Originally Posted by
travelmad478
I have an easier time in NY (which, to be fair, I have been using my whole life, vs. about 6 months' cumulative time spent in London over the last 20 years). For me it is a lot simpler to choose between "uptown" and "downtown" instead of Epping vs. West Ruislip, for example. That doesn't do much for people who haven't the faintest idea where Epping or West Ruislip are!
Well, the geography of Manhattan and the way the city is laid out lends itself well to having a "downtown" and an "uptown" subway configuration. Beyond "downtown", you know the subway is going to Brooklyn. Beyond "uptown", you know the subway is going to Queens or the Bronx. The subway lines support this type of wayfinding via an alpha-numeric system. "Take the A train Uptown", for example.
OTOH, London is not laid out like Manhattan. The city layout is much more complex where you follow roads because there is no street grid to tie a location to an intersection. So the Tube uses line names like the Circle Line or the Picadilly Line so that one understands the city by using the line much like how Londoners follow roads to get from one point to another.
Another difference between the Tube and NY Subway is that the Tube is a much older system with narrower tunnels and tube cars. These trains in London run at much slower speeds than NY's subways, if you were to just compare local train service in each city.