Transport for London and councillors in south-west London are at loggerheads over one of the Mayor’s Superloop routes.

Councillors in Richmond are refusing to sign-off on funding improvements on a route connecting Heathrow and Croydon until the transport operator commits to providing extra bus stops.

Elected representatives said the SL7 Superloop route that runs through parts of the borough does not stop frequently enough, despite Richmond being known for its poor connections.

The Superloop is a network of express bus routes designed to improve connections and journey times between key outer London town centres and transport hubs.

Lord Sadiq Khan, the Mayor of London, unveiled the plan in 2023, with the first routes running that same year. Transport for London (TfL) has said that Superloop buses have increased ridership in the areas they serve.

The Liberal Democrat-led Richmond Council is pressing transport bosses for stops in Hampton and Hampton Hill along the SL7 line, which runs between West Croydon and Heathrow Central across five outer boroughs.

Richmond has just one pair of stops on Teddington’s Broad Street, but it is understood that TfL has no plans to introduce extra stops in Hampton or Hampton Hill, creating a stand-off.

Council officers had put forward plans to use £50,000 of TfL grants to draw up proposals to improve the SL7 route, in a bid to shorten bus journey times and increase reliability.

But Lib Dem members of the borough’s transport committee agreed that it could not move ahead with the improvements until TfL committed to providing another pair of Superloop bus stops.

At a hearing on November 9, Alexander Ehmann, a Lib Dem councillor representing St Margaret's and North Twickenham ward, said it was “clear that we need such leverage in order to bring about change”.

The proposals put forward by council officials included introducing more waiting and loading restrictions on Uxbridge Road and Park Road, widening a bus stop on Ferry Road along the SL7 route and banning turns at the junction of Hampton Hill High Street, Hampton Road and Park Road.

The proposals were designed to ease congestion on the SL7 route.

When objecting to the expenditure, Lib Dem councillors said TfL had underinvested in public transport in Richmond for too long.

Carey Bishop, representing Hampton North ward, said TfL had given Richmond an “unfair deal” on the Superloop.

She said it travelled five miles from Broad Street to Hatton Cross without stopping – the longest gap on the service.

Ms Bishop said: “It goes straight through our borough, and yet people in Hampton and Hampton Hill cannot get on. That matters because public transport access in the Hamptons is already poor.”

James Chard, a Twickenham Riverside councillor, said the lack of service was happening in “one of the worst-connected areas of this borough”.

A TfL spokesman, in a statement issued previously, said: “We are committed to providing a comprehensive, reliable bus service across the breadth of London and keep the network under constant review to ensure we invest our resources where they are needed most.

“We continue to monitor and review all Superloop routes to get a full understanding of how customers are using the network, working with local councils, to improve the bus network across the capital.”

Richmond, recently crowned the happiest place to live in Britain, has long been considered a borough with poor transport connectivity compared with other parts of the capital.

The borough has only two stops on the London Underground, with both Richmond and Kew Gardens stations sitting on the District line.

These two stations are also on the Overground’s Mildmay line, marking the only points the London Overground enters the borough boundary.