Very well connected, by rail, by bus and by broadband. There are four stations, and one of them has direct trains into central London. Buses come often enough that nobody needs the timetable. Gigabit broadband reaches most homes. At the last census, more of Bromley's workers stayed at home than took the trains.
Bromley South is the main station, with direct trains to London Victoria, including non-stop services, and to London Blackfriars, plus trains out to Orpington, Sevenoaks, Ramsgate, Dover Priory and Ashford International. Shortlands, one stop west, serves the residential streets to the south west, Sundridge Park covers the north side, and Bromley North runs a shuttle to Grove Park for connections towards Charing Cross and Cannon Street. The area has 365 bus stops. At the 2021 census about 10% of workers commuted by train and about 8% by bus.
Working from home was the biggest single answer at that census, at about 42% of workers. About 27% drove, 5% walked and 1% cycled. About 28% of households have no car and about 25% have two or more. The railway reached Shortlands in 1858 and turned Bromley into a commuter town, and by 2021 four in ten of its workers were not commuting at all.
The Department for Transport's modelled journey-time statistics put the nearest town centre about 10 minutes away by car, 18 by public transport, 14 by bike and 24 on foot. For most of Bromley the town centre is close, and that 24-minute walk is the average for homes further out.
The same Department for Transport model puts a GP about 7 minutes away by car, 10 by public transport and 11 on foot. A hospital is about 17 minutes by car and 31 by public transport. A food shop is about 7 minutes on foot or by car, and a place of employment about 10 minutes by car or 11 by public transport. These are modelled averages for the area, and the public transport times date from 2019. Bus and train services have changed since, so those times are the least reliable of the set, while the car and walking times barely move.
The buses are the better measure of what is running now. Each stop averages about 257 scheduled departures on a weekday, around 14 an hour at peak, and about 99% of stops have some service at the weekend. That is a lot of buses, enough that missing one does not ruin the day.
Gigabit broadband is available to about 86% of premises and ultrafast to about 87%, while superfast reaches about 98%. Every network's 4G or 5G covers practically the whole area, so mobile signal is not a problem.
Bromley was a coaching stop on the road from London to Hastings long before the railway arrived, and it still has heavy traffic. About 81% of postcodes are near or above 65 decibels of road noise, the level at which official noise mapping treats it as significant, and the loudest band in the area reaches 75 decibels. Rail noise is mapped separately: about 22% of postcodes are near or above 65 decibels from trains, with a loudest band of 70. For a house on or near a main road or a railway line, the government's noise map for that exact location is worth checking. Bedrooms at the back are a different matter from bedrooms over the bus route.
There are 34 public charge points in the area with 62 connectors between them, and 4 of those are rapid chargers. With so few rapid units, most electric-car owners without a driveway will need to plan their charging in advance.
Bromley is one of the best-connected parts of outer London. It has a mainline station, buses all day and broadband fast enough that a lot of residents no longer need either.