London Underground map – How to read the tube map

How do you read the Underground map?

The first thing to bear in mind is that it’s not drawn to scale. The distance between each station bears absolutely no relation to its distance on the ground – nobody catches a train between Charing Cross and Embankment, for example, because it’s just a few minutes walk. And Bank, Cannon Street and Monument are all within five minutes of each other.

Underground line colours

Each underground line has its own special colour:

Bakerloo Central Circle District Hammersmith & City Jubilee Metropolitan Northern Piccadilly Victoria Waterloo & City

Three more lines are white with a coloured border, which signifies that they are mostly overground lines:

Elizabeth Docklands Light Railway London Overground

Stations which only serve one line are shown by a little stub protruding from it. Like Covent Garden, for example, which only serves the Piccadilly line.

Stations which serve two or more lines are said to be ‘interchanges’, and are shown by a large white circle. Like Holborn, for example, which serves the Central and Piccadilly line.

National Rail stations

London Underground stations which also serve National Rail trains (the overground trains to other parts of the country) are shown with the following symbol:

The main National Rail stations in central London are: Blackfriars, Cannon Street, Charing Cross, Euston, Farringdon, King’s Cross St Pancras, Liverpool Street, London Bridge, Marylebone, Paddington, Vauxhall, Victoria and Waterloo.

Step-free and wheelchair friendly stations

Stations with a blue wheelchair symbol have step-free access between the train and the street:

Stations with a white wheelchair symbol only have step-free access between the platform and the street: