Overview – The Original Objective
To be the first person to run between every station on every branch of every line of the London Underground (and the Docklands Light Railway).
I started in November 2010 and aimed to complete in mid-August 2011.
Tube running is really all about the “segments” that exist between stations. I’m not just running ‘to’ a station; else that would be relatively easy as there are large clusters of stations in the centre of town. I’m running the length of each line, and each branch of every line. If a segment happens to be the same on one line as another line, then I’ll simply have to do it twice or more!
There are eleven Underground Lines and there is also the Docklands Light Railway.
Out of Scope:
1. The London Overground – which absorbed the East London Line is a considerable distance, and is not really an Underground style network.
2. The Croydon Tram Link – ditto. Whilst more local to me, it doesn’t quite have that same challenge ring about it!
Total Distances
The LU website gives a total track length of 325 miles I estimated around 400 segments on the network. I then completed point-to-point segment planning using Google Maps (this took a while!) and worked out that the total planned mileage could be just over 400 miles! This would be an optimal distance, i.e. without stopping for roast dinners or interesting points of distraction! The circumference of the M25 is only 177 miles by way of comparison.The average distance of a ‘segment’ is just under one mile. The longest is about 6.5 miles (between Canary Wharf and Canada Water) and the shortest is just 0.1 miles – also from Canary Wharf but to Heron Quays.I have experienced some ‘execution errors’ resulting in me covering 168 miles against my planned mileage of 153. That’s about a 10% error. Taking this ‘error’ and uplifting it for the miles that I haven’t done, I would estimate the total journey to take some 440 miles. At 10 minute miles and running eight hours a day that would take just nine days. However, that would be totally mad. Its equivalent to nearly 17 marathons. Going from London to Edinburgh (via Manchester) would take 428 miles, so that’s a good way to imagine it. Phew!
