London Reconnections 2021 Christmas Quiz

2021 has been another year affected by Covid and, as in 2020, the LR team have not got out and about as much as they normally do. So in the 2021 London Reconnections Christmas Quiz you might find some familiar topics, but we hope you find them challenging, nonetheless.

Our aim is to provide you with a variety of questions that can be answered with a bit of transport knowledge and devious thinking. In many cases intelligent searching on the internet will help you on your way to providing an answer as well.

Prizes continue to something we have failed to keep on top of. It you would like to enter our quiz we promise to add you to our list of outstanding prize winners should you provide one of the top entries. If you wish to formally enter please send your entry to [email protected] and, as usual, and we will publish (with approval) the names of those who do well. If sent in, these much reach us by 23:59 on December 31st and we will attempt to supply the answer at 00:01 on January 1st.

Question 1

We like to start with a railway diagram (schematic map) that contains errors. For 2021 there was really no competition for the most appropriate entry even if it makes our first question rather easy. Geoff Marshall provided a wonderful example that was plagiarised by many others (probably without permission). We will unashamedly do this ourselves. Geoff pointed out two major different errors with this diagram.

What are the errors?

Question 2

When Margaret Thatcher was prime minister, one of her ministers, Norman Tebbit famously urged the unemployed to ‘get on your bike’ to find work. In 2021 a government minister came off their bike.

Which minister fell off his bike?

Question 3

This is a picture taken in the last 12 months of the control tower of an active airfield in Greater London.

Where is it ?
What is so unusual about the control tower at this location ?

Question 4

In 2021 it was reported, technically accurately but highly misleadingly, that TfL had spent more money on one Thames Bridge in the past ten years than they had spent maintaining 25 other Thames crossings.

Which bridge encountered all this expenditure?

This amount is due to be dwarfed by spending on another TfL Thames crossing in the next few years (although the money will not necessarily be provided by TfL).

Which crossing is this?

Question 5

Terminal 4 Underground station was shut in 2020 due to the pandemic and remained shut throughout 2021.

But which station managed, for a second successive year, to have no service at all for some weeks in 2021 – this time due to the ‘pingdemic’?

Question 6

We love to have a question about a road sign. This one is specifically for 2021.

Where is the following road sign?
Why isn’t it displaying anything?

(There are two possible valid answers. Given that you don’t know exactly when the photo was taken, either of the two possible answers is acceptable).

Question 7

In 2021 the following had something in common:

• An approach road to IKEA Wembley Park,
• Hogarth Roundabout,
• Sainsbury’s, Waitrose and M&S Simply Food in South Woodford.

What is it that they have in common?

Question 8

In 2021 it became known that a train manufacturer is planning to build railway carriages without any wheels.

Which train manufacturer is intending to do this ?
Why ?

(any plausibly correct answer acceptable to the ‘why?’ part of the answer)

Question 9

In 2021 the MyLondon website published an article about York Road disused Underground station and suggested that reopening it would benefit visitors to Granary Square. You can read the article here.

Why might this not really be the benefit to visitors that MyLondon are suggesting ?
(There are at least two highly plausible reasons. Either of these would be acceptable.)

If, in an alternative universe, it was decided to reopen the former station called York Road, why might it not be a good idea to call the reopened station ‘York Road’ ?

Question 10

2021 features more than usual with projects that are being delayed and not progressing according to schedule. Not all of this can be blamed on Covid.

Identify the following projects (none of them are Crossrail):

a) A service due to be operational in Spring 2021 that still hasn’t started operating and, it was recently announced, will probably never do so. The need for it was created by an infrastructure failure that TfL wasn’t responsible for.

b) upgrade that was due to complete around 2014 or 2018 or 2023 depending on whether you go by the original contract, the replacement contract or the current contract. In 2021 it did not even make all of the revised expected progress for the year. Some of the upgrade has now been abandoned and there is currently no published date for when the revised project will be completed.

c) A critical upgrade in the long term plans of TfL but there are no current plans to begin work. However, the project was kept alive (safeguarded) by the purchase of a school.

d) It involves a temporary closure that was due in 2020 then 2021 and now 2022. The latest closure plans are slightly more radical than what was originally intended. A temporary replacement bus service will be provided.

Question 11

It has always generally been the rule that London Underground Working Timetables are timed to the nearest half minute, except for lines with Automatic Train Operation (or the part of the line with Automatic Train Operation).

What is or are the exception(s) found to this rule (one exception introduced in 2021)?

Question 12

Railways and references to them often feature in books, plays and films.

a) In ‘Love on a Branch Line’ what was unusual about the ticket purchased by Jasper at Liverpool Street station?

b) In the once-banned play by Bernard Shaw ‘Mrs Warren’s Profession‘, Praed is leaving for Italy by train. From what unlikely but plausible London Terminus was he departing from ?

c) The Agatha Christie whodunit classic ‘Why didn’t they ask Evans?‘ was first published in September 1934. In it there is the following paragraph (with a station name replaced by ‘X’s by us).

The train drew up at a station and Frankie saw that it was XXXXXXXXXXX. She had overshot Oxford Circus, where she meant to have changed, by two stations.

Given that this station name tells us something about when the story was set, with a bit of intuition a good guess can be made for the station name. What was the name of the station ?

d) For our last part, we reference the classic play ‘The Importance of Being Earnest‘ by Oscar Wilde. In particular we note lines from the famous first meeting of Mr Worthing and Lady Bracknell:

LADY BRACKNELL. Where did the charitable gentleman who had a first-class ticket for this seaside resort find you?
JACK. [Gravely.] In a hand-bag.
LADY BRACKNELL. A hand-bag?
JACK. [Very seriously.] Yes, Lady Bracknell. I was in a hand-bag—a somewhat large, black leather hand-bag, with handles to it—an ordinary hand-bag in fact.
LADY BRACKNELL. In what locality did this Mr. James, or Thomas, Cardew come across this ordinary hand-bag?
JACK. In the cloak-room at Victoria Station. It was given to him in mistake for his own.
LADY BRACKNELL. The cloak-room at Victoria Station?
JACK. Yes. The Brighton line.

Although we cannot be 100% sure what Oscar Wilde intended, there is general acceptance as to why Jack was so anxious to point out that the cloak-room was the one for the Brighton line. What was that reason ?

Question 13

A two pointer, which London Underground line has the most stations Underground? And as a follow on, which has the least number of stations Underground?

Question 14

In what year, did London buses prevent a German invasion of England? And which town were the Germans trying to occupy as a bridgehead?

Question 15

And a nice easy one to finish… based on the photo below, where are we?

Merry Christmas from all of us here at LR, and we hope that we get to see you more next year!

The LR Team.