The Impact of the Jubilee Line Extension of the London Underground Rail Network on Land Values

Using U.K. Government published property value data, an analysis of the impact of a major extension to London’s subway network during the late 1990s was undertaken to establish whether value uplift attributable to new transport infrastructure could finance such projects.

Different approaches were used for commercial and residential land. Data deficiencies were a major problem and it was not possible to combine the results. Commercial land value uplift could not be quantified. For residential land the total figure (£9 billion) for the Jubilee Line Extension (JLE) was based on calculations for five stations. This could be several billion pounds higher or lower. The JLE actually cost £3.5 billion.

Although a method of spatially analyzing commercial ratable values was developed, data deficiencies prevented modeling a true ‘landvaluescape’. It was concluded that this did not significantly affect the accuracy of results.

The matter of how individual land value increments could be fairly assessed and collected was not pursued but some recommendations were made as to how U.K. property data systems might be improved to support such fiscal instruments.