UPDATED London’s buses are the slowest in England, averaging 7.1mph. Putney’s are worse. Route 14, which runs through the heart of the area, averages 5.7mph.
This week, a BBC News crew came to Putney High Street, boarded the 14 at the Green Man, and got off before it reached the end of the high street because it was moving too slowly to bother with. Putney residents will be familiar.
The Confederation of Passenger Transport published a 60-page analysis the same day setting out what fixing this would take and what it is worth. A 10% improvement in London bus speeds would free up £283.9m a year: £214.4m in operating cost savings and £69.5m in additional revenue. Every 1mph gained reduces operating costs by around 7.5%. The three measures that would deliver the improvement are bus lanes, traffic signal priority, and roadworks coordination. TfL told the BBC it is revamping traffic light sequences across London.
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1Bus lanes Dedicated road space to keep buses moving independently of traffic
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2Traffic signal priority Signals that detect approaching buses and extend green phases
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3Roadworks coordination Sequencing utility and highway works to avoid simultaneous disruption
The local picture
Route 14’s 5.7mph is not a snapshot. In 2020, when the roads were clear, it averaged 6.9mph. It has slowed by 17% over five years. And the problem is not general London congestion: TfL’s own Excess Waiting Time data shows routes 22 and 265 along Lower Richmond Road running 55% above TfL’s own target of one minute. Those same routes perform among the best in the borough after midnight, when junction traffic falls. The junction is not a contributing factor to Putney’s bus problem. It is the cause.
Paul Lynch, Managing Director of Stagecoach London, told the London Assembly Transport Committee in December that “endless traffic is driving passengers away” and that conditions were the worst in 40 years. Three of the five most complained-about bus routes in the entire TfL network serve Putney.
Where the fixes have worked
The CPT report documents three places that have already delivered the kind of improvement London needs.
Oxford introduced bus gates and coordinated traffic signals alongside free Park and Ride: patronage grew 12%, journey times fell 5.5%, and nine fewer buses were needed to run the same service.
Portsmouth applied priority measures across the city centre: journey times fell 31% and patronage grew 41% over two years. Aberdeen introduced bus gates with signal coordination: patronage grew 12.7% and journey times fell 17 to 18%.
All three involved traffic signal priority as a key part of the changes. All three required coordinated action between the local authority and the bus operator.
Putney’s junction already has traffic signals. In our case, the signal timing at the Putney Bridge junction that is causing the increase in congestion, has been a sticking point. The council maintains that the timing agreed was not what was implemented, and the result was months of traffic chaos.
There has yet to be a clear explanation for why the signaling was different to what was agreed and why it was changed: could it be that TfL surreptitiously introduced priority programming for buses? We are still to find out, a year later.
We do know that despite being a brand new junction that TfL did not introduce the latest version of its signaling technology which adapts on the fly to actual traffic patterns. We also know that it did not add cameras that can see bicycles and adjust timing accordingly, relying instead on older, dumber technology that tells whether a car is above it by recording the presence of metal.
The result has been a huge amount of green time wasted giving bicycles that aren’t even there priority over everything else.
But back to the BBC segment on Putney’s die bus speeds. One resident put it plainly: “Quicker to jog, surprise surprise.”
What comes next
Putney.news put specific questions to TfL about whether the traffic light revamp covers the Putney Bridge junction and when any improvement in bus journey times is expected.
A TfL spokesperson said:
“We have regularly reviewed the traffic signals at Putney Bridge junction several times since the safety scheme was introduced to make sure they’re working as efficiently as possible.
We’re working closely with Wandsworth Council to help them improve journeys through this busy and complex area, helping the borough to make physical changes to the junction and road layout to help traffic flow better, as well as upgrading signal technology to respond more quickly and give longer green lights to the busiest routes.”
The BBC did not come to Putney by accident. They chose this junction, this bus, to illustrate a national story about slow buses. That choice is its own data point in a series that has been building since 2024.
Residents can submit feedback on bus performance directly to TfL at tfl.gov.uk/help-and-contact. London TravelWatch, the independent passenger watchdog, handles systemic complaints: londontravelwatch.org.uk. Putney’s MP Fleur Anderson has previously raised Putney transport issues in parliament and can be contacted at fleur.anderson.mp@parliament.uk. Ward councillors’ contact details are at wandsworth.gov.uk/councillors.
I think we need to have a broader conversation about Putney and London transport. Isolated and unconnected engineering solutions are not enough. We need to focus on moving people rather than just vehicles, and make it much easier and safer to walk and cycle for short journeys. Car drivers need to play their part alongside everyone else. Maybe time to revisit the 15-minute neighbourhood and city ideas and adapt for Putney
The three measures you describe are only tinkering at the edges: we really need something more strategic. The real, underlying problem? Simply, TOO MANY CARS, and the only long term solution is to restrict their use, preferably by dynamic road pricing, to try ti ensure that their journeys are necessary rather than for convenience.
