I'd like to submit a Freedom of Information request to see the data showing the number of passengers travelling across the TfL network on average each half-hour of the day. IE, the number of people travelling from 6am-6:30am, the number of people travelling from 6:30am-7am, from 7am-7:30am, and so on. If it's possible to break that data down further into 15-minute intervals, then even better. Ideally, I would like to see the data divided into separate days of the week if possible. IE, 6am-6:30am on Mondays, 6am-6:30am on Tuesdays, etc.

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TfL Ref: FOI-1063-1920

Thank you for your request received by Transport for London (TfL) on 7^th July 2019 asking for information about the number of passengers travelling across the TfL network.

Your request has been considered in accordance with the requirements of the Freedom of Information Act and our information access policy.

Specifically you asked:

“I'd like to submit a Freedom of Information request to see the data showing the number of passengers travelling across the TfL network on average each half-hour of the day. i.e. the number of people travelling from 6am-6:30am, the number of people travelling from 6:30am-7am, from 7am-7:30am, and so on. If it's possible to break that data down further into 15-minute intervals, then even better. Ideally, I would like to see the data divided into separate days of the week if possible. i.e. 6am-6:30am on Mondays, 6am-6:30am on Tuesdays, etc.”

The “TfL network” covers a wide range of different transport modes across the city, including the London Underground, London Overground, TfL Rail, buses, trams, river services and more. Having liaised with colleagues in our data team I am informed that while in theory TfL may have the raw data to answer your questions, in practice to provide it for the entire network, at the level of detail requested, would be an excessively complex task and would cost far above the £450 costs limit for responding to FOI cases, as specified in section 12 of the FOI Act.

Under section 12 of the Act we are not obliged to comply with a request if we estimate that the cost of determining whether we hold the information, and then locating, retrieving or extracting it from other information, would exceed the appropriate limit. This is calculated at £25 per hour for every hour spent on the activities described – equivalent to 18 hours work.

You may therefore wish to refine or narrow the scope of your request to bring it within the parameters of the costs limit. However, before submitting any such revised request it would be advisable to review the data that can be found on our website. We publish a large amount of data on the site about travel across the network, and you may be able to find information which meets your needs that is already readily available. For example, you may wish to review the data that can be found via the following links:

https://tfl.gov.uk/corporate/publications-and-reports/travel-in-london-reports - provides regular reports on travel across the TfL network;

https://tfl.gov.uk/info-for/open-data-users/our-open-data - provides access to a number of TfL open data feeds and guidelines for using them;

https://tfl.gov.uk/corporate/publications-and-reports/oyster-card#on-this-page-1 – provides data on Oyster card usage;

https://tfl.gov.uk/corporate/transparency/freedom-of-information - provides links to previous Freedom of Information requests, which can be searched by keyword. You may, for example, be interested in requests such as this (https://tfl.gov.uk/corporate/transparency/freedom-of-information/foi-request-detail?referenceId=FOI-3187-1819)

Please see the attached information sheet for details of your right to appeal.

Yours sincerely,

David Wells

FOI Case Officer

FOI Case Management Team

General Counsel

Transport for London

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