Only one thing worse than noise on public transport...

As Sadiq Khan encourages travelling Londoners to put their headphones on in a bid to stop disturbing other passengers, Olivia Petter makes a case for the dying art of interaction

- Olivia Petter

If you’re looking for peace and quiet, the London Underground shouldn’t be your first port of call. You’d think that would be obvious. It’s public transport, for starters; the guarantee that other people will be there is in the name. And travelling with other people comes with a few other guarantees, like idle chatter, wafts of body odour and, if you’re British, the acute discomfort that comes from sitting inches away from someone while pretending they don't exist.

Then there's the noise. The rattle of the carriage when it starts to speed up. The screech of wheels as they spin on tired tracks, and through even more tired tunnels. In a fairly new development, there are also the sounds of TikTok, Spotify, Netflix and Instagram, all rolled into one chaotic cacophony. Now, thanks to its ubiquity, that latter component has a name, "bare beating", and Sadiq Khan is trying to put an end to it.

Yesterday, the mayor of London launched a new campaign encouraging people on public transport to wear headphones to prevent them from disturbing other passengers with noise from their phones. Posters will be rolled out across Tube stations and bus stops throughout the autumn, with messaging reminding people to keep their sounds to themselves.

"The vast majority of Londoners use headphones when travelling on public transport in the capital, but the small minority who play music or videos out loud can be a real nuisance to other passengers and directly disturb their journeys," said Seb Dance, deputy mayor of London for transport. "TfL's new campaign will remind and encourage Londoners to always be considerate of other passengers."