London Marylebone (MYB)

London Marylebone was the last of the great London termini to open, though nearly closed in the 1980s.

Information
Type: National Rail
(Chiltern Main Line)
Station code: MYB
Opened: 1899
Platforms: 6
The station was opened in 1899 as the terminus of the Great Central Main Line. The station was opened with four platforms. It was originally planned to be twice the size as the station that was eventually built but plans were changed due to a shortage of money. The station has an adjacent tube station on the Bakerloo Line, on Marylebone's platforms are still written Great Central in the tiles.

The Great Central was never the busiest of lines and London Marylebone remained a relatively quiet terminus. Station usage was improved by London commuter traffic from High Wycombe and Aylesbury. British Railways closed the Great Central North of Aylesbury in 1966. With services reduced to local routes only the station began to be run down and threatened with closure. British Rail indeed issued a closure notice in 1984 and there were plans to convert the station into a coach station with commuter traffic using the London Underground into Baker Street instead. However protests and legal action prevented the closure (plus there were flaws in the coach station plan - low tunnel restrictions would mean only single decker coaches could be used [1]) and the station was officially reprieved in 1986.

London Marylebone then began a renaissance thanks to the huge increase in rail passengers due to the advent of Network South East and the revolution in commuter services into the capital. Part of the station complex was sold to developers but the money raised was used to modernise and refurbish the station.

In the privatised era London Marylebone has had intercity services restored with trains to Birmingham and Oxford. Two new platforms have also been added on the site of former goods sidings. In the days of the Great Central London Marylebone was said sometimes to be so quiet that staff outnumbered passengers, now over sixteen million passengers a year pass through the station with work being done to relieve pressure on the station.
Chiltern 68 015 has just bought an express in from Birmingham

Station frontage

Gate barrier and view of three of the platforms

Station concourse

View of the roof

Chiltern 168 005 waits to depart for the Midlands

[1] John Glover, BR Diary 1978-1985 (Ian Allan, 1985) p. 95

Acton Town (ZAT)

Acton Town is one of a number of tube stations in Acton, West London. This one is served by the District and Piccadilly Lines and is adjacent to Acton Depot (formerly Works) and the London Transport Museum Depot (see below).

Information
Type: Transport for London
(District & Piccadilly Lines)
Station code: ZAT
Opened: 1879
Platforms: 4
The station was opened in 1879 by the District Railway (now District Line) as Mill Hill Park. It gained its current name in 1910 which is also when the station was rebuilt.

The current station building dates from 1932 when the Uxbridge branch was transferred to the Piccadilly Line. The station was designed by Charles Holden and is Grade II listed.


Acton Town continues to be served by the District Line Ealing Broadway branch and Piccadilly Lines. After Acton Town the Piccadilly Line splits into its 2 western branches to Uxbridge and Heathrow making the stop an important interchange in West London.
Piccadilly Line 73ts 235 at Acton Town

Station frontage

A Piccadilly Line train arrives

A Heathrow bound Piccadilly Line train prepares to depart

London Transport Museum Acton Depot

Adjacent to Acton Town station is Action Depot including the depot of London Transport Museum. Most of the museum's collection is held here (the Covent Garden site simply cannot hold but a small fraction of the museum's large collection of rolling stock, vehicles and other items). The depot also includes facilities and space for the restoration of trains and road vehicles.

Former Waterloo & City Line Class 487 car is under restoration in the depot

A selection of the museum's extensive bus collection

Devons Road (ZDR)

Devons Road is a stop on the Stratford-Lewisham line of the Docklands Light Railway.

Information
Type: Transport for London
(Docklands Light Railway)
Station code: ZDR
Opened: 1987
Platforms: 2
The station was one of the original DLR stations opening in 1987 [1] and is located in Bromley-by-Bow in between Bow Church and Langdon Park DLR stations.

The station follows the same pattern as a number along the route with two platforms with canopies over about half their length and a footbridge to allow for transfer between platforms.
Stratford bound #80 pulls into the station

View of the canopy

View from the Lewisham platform

#54 departs heading South

[1] Stephen Jolly & Boy Bayman, Docklands Light Railway (Capital Transport, 1986) p. 26

Ealing Broadway London Underground (ZEB)

Adjacent to Ealing Broadway national railway station the tube station is a West London terminus of both the Central and District Lines.
Information
Type: Transport for London
(Central & District Lines)
Station code: ZEB
Opened: 1879
Platforms: 5

The national railway station at Ealing Broadway was opened by the Great Western Railway in 1838. The origins of the tube station date from 1879 [1] when the Metropolitan District Railway opened a station to the North of the GWR one as a terminus of a branch from Turnham Green. The District Railway line was electrified in 1905.

