The Docklands Light Railway ( the DLR ) is an automated light metro or light rail system opened in 1987 to serve the redeveloped Docklands area of London.

The system is owned by Docklands Light Rail Limited, part of the London Rail division of Transport for London.

The London Docklands Development Corporation ( LDDC ), needing to provide public transport cheaply for the former docks area to stimulate regeneration, considered several proposals and chose a light rail scheme using dock railway infrastructure to link the West India Docks to Tower Hill and to run alongside the Great Eastern line out of London to a northern terminus at, where a disused bay platform at the west of the station was available, for interchange with the Central Line and main lines.

The growth brought to Docklands enabled the Jubilee Line to be extended in 1999 to east London by a more southerly route than originally proposed, through Surrey Quays, Canary Wharf and the Greenwich Peninsula ( which was the next regeneration area ) to Stratford.

Docklands is the semi-official name for an area in east and southeast London, England.

The name London Docklands was used for the first time in a government report on redevelopment plans in 1971 but has since become virtually universally adopted.

It also created conflict between the new and old communities of the London Docklands.

The London Docklands was bombed during the Second World War, and was hit by over 2, 500 bombs.

To address this problem, in 1981 the Secretary of State for the Environment, Michael Heseltine, formed the London Docklands Development Corporation ( LDDC ) to redevelop the area.

London Docklands also now boasts its own free newspaper, The Docklands, launched in 2006 by Archant London, following the purchase of Docklands News, the ex LDDC newspaper which was then owned by Ivy Communications.

da: London Docklands

It is the second largest metro system in the world in terms of route miles, after the Shanghai Metro and part of the largest system in terms of route miles when taken together with the Docklands Light Railway. The light metro lines in London are operated by the Docklands Light Railway, whereas the Shanghai Metro is a group of four companies which operate heavy rail rapid transit and light metro lines.

Taken together on a like-for-like basis, London Underground and Docklands Light Railway operate of track, longer than the Shanghai Metro ( excluding the Shanghai Maglev line ).

These include the London Underground, Docklands Light Railway, Blackpool Tramway, London Tramlink, Glasgow Subway, Tyne and Wear Metro, Manchester Metrolink, Sheffield Supertram, Midland Metro and Nottingham Express Transit.