July 19th 18, 10:18 AM
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Senior Member
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First recorded activity at LondonBanter: Feb 2011
Location: Leyton, East London
Posts: 902
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The North London Line was indeed electrified decades ago, and electric trains ran from Richmond to Broad Street. When Broad Street was closed, the 3rd rail electrification was extended to North Woolwich and the trains from Richmond were diverted to there.
During those years trains along what is now GOBLIN ran to Kentish Town and in the evenings to St. Pancras. It was a very lightly used service. When I moved to Leyton, I used it one day to visit a friend in Kentish Town. The man in the ticket office - yes, we had them in those days - asked me "why does nobody use this line?" I replied that it was because no-one knew about the service.
That is still my opinion. If the route to Kentish Town had remained open and GOBLIN had been absorbed into Thameslink, the volume of business would be far, far higher than it is today. However, the reason GOBLIN was not electrified with 3rd rail back then was because it was such a quiet backwater railway.
Last edited by Robin9 : July 19th 18 at 01:41 PM
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