-
Our new ticketing site is now live! Using either this or the original site (both powered by TrainSplit) helps support the running of the forum with every ticket purchase! Find out more and ask any questions/give us feedback in this thread!
Why are the centre platforms at Edgware Road (Sub-Surface) through platforms
- Thread starter A60stock
- Start date
Sponsor Post - registered members do not see these adverts; click here to register, or click here to log in
R
RailUK Forums
I believe it is because when Edgware Road was rebuilt in the 1920s it was for a planned extension of the Metropolitan line that split between Edgware Road and Paddington. The plan was cancelled after it was built and presumably they have been retained for flexibility. Not much point paying to resignal them.
Sun Chariot
Established Member
In my twelve years of near-daily use*, I was on some services that used platforms 2 or 3 to / from Baker Street.
It was typically when balancing a serrvice, or occurenxe of a problem with a train already in platform 1 or platform 4.
The rarest, was when a country-bound Met Line service was mis-routed at Baker Street! I was at Edgware Road, waiting for my H+CL train - and a pair of A60/A62 stock, with many confused / annoyed faces inside, rolled into platform 2.
I guess Edware Road was the first possible place to cross it back over for an eastward return; I suspect it was then taken out of service at Great Portland Street, rather than it doing another crossback at Kings Cross.
* I used Edgware Road CL/H+CL station, for commuting, 1998 to 2012 (two years from + to Liverpool Street, then five years from + to West Brompton / Earls Court, then seven years from / to Docklands).
Mldaureol
Member
I believe it was because decades ago Edgware Road was not a terminus Station.
The district line service used to run through Edgware Road and terminate at a bay platform at Liverpool St (no longer there).
The circle line was also a true circle running continuously around through out the day.
edwin_m
Veteran Member
There was a plan for a curve east of Edgware Road to join up with the line towards Finchley Road - I'm not aware of any other junction being planned on the Paddington side.
Making the centre platforms bays would create a level route behind the buffer stops (assuming there is enough space there) for people whose interchanges are not across the same island, although this would be at one extreme end of the train so maybe not that helpful.
bluegoblin7
Established Member
No, the junction was planned to the west of Edgware Road, between Edgware Road and Praed Street Junction - @Benjwri is correct.
This archive image of the erstwhile signal cabin shortly after opening shows the planned junction painted out on the diagram.
As mentioned, the station would have handled a higher number of through services had this gone ahead, necessitating a more flexible layout. This was also very much the mantra at the time, and was largely mirrored at Whitechapel at the east end.
The platforms certainly had daily booked workings prior to September 2019, but I haven't recently studied at C&H WTT in depth to confirm. They are incredibly useful 'get out of jail' cards at a busy junction station and crew relief point like Edgware Road, and the SSR as a whole would suffer without them.
I must say there is quite a lot of alternative history in this thread and I would treat much of it with caution. The Liverpool Street bay platform was almost exclusively the domain of fast, locomotive-hauled Metropolitan line services, for instance. 'Top side' District services were generally either part of the combined Met/District Inner Circle or were specials working to/from the District proper. That's not to say they would have never used the bay road, particularly after the end of locomotive hauled services, but it wasn't at all a regular proposition or reason for its use.
Idle speculation is one thing but contradicting the many printed and accurate histories of the Underground is a concerning modern trend - in fact checking my own work I've found a completely invented date for something, which I won't repeat here.
== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: ==
Return would almost certainly have been empty to Moorgate bay roads and return to the Met from there - there is a wrong-road shunt east of Baker Street (at the time this would also have not required using the above mentioned crossover) but given the delays this would have caused I suspect it unlikely. At the time King's Cross was also a mainline shunt outer to inner to the east of the station, so just as disruptive.
This archive image of the erstwhile signal cabin shortly after opening shows the planned junction painted out on the diagram.
As mentioned, the station would have handled a higher number of through services had this gone ahead, necessitating a more flexible layout. This was also very much the mantra at the time, and was largely mirrored at Whitechapel at the east end.
The platforms certainly had daily booked workings prior to September 2019, but I haven't recently studied at C&H WTT in depth to confirm. They are incredibly useful 'get out of jail' cards at a busy junction station and crew relief point like Edgware Road, and the SSR as a whole would suffer without them.
I must say there is quite a lot of alternative history in this thread and I would treat much of it with caution. The Liverpool Street bay platform was almost exclusively the domain of fast, locomotive-hauled Metropolitan line services, for instance. 'Top side' District services were generally either part of the combined Met/District Inner Circle or were specials working to/from the District proper. That's not to say they would have never used the bay road, particularly after the end of locomotive hauled services, but it wasn't at all a regular proposition or reason for its use.
Idle speculation is one thing but contradicting the many printed and accurate histories of the Underground is a concerning modern trend - in fact checking my own work I've found a completely invented date for something, which I won't repeat here.
== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: ==
Generally speaking such services would have been detrained at Baker Street, and then a convoluted shunting procedure to get the train to reverse inner to outer via the west end Edgware Road. A stock were overlength for the centre roads, and even in days gone by was avoided whenever possible, so I suspect the points immediately to the east of Baker Street were otherwise unavailable. Worth noting that platform 2 is also only accessible to eastbound trains and not from the Baker Street direction. The time scale certainly supports a more disciplined approach rather than some of what happened in much older times.
Return would almost certainly have been empty to Moorgate bay roads and return to the Met from there - there is a wrong-road shunt east of Baker Street (at the time this would also have not required using the above mentioned crossover) but given the delays this would have caused I suspect it unlikely. At the time King's Cross was also a mainline shunt outer to inner to the east of the station, so just as disruptive.
Last edited:
edwin_m
Veteran Member
Noted thanks, I assume you refer to the patch to the right of "Road".
This doesn't make a lot of sense operationally though - the extra trains using this route would either have fed straight into the Baker Street bottleneck or would have had to terminate at Edgware Road ... which would only have needed bay platforms ...
It would have gone to Finchley Road, then it was decided that building the Bakerloo/Jubilee line there instead was a more sensible idea
I wasn't quite as regular at Edgware Road but like you went Eastbound to/from Platforms 2 and 3. Never saw A Stock at Edgware Road though. That would have been quite the thing!
Sun Chariot
Established Member
@bluegoblin7 has corected (thanks!
) my memory of platforms' numbering; I guess I meant platform 3 not 2.As the A stock rumbled its way towards me, from Baker Street CL, I saw the twin headlights and I had a "WTF?!" moment...!
Superb archive photo btw @bluegoblin7 !
Now this is what I really want to hear more about! So was it in service at Baker Street? I.E. did it call at the H/C & Circle line platforms. If it was mis-routed, they wouldn't have known to take it out of service before Baker Street?
I wonder why that would annoy passengers, unless it caused a delay for trains behind it?!
Sun Chariot
Established Member
Lots of insider-insight in post 7. The bottom third of that post, I think answers your q's.
Commuters are creatures of habit: same train service, same carriage. It's a bit of a subconscious "comfort-through-routine" behaviour. When that routine gets broken, uncertainty and, for some, frustration and annoyance will manifest within them.
So, for those folk, who had boarded "their" Watford / Amersham / Chesham service, from one of the City of London area stops, their routine is crushed when their service goes west instead of north-west...
No chance of de-training at Edgware Road: as @bluegoblin7 explained in Post 7, A stock was overlength for its centre roads.
bramling
Veteran Member
I’ve never really understood the rationale for why this was ever proposed, let alone got as serious as appearing on the signal diagram. Edgware Road isn’t a particularly important station from a passenger point of view, it’s always enjoyed a somewhat inflated status because of its operational location. I can see no benefit at all in running Metropolitan main trains through there. A far more worthwhile scheme would have been finding a way to grade-separate the junction at Baker Street, in fact given all the other schemes LT did over the years it’s somewhat surprising this never got tackled.
As mentioned, the station would have handled a higher number of through services had this gone ahead, necessitating a more flexible layout. This was also very much the mantra at the time, and was largely mirrored at Whitechapel at the east end.
The platforms certainly had daily booked workings prior to September 2019, but I haven't recently studied at C&H WTT in depth to confirm. They are incredibly useful 'get out of jail' cards at a busy junction station and crew relief point like Edgware Road, and the SSR as a whole would suffer without them.
I must say there is quite a lot of alternative history in this thread and I would treat much of it with caution. The Liverpool Street bay platform was almost exclusively the domain of fast, locomotive-hauled Metropolitan line services, for instance. 'Top side' District services were generally either part of the combined Met/District Inner Circle or were specials working to/from the District proper. That's not to say they would have never used the bay road, particularly after the end of locomotive hauled services, but it wasn't at all a regular proposition or reason for its use.
Idle speculation is one thing but contradicting the many printed and accurate histories of the Underground is a concerning modern trend - in fact checking my own work I've found a completely invented date for something, which I won't repeat here.
== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: ==
Generally speaking such services would have been detrained at Baker Street, and then a convoluted shunting procedure to get the train to reverse inner to outer via the west end Edgware Road. A stock were overlength for the centre roads, and even in days gone by was avoided whenever possible, so I suspect the points immediately to the east of Baker Street were otherwise unavailable. Worth noting that platform 2 is also only accessible to eastbound trains and not from the Baker Street direction. The time scale certainly supports a more disciplined approach rather than some of what happened in much older times.
ISTR, maybe incorrectly, that Edgware Road could handle 8-car trains until signalling modifications some time around the 1990s when changes were made to address compromised overlaps across the site. Everything was then optimised for 6 cars of C stock, starting signals were moved, and possibly some draw-up signals were added. I have the traffic circular entry somewhere, though in paper form as this was pre PDF days!