were originally entered into the database of stations. It also shows a lack of testing and of course that classic problem of the people responsible never using their own products. The fact that entering "heathr" only shows 4 of the 7 results that should be shown is ludicrous.

if anyone at TfL wants to give me one of their £100k+ jobs to help put this silliness right, I'm all ears!!

Watershed said:
Worth noting that if you're heading to T5 and the first train is for T4 (or to T2&3 and time isn't of the essence) you can 'step back' a train at Hatton Cross whilst touching out and back in. This reduces the fare slightly as Hatton Cross is in Zone 5 (so you pay for one zone less), and the fare from Hatton Cross to Heathrow is free. It also has the further benefit of avoiding the all-week peak fares that apply to Heathrow journeys if you travel to/from/via Zone 1.

It's unclear to me why journeys between Hatton Cross and Heathrow became free when the all-day peak changes came in, but I'm certainly not complaining!

Thanks! Fascinating!

plugwash · 11 Apr 2024

One issue with PAYG schemes is that they can only set fares based on the data they actually have.

If you change from Rail to Undergound at a south London terminal (London Bridge, Victoria, Blackfriars, Cannon Street, Charing Cross, Waterloo or Waterloo East), the system can see that because the south london terminals have seperate gate-lines for the NR and LU parts of the station.

OTOH if you change from a Southern Train to a Thameslink train at London Bridge (one of the aformentioned south London terminals), that leaves no record. Similarly changing from Thameslink to Crossrail at Farringdon leaves no record. So while a journey using Southern to London bridge, Thameslink to Farringdon and then the Lizzie to heathrow should logically attract a mixed-mode fare in practice there is no way to define such a fare in the system.

Alfonso · 11 Apr 2024

Watershed said:
Worth noting that if you're heading to T5 and the first train is for T4 (or to T2&3 and time isn't of the essence) you can 'step back' a train at Hatton Cross whilst touching out and back in. This reduces the fare slightly as Hatton Cross is in Zone 5 (so you pay for one zone less), and the fare from Hatton Cross to Heathrow is free. It also has the further benefit of avoiding the all-week peak fares that apply to Heathrow journeys if you travel to/from/via Zone 1.

It's unclear to me why journeys between Hatton Cross and Heathrow became free when the all-day peak changes came in, but I'm certainly not complaining!

I think free to Hatton Cross came in the same time the free buses around Heathrow came out.

JonathanH · 11 Apr 2024

plugwash said:
So while a journey using Southern to London bridge, Thameslink to Farringdon and then the Lizzie to heathrow should logically attract a mixed-mode fare in practice there is no way to define such a fare in the system.

Yes, Farringdon is a big hole when it comes to charging the mixed-mode premium for appropriate flows, although it is noticeable that no mixed-mode premium is charged for changing at St Pancras either.

plugwash · 11 Apr 2024

JonathanH said:
it is noticeable that no mixed-mode premium is charged for changing at St Pancras either.

Yeah, I've noticed that before, A few possible reasons spring to mind but I don't know what was or wasn't going through the heads of the negotiators/planners.

1. While the new Thameslink platforms at St Pancras Thameslink now have their own gateline, it's predecessor Kings Cross Thameslink was part of the underground station. So perhaps when the oyster expansion south of the river was negotiated, it was assumed that interchange there would be open, like it is at Farringdon and Moorgate.
2. The thameslink core is eligible for TFL fare scales, so there is an argument that an interchange at STP is a much weaker indication that someone should be charged a mixed-mode fare than an interchange at one of the Southern terminals.
3. My understanding is that the system has limited capacity for adding interchange rules, perhaps it was just not deemed worth adding a rule for St Pancras or City Thameslink given that farringdon was open.

redreni · 11 Apr 2024

Bletchleyite said:
While that was a long way before COVID, I can't see as much sense in cheaper "avoiding zone 1" fares any more as since COVID zone 1 doesn't have the overcrowding problem it did.

