TfL Ref: FOI-2169-1617
Thank you for your request received by Transport for London (TfL) on 9 January 2017 asking for information about Driverless trains.
Your request has been considered in accordance with the requirements of the Freedom of Information Act and our information access policy. I can confirm we do hold the information you require.
Unfortunately, to provide the information you have requested would exceed the ‘appropriate limit’ of £450 set by the Freedom of Information (Appropriate Limit and Fees) Regulations 2004.
Under section 12 of the FOI Act, we are not obliged to comply with a request if we estimate that the cost of determining whether we hold the information, locating and retrieving it and 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.
We have estimated that it would considerably exceed the appropriate limit to provide a response to this request. This is because we would need to run a comprehensive search on any and all emails containing the keyword “driverless” and/or “automated” over the specified two year period and then manually review these results individually to determine whether each would fit within the scope of your request and then collate them accordingly. Such a broad and unfocused approach produces thousands of emails requiring a review and this process would considerably exceed the cost limit explained above.
To help bring the cost of responding to your request within the £450 limit, you may wish to consider narrowing its scope so that we can more easily locate, retrieve and extract the information you are seeking. If you want to refine your request or make a Freedom of Information Act request in future, please bear in mind that the Freedom of Information Act allows you to request recorded information held by us. You should identify the precise information that you want as clearly and concisely as you can and you might also consider limiting the time period and employees covered by your request. Additionally you may wish to specify keywords that are less broad in nature and allow for a more targeted search.
Please note that we will not be taking further action until we receive your revised request.
In the meantime, if you have any queries or would like to discuss your request, please do not hesitate to contact me.
Please see the attached information sheet for details of your right to appeal
Yours sincerely
Lee Hill
Senior FOI Case Officer
FOI Case Management Team
General Counsel
Transport for London