You mention that “Portsmouth applied priority measures across the city centre:” does that mean anything more, or just tinkering? If not, it was pretty pointless.
And you say that “a huge amount of green time [is] wasted giving bicycles that aren’t even there priority.” What dies thus refer to? As far as I can see, it’s a tiny about of green time at the northbound point to allow cyclists to advance 20 yards to the next red light, which allows traffic to enter the junction from the LRR. So in fact it doesn’t hold anyone up, and this claim is simply wrong (and reads more like fodder for the petrolheads. I hope not!!)
… abd I didn’t even mention the all-importanr need to reduce our burning of fossil fuels to deakvwith the climate emergency!
It’s a bit more nuanced than that. The same number of cars are going through the junction as a decade ago but the congestion is far worse for several reasons – first is the junction redesign. It just doesn’t work. We’ve covered this in depth in several articles – but this one is probably the best overview: https://putney.news/2026/04/15/every-warning-proved-right-the-full-evidence-behind-putneys-broken-junction/
Putney is at the centre of several problems:
1. Not enough Thames bridges in general. See here for comparisons with Paris and New York: https://putney.news/2026/04/29/putney-once-had-three-thames-crossings-it-is-time-to-think-about-a-fourth/
2. The few bridges we do have don’t currently work – Hammersmith Bridge, Albert Bridge, Wandsworth Bridge are all either closed or under repair – Vauxhall and even Putney Bridges are also in trouble. See here: https://putney.news/2026/05/12/putney-bridge-is-in-serious-trouble-the-council-knows-now-you-do-too/
3. We are trying to jam cars and buses and pedestrians and bicyclists onto the same roads and junctions. The roads are too narrow and can’t be widened. The solution? Pedestrian and cyclist bridges. Very feasible, and would make everyone happier. See here: https://putney.news/2026/04/29/putney-once-had-three-thames-crossings-it-is-time-to-think-about-a-fourth/
4. Putney High Street is a central point of traffic and effectively a valley. The timing problems on the junction are in large part because the North-South corridor is being protected over everything else. The solution to that? Move the traffic around more. This is also doable – we’ll produce a policy proposal for that too. But as things stands, the design is all wrong.
So while ‘TOO MANY CARS’ is true in one sense, it’s also like saying ‘NOT ENOUGH HOUSES’ to explain why rents and houses prices are too high: it’s a statement but not a solution.
On the bike timings – the main culprit was the bike-only lane southbound from the junction to the High Street which stopped Putney Bridge Road traffic from joining the junction for, I think, 12 seconds every cycle and which no bicycles used. The council admitted as much and killed it off. They have also tweaked the other cycle-only timings. But the truth is that it is grossly inefficient – in large part because the signalling system itself is dumb – they have to install special chips with the timings on and once set in place, that’s it.
There are plenty of places in the world now that are using smart and adaptive technology to add some dynamism to junctions and they are significantly more efficient. TfL is way behind and still trialling technology that has already been superseded. TfL is a bit of a lumbering bureaucracy and we are all suffering as a result.
Anyway, the broader point is this: no one is happy; and the answer is not to prioritise or blame other road users but to find solutions that work for everyone. It is possible, but for some reason the authorities feel driven to pick a side and push policies in their favour rather than do the hard work of find a better overall solution.
How about some Putney News features with our new councillors on Putney Town centre and access to green spaces and the river? What has been lost in the discussion about bridges, junctions and buses is the balance between Putney – and its High Street as a place, not just the movement of traffic. And – when we think about movement we are focused too much on private vehicles and not enough on people. We need to think about what sort of place we want Putney – High Street, river, LRR, parks etc and how we can make that work. Traffic movement is part of that but not all. Agree it is more nuanced than too many cars – but it is also more nuanced than just build or free up another car lane. In crowded Putney and London in general there is an imbalance in street space given to parked cars which are not used most of the time, and too many short journeys by private car. But – that won’t change unless our town centre better fits our needs and wants, and it is safer, quicker and more efficient to walk and cycle. Time to reopen the concept of 15-minute cities, revitalising our high street, and balancing movement and place in Putney Town Centre? Then build for what is needed to achieve that.
Do the people making the decisions travel by bus?
Decisions are so poor that having USB sockets on buses has become the only improvement in decades.
Ordering ever bigger and heavier buses with just two doors and capable of motorway travel when they operate almost entirely 20mph roads makes no sense.
We need multiple doors with tap in and out to reduce the time at bus stops and clear more space on the lower deck for prams and wheelchairs with the rest just priority seating.
Ideally we should also start issuing parking tickets on buses and that have parked at inappropriate bus stops.
(Completely agree about the signalling, excellent article as always!)