Somebody who underestimated the determination to keep increasing the farebox contribution to public transport running costs and cut the proportion contributed from public funds (despite this being a terrible idea for perfectly obvious reasons) might think:

"Huh, if zone 1 doesn't have the overcrowding problem it did, why not reduce the charge for zone 1 to the same rate as other zones instead of increasing the fares outside zone 1?"

Pushpit · 11 Apr 2024

The other way to have done this, kind of halfway house, is Crystal Palace to Feltham, single change at Clapham Junction, then bus 490. This gives you line of sight of Hounslow Heath (just before Feltham Station), the original airport location before Heathrow, and past two popular spots for aircraft spotters on the Southern Perimeter Road. Journey Planner says 91 minutes, optimistically.

talldave · 11 Apr 2024

Pushpit said:
The other way to have done this, kind of halfway house, is Crystal Palace to Feltham, single change at Clapham Junction, then bus 490. This gives you line of sight of Hounslow Heath (just before Feltham Station), the original airport location before Heathrow, and past two popular spots for aircraft spotters on the Southern Perimeter Road. Journey Planner says 91 minutes, optimistically.

Interesting - thank you. That sounds well worth checking out. The airport itself is pretty useless for seeing anything, but the parking pods provide a fun ride and good views of one of the runways!

MikeWh · 12 Apr 2024

Watershed said:
It's unclear to me why journeys between Hatton Cross and Heathrow became free when the all-day peak changes came in, but I'm certainly not complaining!

Recognition that some of the warehouse facilities are sited near Hatton Cross was mentioned at the time.

talldave said:
I find the TfL Single Fare Finder atrocious in terms of its search algorithm. As you type in the word "Heathrow" character by character, it offers you a varying list of suggestions to choose from which make absolutely no sense. After three letters you get all the Underground options, but it's not until 6 letters that "Rail Station" options start to appear - Terminal 5 on 6 letters but Terminals 2&3 and Terminal 4 don't appear until you've typed all 8 letters. And it's nothing to do with the length of list its able to present because after 5 letters, you're getting a list of 8 suggestions, 3 of which are Heathrow based, 5 of which aren't. Stations that start with "Heathrow" should have higher priority in the algorithm than those with "Heath" elsewhere in their name - but this isn't the case. it's embarrassingly bad.

My fare finder tries a bit harder and resolves some annoying anomalies (eg try finding East Croydon on the SFF). You still get other stations appearing while typing Heathrow, but all 6 are there as soon as you enter the 'r'.

boiledbeans2 · 12 Apr 2024

talldave said:
Interesting - thank you. That sounds well worth checking out. The airport itself is pretty useless for seeing anything, but the parking pods provide a fun ride and good views of one of the runways!

Ifyou haven't heard of it, the popular plane spotting place is Myrtle Avenue, near Hatton Cross station. It is located at the end of one of the runways.

On a clear sunny day, you will see plane spotters with deck chairs and radios gathered on the green space there.

Myrtle Avenue, Hounslow - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Haywain · 12 Apr 2024

boiledbeans2 said:
Ifyou haven't heard of it, the popular plane spotting place is Myrtle Avenue, near Hatton Cross station. It is located at the end of one of the runways.

On a clear sunny day, you will see plane spotters with deck chairs and radios gathered on the green space there.

Myrtle Avenue, Hounslow - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

I preferred the days of proper spectator areas, like the Queen's Building at Heathrow.

plugwash · 12 Apr 2024

Manchester still has a "runway visitor park", though its a bit of a pain to get to without a car. The nearest bus stops seem to be at the world freight terminal.

Thames99 · 12 Apr 2024

At Manchester there is also a pub right alongside the end of the runway. You can sit in the garden watching planes landing and taking off while getting gently plastered.

