Revealed: London’s dirtiest tube lines according to TfL

Millions of Londoners get the tube every day – and, well, not all London Underground lines are equal. Some are louder, hotter and generally worse than others. And that goes for cleanliness, too. 

If you’ve always wondered which London Underground lines are dirtiest, now TfL has revealed that info. A recent Freedom of Information (FOI) request lays bare the mucky details of how long each tube line goes without a ‘full service’ clean.  

Running an average of 43 days between full-service cleans, the Piccadilly line was named the filthiest tube service. That’s nearly half as often as the Jubilee line, despite the grey line having a similar fleet size and bacteria levels. Here are the rest of the findings. 

London’s dirtiest tube lines, according to TfL data

1. Piccadilly line – 14 trains cleaned per week, with approximately 43 days between cleans
2. S-Stock – these are the trains used on the District, Circle, Metropolitan and Hammersmith & City lines, and they’re cleaned every 28 days
3. Central line – London’s busiest tube trains operate for an average of 27 days between full cleaning services
4. Bakerloo / Northern line – these two lines are tied, with 25 days between cleans
5. Jubilee – a mere 18 days between full services. You could lick the floor! (But please don’t).

No word on the Lizzy line or Overground - they weren’t included in the dataset released. But then again, neither of them are tube lines.

TfL plans these cleaning intervals to fit into a regimented tube maintenance system decided way back in 2020. The underground’s beauty routine is split into ‘mini cleans’ and ‘deep cleans’. The first version involves spot cleaning the interior of the tube carriages – mopping the floors, cleaning seats, surfaces, window ledges, advert panels and the driver’s carriage. The deep clean amps things up by cleaning the ceilings, end-of-carriage doors, grab rails, and ‘all internal surfaces’, plus hoovering the seats. Carriage exteriors are also cleaned.

So, why are we hearing about this now? Well, following the great bed bug panic of 2023 – you know, when Londoners freaked out about the possibility that the critters were hitchhiking over from Paris on the Eurostar and taking over tube carriages – TfL said it had not confirmed any bed bug sightings on the tube network in the past two years. However, a study found high levels of E.coli-causing bacteria on the Victoria and Central lines, leading a company called Showers to You to submit an FOI asking how often the different lines are cleaned.  

Of course, it’s worth noting that just because tube lines get ‘deep cleaned’ less regularly doesn’t necessarily mean they’re dirty. What’s to say Piccadilly line users aren’t cleaner and tidier than Jubilee riders – and that the navy blue line thereby doesn’t need cleaning so regularly? Now that is some food for thought. 

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