♪ Yellow productions presents... ♪
- How to ride the London Underground.
I'm Chris, this is Yellow Productions.
I do travel guides that are fun, informative, entertaining
and in this video I'm going to be telling you
everything you need to know
to ride the Underground,
also known as the Tube.
While it may seem complicated at first,
after you watch this video, you'll be a pro.
I've broken it down in the seven different areas:
First I'll give you the system overview,
then I'll talk about planning your journey,
buying tickets,
getting in,
finding the platform,
riding the train
and then finally getting out of the station.
So, here we go.
The first thing to know is a system overview.
The London Underground, also known as the Tube
is never known as the Subway.
A subway here in London is a pedestrian underpass.
The London Undergound is the best way
to get across town or to a different neighborhood in town.
Though it may not be the best way to go a short distance.
The Tube stations are a long way underground,
so it can take you quite a ways on the escalator
walking to get to the platform,
so if you're going one or two stops
you might be best of walking
or taking the bus.
The Tube has two hundred and seventy stations.
There are twelve lines which are named and colored
for example the Central line has also the color of red,
it's the red line.
The hours of the Tube:
the trains run from 5:30 a.m. to midnight
Monday through Thursday.
Friday and Saturday it's open till 1:00 a.m.
and Sunday it opens a little later,
6:30 a.m. and closes a little earlier
at 11:30 p.m.
Rush hour in the morning is from 8 to 10:00 a.m.
and then in the evening,
from 5 to 7:00 p.m.
Those are probably times if you can
you want to avoid the Tube,
it is definitely most crowded at those hours
and is also more expensive.
They have peak fares and off-peak fares.
There's also a few lines that offer Night Tube service;
those lines run 24 hours
but only on Friday and Saturday nights.
The second thing to know is about planning your journey
before you go someplace,
you gotta know where you need to go.
Obviously you could wait until you get to the station
'cause every station has a Tube map
but you really want to start planning
before you even leave where you're standing.
You can do that online,
there's Tube maps you can pick up,
a handy Tube map that you carry around with you.
But the best way to do it
is to download the Citymapper app.
Yes, Citymapper you can get it for iPhone or Android.
It gives you great connections, great suggestions,
it'll tell you the Tube, the bus.
It'll tell you which part of the train
you should be in.
It'll tell you how long it takes to walk
between stations,
it's really great so you can use that.
Google Maps will work in a pinch
but the Citymapper really a lot better.
The third thing to know about riding the Tube in London
is buying a ticket.
And simply put, don't buy a paper ticket.
They do sell paper tickets
and unless you're only going to ride once in London,
it's totally not worth it.
A single one-way paper ticket is Five Great British pounds.
You are best off buying an Oyster card,
it's their stored-value card.
It costs Five Dollars to store some value on it
and then you can use the tap in and tap off.
You buy the Oyster cards at any Tube station.
They've got a whole bunch of vending machines,
you just go up there,
you say buy the card
and then you put exactly how much
you want to load on it.
The machines will take bills, coins and credit cards,
though maybe not your credit card.
If you've got a foreign card,
so so luck on actually getting those to work.
So if you're not from the U.K or Europe
and you don't have a chip and pin card
then make sure you've got some cash on you
to buy the Oyster card.
I find if you're here for say three of four days,
loading up about 20 pounds is pretty good.
The only reason you might want to buy
something on paper
is if you're purchasing a travel pass.
You can buy a One day Travel pass
or a week long travel pass.
It depends in that case how many zones you going,
how much it would cost.
For shortness of this video
I won't list out the whole prices
but I'll put a link in the descriptions below
that you can look up the exact prices of the single day
and the week pass
to determine whether that's a better deal .
I should mention one good deal about the Oyster card
and the way things work here
is there's a daily cap
that's basically if you ride the Subway
about twice it works out to be then every ride after that
is pretty much free.
So, that's nice.
The fourth thing to know is about getting in.
Every station has ticket gates
so to get in find the ones that have an arrow
that indicates it's for entry,
insert your paper ticket in the slot
or tap your Oyster card,
the gates will open up.
If you have an Oyster it will show you the balance.
You could also use the contact less credit card
to go through
but maybe not your credit card
if you're not from the U.K.
'Kay, once you're through the ticket gate
because you've planned your route,
you know what line and direction you need to go to.
Look at the overhead boards you'll see colors
and names and directions
so just head that way, likely down the escalators
or some stairs.
Once you get to the platform,
you'll see things up on the tops
and signs up on the top,
that'll tell you what time the next departure is
and what direction and what leg
or spur of the train it's going.
Some lines, they're just one line
but other ones,
they don't travel to all stops,
they make a split so make sure
you're going on the correct split of the train
to go to the stop that you want to.
And while you're on the platform
make sure to stand behind the yellow line to wait
or when the train gets there,
step to the side of the doors,
let the people off
then get on the train.
Make sure to mind the gap
there could be a pretty big gap
between the platform and the actual train.
Sometimes it can be significantly higher
than the platform too
so make sure you pay attention
as step onto the train.
Once you're on the train,
either sit or stand
Pay attention to the priority seats
for disabled or pregnant or older people.
Also, if you're standing right next to the door
pay attention to the doors,
the doors are curved so watch your head.
If you're tall the doors are going
to kind of come in a little bit like this.
When you're on the train
the stops are well announced in English,
you can look outside the window
and see the stops as well
but use the Citymapper app
it'll tell you exactly how many stops you have to go
so just go ahead and count.
Once you've made it to your stop
its time to get off the train.
At this point you're either going to exit the train
and transfer to another train
or you're going to exit the station.
If you're transferring just follow the same process,
look at the overhead signs to transfer.
If you're exiting you'll be looking for
signs that say Way out
That's what to says: Way out, usually in yellow
And then make sure you go to the correct exit,
many stations have different exits.
When you get to the exit just tap your Oyster card
or insert your paper ticket.
To get out and there you have it.
Well thanks for watching I hope you enjoyed this video
If you've found it useful
please hit the thumbs up button
or click on this little yellow ball right here
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to watch some of the other videos
from our London series, all right.
Thanks, bye bye.