Explore our Pub and Restaurant – The Airport Pub

Take off with us at The Airport Pub – A family pub and restaurant with beer garden close to Manchester Airport.

airport.pub

Pushpit · 12 Apr 2024

The Heathrow equivalents are the Green Man (more so) and the Duke of Wellington both nearish Hatton Cross.

nw1 · 13 Apr 2024

talldave said:
Interesting - thank you. That sounds well worth checking out. The airport itself is pretty useless for seeing anything, but the parking pods provide a fun ride and good views of one of the runways!

Has this changed? I remember visiting Heathrow in 1993 during a public-transport-themed day out in London when I spent most of the day on trains of one sort or another (also remember covering part of the NLL on this day) and there was a roof-top observation area, which gave good views of aircraft taking off. I distinctly remember a Boeing 727 taking off, which must have been towards the end of their time.

I have to confess I don't remember which terminal it was, but it was one of 1-3.

Pushpit · 13 Apr 2024

nw1 said:
Has this changed? I remember visiting Heathrow in 1993 during a public-transport-themed day out in London when I spent most of the day on trains of one sort or another (also remember covering part of the NLL on this day) and there was a roof-top observation area, which gave good views of aircraft taking off. I distinctly remember a Boeing 727 taking off, which must have been towards the end of their time.

I have to confess I don't remember which terminal it was, but it was one of 1-3.

There's a reference to it in post 22 supra. It was Terminal 2 and it was the Queen's Building, an office block attached to the terminal which had a roof garden and spectators' gallery on the top of the building, along with several refreshment facilities. It was demolished in 2009 but at one stage it was a more popular tourist attraction than the Tower of London. In its place we have the modern Terminal 2, which is named the Queen's Terminal as a nod to that connection to the Royal Family.

Now the best locations are airside, such as at the end of Terminal 5C, plus some of the T5 lounges; the top of the Hilton Garden Inn T2 (they discourage visitors unless they are spending money), many of the bedrooms in the Renaissance hotel and Hilton Garden Inn at Hatton Cross, and above all an observation deck airside in T4 between gates 15 and 16.

Heathrow Airport Limited replaces the spectator facilites at T2 with a viewing deck in front of the Heathrow Academy, their training building, in Newall Road, TW6 2RE. This is just a glorified bus shelter but it does get some visitors.

nw1 · 13 Apr 2024

Pushpit said:
There's a reference to in in post 22 supra. It was Terminal 2 and it was the Queen's Building, an office block attached to the terminal which had a roof garden and spectators' gallery on the top of the building, along with several refreshment facilities. It was demolished in 2009 but at one stage it was a more popular tourist attraction than the Tower of London. In its place we have the modern Terminal 2, which is named the Queen's Terminal as a nod to that connection to the Royal Family.

Interesting. The day I went it was pretty quiet, but it was midweek.

island · 14 Apr 2024

Mcv378 said:
When touching in or out at Heathrow it charges a peak fare.

Only if your journey involves zone 1 and even then not always.

Mcv378 said:
Touching out then touching back in at Hatton Cross gives you the off peak fare (obviously dependant on the time of day) and your onward fare to Heathrow will be free.

Not necessary on the OP's journey.

Alfonso said:
I think free to Hatton Cross came in the same time the free buses around Heathrow came out.

I believe that's right and is something to do with there being an obligation to let people get to and from terminals 2 and 3 at no cost if they do not have a vehicle, as there is no (legal) way between those terminals and the rest of the world on foot.

Watershed · 14 Apr 2024

island said:
I believe that's right and is something to do with there being an obligation to let people get to and from terminals 2 and 3 at no cost if they do not have a vehicle, as there is no (legal) way between those terminals and the rest of the world on foot.

Although I'm obviously in favour, free access to Terminals 2 and 3 has long already been possible by means of the (free) Tube and National Rail services to/from Terminal 4, which can of course be accessed by foot.

The Heathrow free travel area for buses was also withdrawn before journeys to/from Hatton Cross became free, so that would otherwise suggest there was a period of "non-compliance" with whichever obligation you are referring to, if T4 were somehow deemed not to count?

Getting to Heathrow - cheap vs expensive

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