Cyclists fear bike hire scheme is losing its way - TfL’s ‘wayfinding’ takes a few wrong turns in Fitzrovia

Published: 04 February 2011
by JOSH LOEB

IS London’s bike hire scheme losing its direction? 

Yes, if maps attached to one of the city’s newest docking stations are anything to go by.

Bemused two-wheelers are up in arms after discovering that the latest bike bay to be built in Fitzrovia wrongly informs people that Soho is to the north and Fitzroy Square is to the west.  

A docking station in Warren Street is labelled Euston, and the maps – which are produced by TfL’s “wayfinding” organisation Legible London – appear to direct bike-users the wrong way down one-way streets. 

Linus Rees, a cyclist and chair of the Fitzrovia Neighbourhood Association, has catalogued a series of Boris bike “blunders” on the website of local paper Fitzrovia News. 

He said: “As anyone should know, Fitzrovia is the area bounded by Gower Street to the east and Great Portland Street to the west, and Euston Road to the north and Oxford Street to the south. 

“But it seems the folks at Transport for London and Legible London can’t find their way around as well as they should.”

Last year Labour London Assembly member and north Westminster resident Murad Qureshi criticised TfL for marking non-existent docking stations on its maps.

He said: “I have been particularly concerned about the delay in the roll-out of the final docking stations in the central zone, particularly in Westminster and Camden. 

“Getting the directions wrong in the map in Fitzrovia is perturbing and suggests the whole vision of the bike hire scheme isn’t quite going in the right direction either.”

Because one-way streets are not marked on Legible London’s maps, bike-users unfamiliar with London’s roads could unwittingly break the rules by taking what they believe to be the best route, said Mr Rees.

He added: “Westminster City Council fine people for going the wrong way down one-way streets, but they are directed that way by these maps.”

He has uploaded photographs of a bike restocking trailer parking on a pavement and another of a docking station labelled as being in Bloomsbury when it is actually in Fitzrovia.

Yesterday (Thursday) a TfL spokeswoman said signs would be corrected.