Stop the closure of Brent's London Overground Ticket Offices

Ticket offices marked for closure

London Overground is proposing the closure of ticket offices on the Brent section of the line. This follows the closure of London Underground ticket offices last year.

These station serve both the Bakerloo line and London Overground. Harrow and Wealdstone and Wembley Central also serve Southern (East Croydon to Milton Keynes) and some London Midland services (Euston to Milton Keynes). In addition tickets can currently be booked for through onward journeys further North and South including Birmingham and Brighton.

Apart from the issues around safety which Dawn Butler has taken up LINK, remembering the murder at Kensal Green station some years ago, these closure would seriously affect passengers'convenience.
Journeys accessing the rail network are much more complicated to book, involving peak and off-peak fares, changes, choices of routes, and use of various rail cards, reduced rates for children etc.

A booking office clerk confirmed to me today that current ticket machines would not be able to offer all these options. With only a limited number of fares on offer passengers may well lose out being unable to book the cheapest fare for maybe a grandparent and child travelling together. All the permutations are likely to mean frustrating queues at the machines.

This is the announcement on London Travel Watch

London Underground are consulting on proposals to close the ticket offices and carry out improvement works which will include installing new, improved ticket machines at the following London Underground stations, which are covered by the National Rail, Ticketing and Settlement Agreement (Schedule 17):

• Gunnersbury
• Harlesden
• Harrow & Wealdstone
• Kensal Green
• Kenton
• Kew Gardens
• North Wembley
• Queen’s Park
• South Kenton
• Stonebridge Park
• Wembley Central

To comment on these proposals and how you might be affected as a passenger, please write to London TravelWatch, 169 Union Street, London, SE1 0LL or email
enquiries@londontravelwatch.org.uk, with ‘London Underground ticket office changes’ in the subject line. The consultation will close on Wednesday 27 January 2016.

London TravelWatch will review all comments received, and will make a recommendation to the Department for Transport based on these and other information received.
Further information on consulations and closures can be found in the consultations section of the website.
You can also read the letter we received from TfL about the proposed closure of Regulated Stations ticket offices.