New data from Southeastern reveals what thousands of frustrated commuters already knew - if you live in Greenwich and want to get to work on time it's standing room only.

Southeastern's new tool uses a "traffic light" system to show which peak time trains are the busiest - green for seats available, yellow for limited seating and red for no seats - and it's red lights pretty much all the way for the royal borough.

Passengers at Eltham and Kidbrooke - where thousands of new homes are being built - are particularly badly hit with almost no seats available at all in the morning peak.

Meanwhile, you're in for an uncomfortable journey if you're travelling from New Eltham into London Cannon Street for the entire rush hour, with only a slightly better commute for Charing Cross-bound trains.

And on the Greenwich line, by the time any London-bound train between 7.19am and 8.06am hits Abbey Wood it will be packed - bad news for passengers waiting even further down the track.

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In the wake of problems caused by London Bridge work, Southeastern announced its new online tool as a way for commuters to see if using a different route could be more comfortable. 

But many passengers have been left wondering why they can't just have longer trains instead.

Mike Sparham from the Greenwich Line Users' Group said: "If you live on the Greenwich Line, on all the trains in the height of the peak period you've got no chance of getting a seat.

"I also noted that some of those trains are only eight carriages long. So my first point is, they should explore options for lengthening the trains.

"It's not that long ago that all the stations were changed in order to accommodate 12-car trains."

Launching the tool - which also includes data on Kent-bound evening services from London - Southeastern managing director David Statham said last week: "We want to give passengers an easy way to see how busy different services are at their station. 

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"Those able to catch an earlier or later train can now see which is likely to have more space."

But Mr Sparham said: "The tool I guess should be of some assistance to travellers where perhaps they've got some flexibility in their working requirements.

"But a lot of people don't have that flexibility - they don't have any choice."

A spokesman for Southeastern said: "In general terms customer numbers have increased by around 30 per cent on the Southeastern network since 2009. We have responded to this with around 200 additional peak and shoulder peak trains but infrastructure and rolling stock capacity are finite and there is a limit to what we can within current resources.

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“Across the network we use all available trains at peak times and now we have more in service than ever before. We also regularly review our timetable and monitor the number of passengers.

“In March we moved carriages from less busy trains to those most in need of extra space to ease crowding; 14 trains were lengthened and seven now make additional stops in response to passenger feedback and demand. We also increased capacity on trains to Cannon Street by 24 per cent in the New Year.

“With regard to new rolling stock, decisions on procurement need to be taken by the Department for Transport. We continue to work with government to explore the potential to add more rolling stock to the Southeastern network.”

To use the tool, visit southeasternrailway.co.uk