Request ID: FOI-3700-2324 Date published: 08 February 2024
You asked
Follow on from FOI-3482-2324: Thank you for your response, these are the axonometric views I refer to.
To be more clear, I am requesting 2D plan drawings.
We answered
TfL Ref: FOI-3700-2324
Thank you for your request received by Transport for London (TfL) on18 January 2024 asking for plan drawings of underground station structures.
Your request has been considered in accordance with the requirements of the Freedom of Information (FOI) Act and our information access policy.
I can confirm that we hold the information you require. However, we are refusing your request under section 14(1) of the FOI Act which provides an exemption to the disclosure of information where answering requests imposes a disproportionate burden on our resources.
There are several pages of information per station that falls within the scope of your request. This means that there are over 1,000 pages of information covering your request for all London Underground stations. In order to fulfil your request, we would have to dedicate resources to manually review information for each station. We believe that a disproportionate use of time would be required to manually review and redact information you have requested for public consumption. In reaching this conclusion we have drawn on guidance from the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) that can be found on its website here: https://ico.org.uk/for-organisations/guidance-index/freedom-of-information-and-environmental-information-regulations/dealing-with-vexatious-requests-section-14/
This guidance includes the following advice to public authorities:
“Section 14(1) is designed to protect public authorities by allowing them to refuse any request which have the potential to cause a disproportionate or unjustified level of disruption, irritation or distress”.
“The information Commissioner recognises that dealing with unreasonable requests can place a strain on resources and get in the way of delivering mainstream services or answering legitimate requests.” “Disproportionate effort: the matter being pursued by the requester is relatively trivial and the authority would have to extend a disproportionate amount of resources in order to meet the request.”
Our principal duty is to provide an effective transport service for London and we consider that answering this request would represent a disproportionate effort. It would be a significant distraction from our work managing the TfL network, requiring re-allocation of already limited resources and placing an unacceptable burden on a small number of personnel. We do wish to clarify that whilst we consider that your request falls under section 14(1) of the FOI Act, this does not reflect a conclusion that it has been your intention to deliberately place an undue burden on our resources.
Please see the attached information sheet for details of your right to appeal.
Yours sincerely,
Mary Abidakun FOI Case Officer FOI Case Management Team General Counsel Transport for London
