Tube fears for Monday

The Tube will be swamped with even more passengers than expected on Monday when congestion charging starts, according to figures released today.

An extra 9,000 motorists - above the 20,000 expected - could desert their cars when the £5 charge begins.

Most will head not for buses as predicted by the Mayor's Transport for London office but for the Tube instead.

An NOP survey of 900 motorists commissioned by the London Assembly shows that only 14 per cent - the equivalent of 4,200 - planning to leave their cars will travel by bus. But 36 per cent - nearly 11,000 - will flood onto the Tube when it is struggling to cope, following the closure of the Central line and the Waterloo and City line.

A further 24 per cent - 7,200 more - will use trains instead of cars while the remainder find other means of travel or drive around the charging zone to avoid paying.

"The scheme may be more effective than anticipated but that may mean that the extra public transport laid on will be overwhelmed by those switching from their cars," said the survey.

The figures also suggest that the Mayor could face a shortfall of around £30million a year as more drivers than anticipated decide to avoid the £ 5 charge, denting the £130 million that congestion charging is expected to raise.

London Assembly transport committee staff said the figures were "conservative" as the drivers interviewed included those who already paid up to £35 a day to park in central London. They said that if more price-sensitive drivers had been polled, even more may have signalled their intention to desert the car.

John Biggs, chairman of the Assembly's transport committee, said: "Tube trains will be clogged. People hold the Tube in higher esteem than buses." Deputy mayor Nicky Gavron said the figures were a "concern".

Today a spokesman for TfL said: "We believe that fewer than those suggested in this survey will go to the Tube and many people on the Tube have already moved to buses.

"We are also confident because we have put on 20 per cent more public transport capacity than we really think we shall need."