London Rail

Tag: railway history

  • The Blue Train

    Britain’s newest train, can be said to be ‘blue in the face’ because its had so many mishaps, its had a considerably poor showing ever since its launch in April 2019. Its ultra-modern coaches and ultra modern interiors with all its mod cons including shoe cleaners, sofas and so on were launched to great fanfare.…

  • A 1956 tube stock mystery

    A special post about the 1956 tube stock. Piccadilly Circus station staff sent a tweet (one of their earliest ones) in February of this year asking for information on a picture of a train at the station itself. Its a photograph I have seen before – but not in colour and certainly not at such…

  • Southwold Railway

    The Southwold Railway – England’s premier three foot narrow gauge passenger railway! This week its ninety years since the last passenger trains ran. 2019 is also the 140th anniversary of the line’s opening. This somewhat quirky railway was in service for just fifty years, and remained moribund for several decades more. It has left a…

  • Marylebone station’s anniversary #1

    The 120th anniversary! The first official train left Marylebone 9th March and the station opened to the public 15th March 1899. The London terminus was to be a grand one, both for the Midlands, the North and even a rail link to an early Channel Tunnel! The Great Central was therefore built to larger dimensions…

  • Marylebone station’s anniversary

    The 120th anniversary! The first official train left Marylebone 9th March and the station opened to the public 15th March 1899. The London terminus was to be a grand one, both for the Midlands, the North and even a rail link to an early Channel Tunnel! The Great Central was therefore built to larger dimensions…

  • King’s Cross Thameslink’s tunnels

    The history and construction of the lines that make up Thameslink are of considerable importance because they are what made the original ‘Thameslink’ network possible. It didn’t really work however as everyone saw London as the place where all their trains went to and any onward journeys were simply a case of using the sub-surface…

  • By Underground to Shanklin

    This year was the 50th anniversary of the Isle of Wight’s ‘underground’, an anniversary that appears to have been missed! There may have been local celebrations however the news archives at the British Library had nothing on record. Instead the 150th anniversary of the line was celebrated in 2014. The 2016 anniversary of 50 years…

  • Stuck in Miltown and furious!

    If you were due a court appearance in Ennis over a counter claim by the West Clare Railway, simply claiming you had travelled by one of its trains to court and been made late would have earned the judge’s deepest sympathies. That is because the West Clare had a most disreputable image in terms of…

  • Central Line: beyond Caxton Road

    A minor update of the article posted two years ago featuring the Central Line around Wood Lane/White City showing how the area’s changed. Previous overground sections of the Central Line are now underground. The header image shows the Central Line tracks as they approach Ariel Way. This section was the original route of the Central…

  • The Crystal Palace Gliding Railway

    Louis-Dominique Girard’s Gliding Railway, in French known as the The Chemin de Fer Glissant (later it was called the Sliding Railway) was an unusual type of train whose origins began in the late 1860s as a test line in the ground of Girard’s home near Paris. It is said Girard developed his patent from somewhat earlier attempts to build a…

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