London Rail

Tag: london underground

  • The Hammersmith & City’s line’s construction disaster

    This is a special post for the 160th Anniversary of the Hammersmith & City line! Everyone knows the history of Metropolitan Railway as the world’s first underground line on 10th January 1863 between Bishops Road and Farringdon – but that was not even how the line was going to be built. Long before they had…

  • Southgate station – an appraisal

    The fact Cockfosters station – an appraisal was popular prompted me to dig out this further look at one of the Piccadilly line’s iconic tube stations. Although we regularly visited Southgate in the 1960s, at no time was the Piccadilly line ever used this far. However the station certainly is remembered because this was where…

  • Cockfosters station – an appraisal

    Despite being the butt of many a joke, ‘Cock Fosters’ as it once was, is a real place and noted for being the northern terminus of the Piccadilly Line. The location itself prior to the opening of the tube was not even a major settlement of any sort, just a small school and a vicarage.…

  • The twopenny tube guard who got killed by his own train

    In the very early days of London’s premier underground line – the Central London Railway (CLR) or the twopenny tube as it was popularly known, procured its first ever fatality. It wasn’t a passenger but a member of staff and the matter was down to the staff in question having taken offence to someone smoking…

  • The day tube staff dropped in on a happy honeymoon couple

    One would think from the title that this was some happy event not ever recorded previously in any blog or other media. You know, quite a big surprise and balloons and a buffet and the rest of it so as to make the honeymoon couple have a most memorable occasion and one to remember… Well…

  • The tube’s first ever fatalities

    The first ever fatality on the tube occurred one hundred and thirty one years ago this month and this occurred in the very early months of the then new City and South London Railway, which as many know, is now part of London’s Northern Line. (PS if one wants to read about the first ever…

  • Bakerloo returns to Kennington Rd!

    Kennington Road station was an early tube terminus however it didn’t last long. It was the penultimate station before the Elephant and Castle and these days is better known as Lambeth North. A strange quirk to this station is that it has retained its full terminus capabilities unlike many other tube stations, including a double…

  • The best Tube photo ever (redux)

    Could this photograph from 1937 be the best ever composition taken on London’s tube? It’s certainly very unusual for its time because it suggests a substantial abstraction and mystique. We do not know who the subject is other than its a guy in a bowler hat and his entire figure is almost in shadow. Perhaps…

  • Western DMUs on the Metropolitan Line!

    The London Underground’s history has been replete with many instances of main line passenger trains, and freight trains sharing tracks with London Underground’s trains. Bow Road to Upminster, Shoreditch to New Cross and New Cross Gate, Gunnersbury to Richmond, Putney to Wimbledon, Ealing Broadway to High Street Kensington, Kilburn High Road to Watford Junction, Croxley…

  • London’s only tube trains with a forward view!

    Now that the 1938 tube stock’s long era in public service has come to an end with the last examples having bowed out from the Island Line, I thought it would be a good time to talk about the one element of these tube trains no one ever seems to mention. That is the fact…

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