The Central London Railway reached Ealing Broadway in 1920 using a GWR freight only line [2], the line later being transferred to London Underground. The CLR services used the GWR station not the District Railway one. When the national railway station (by now operated by BR) was rebuilt in 1961 the new ticket hall served all lines, the separate District Line ticket hall being closed.

The London Underground part of Ealing Broadway now has five platforms. The Central Line uses two platforms and the District Line three. Part of two of the District platforms is covered by a short canopy which includes early Underground signs used before the roundel became ubiquitous.
District S7 Stock train arrives 

Pre-roundel Underground sign

Central Line 92TS train prepares to depart East

View of the canopy over two of the District platforms

End of the line

[1] Jason Cross, London Underground Guide 2017 (Train Crazy, 2017) p. 114
[2] J. Grahem Bruce & Desmond F. Croome, The Twopenny Tube (Capital Transport, 1996) p. 26

Stonehouse (SHU)

Stonehouse is a stop on the Gloucester-Swindon Line, between Gloucester and Stroud.
Information
Type: National Rail
(Gloucester-Swindon Line)
Station code: SHU
Opened: 1845
Platforms: 2

The station was opened by the Cheltenham and Great Western Union Railway (later GWR) in 1845 as Stonehouse (Burdett Road) to distinguish it from a slightly earlier station called Stonehouse, later known Stonehouse (Bristol Road). The other station closed in the mid-1960s. Stonehouse's original station buildings survived until the 1970s.

Stonehouse's two platforms are short and can only comfortably handle two-car trains. Longer trains such as HSTs also stop there with selective door unlocking. Work is currently ongoing for extensions to both platforms. When the work is complete the platforms will be extended from 50m to about 160m. There is a ticket office but it is currently a portacabin.
GWR 43 154 at the tail of as Swindon bound HST

Station view from the footbridge

New platforms, the temporary ticket office can be seen on the right

Mitcham Junction (MIJ)

Mitcham Junction is a station in Merton, South London. Once a junction of two lines (hence the name) now it is an interchange for National Rail and Tramlink.
Information
Type: National Rail (Sutton & Mole Valley Lines)
Station code: MIJ
Opened: 1868
Platforms:

The station was opened in 1868 as a junction of the Sutton & Mole Valley and West Croydon to Wimbledon Lines. The latter line was closed in 1997 to become part of the Croydon Tramlink. Mitcham Junction Tramlink stop is adjacent to the station.

Both National Rail platforms have canopies, access between them is via a footbridge.

Mitcham Junction is served by Southern (who manage the station) and Thameslink and is well connected with trains to Wimbledon, London Victoria, London Blackfriars, St Albans, Epson and Sutton among others.
Thameslink 700 004 on a North bound service

Tram 2531 departs heading for Wimbledon

Station canopy and footbridge

Look down the platform

Southern 377 215 departs the station

Lambeth North (ZLN)

Lambeth North is the penultimate stop Southbound on the Bakerloo Line and the line's original (but temporary) Southern terminus.

Information
Type: Transport for London
(Bakerloo Line)
Station code: ZLN
Opened: 1906
Platforms: 2
Lambeth North was opened as Kennington Road in March 1906 along with the rest of the original stretch of the Baker Street & Waterloo Railway. The Southern terminus of the line was (and still is) Elephant & Castle but this was not ready for the initial opening so Kennington Road served as the Southern terminus until August [1].

The station was renamed Westminster Bridge Road in July (while still the terminus) and didn't get the name Lambeth North until 1917 [2]. In WW2 Lambeth North was badly damaged by a nearby hit of a very large German bomb and had to have parts of the tunnel and platforms rebuilt.

Access to the platforms from the Leslie Green designed surface building and ticket office is via lifts and a spiral staircase. The station is the nearest tube station to the Imperial War Museum. Just North of the station is a crossover and an access line to the Bakerloo Line's London Road depot.
A 72ts train arrives

Look down the platform

Station signs
[1] Jason Cross, London Underground Guide 2017 (Train Crazy, 2017) p. 137
[2] Mike Horne, The Bakerloo Line (Capital Transport, 2001) p. 25