The London Underground

Tube is the London answer to an underground railway system; it’s the oldest, longest and the most expensive running underground network. The system was started in 1863 and serves the central area and most suburbs to the north of the Thames connection neighboring areas of Essex, Hertfordshire and Buckinghamshire. There are 12 major underground lines, to avoid confusion each of the lines have different names and color coding. The 12 lines are the Bakerloo line, Central line, Circle line, District line, Hammersmith & City line, Jubilee line, Metropolitan line, Northern line, Piccadilly line, Victoria line, Waterloo & City line and the East London line.

The Underground covers over 400 km of track distance and has 270 stations. Over a billion people utilize the Tube and thus reducing a lot of congestion on London roads. Oyster card, a smartcard has been the latest addition to the ticketing system for Tube. It is cheaper to operate than old payment methods like cash ticketing or magnetic-strip-based Travel cards. For tourist the all day travel card is the best ticketing option and is available at all underground stations.

The Tube is not a 24 hrs network and is works between 4:30 am to 1:30 am except on major public events like New Year etc.