LETTERS:Trains and tubes in the Docklands

From Mr Steven Norris, MP Sir: Your article "Crucial links hold key to the future" ( 25 January) is not correct to say that "the opening of the Jubilee Line Extension will put the Docklands Light Railway at risk". As you say elsewhere in the article, "without the prospect of a tube line, the DLR would just not have been able to cope with the increased numbers of [Docklands] office workers". In fact, the DLR and the JLE will fit well together, as two distinct public transport schemes. The main Docklands development to be served by the JLE is of course the Canary Wharf development. Canary Wharf will, however, be the only JLE station on the Isle of Dogs, where there are several DLR stations providing more direct access to other office developments. For Isle of Dogs developments other than Canary Wharf, the JLE will complement the DLR by acting as a feeder for it.

Where the markets served by the JLE and the DLR overlap that will bring advantages to users of both. If some DLR passengers divert to the JLE, that will relieve overcrowding on the DLR and bring benefits to the remaining DLR passengers; those passengers attracted on to the JLE will benefit from the new service.

I am confident that, with the operations and management of the DLR franchised to the private sector in 1996, a strong private sector-operated DLR will form an important part of the public transport context in which JLE services to Docklands will start torun in 1998.

Yours faithfully, Steven Norris Minister for Transport in London Department of Transport London, SW1

31 January