One of the commonest explanations you hear for the lack of tube lines
south of the river is that the soil is unsuitable for the tunnelling
equipment in use in the early years of the 20th century. If that's
the case, though, how did the Morden end of the Northern Line get
built?

Patrick

"The Only Living Boy in New Cross" wrote in
message m...
One of the commonest explanations you hear for the lack of tube lines
south of the river is that the soil is unsuitable for the tunnelling
equipment in use in the early years of the 20th century. If that's
the case, though, how did the Morden end of the Northern Line get
built?

I tend to beleive the more probably explanation that the Southern Railway
took suburban commuters seriously as a market, and provided frequent,
electric commuter trains. The other 3 of the big 4 basically ignored this
market, and the system that became London Underground built the lines
instead. This leaves us now with London Underground extending way out to
the north, east and west, but the railways doing the job to the south.

Robin

"Robin Payne" wrote in message
...
"The Only Living Boy in New Cross" wrote in
message m...

One of the commonest explanations you hear for the lack of tube lines
south of the river is that the soil is unsuitable for the tunnelling
equipment in use in the early years of the 20th century. If that's
the case, though, how did the Morden end of the Northern Line get
built?

I tend to beleive the more probably explanation that the Southern Railway
took suburban commuters seriously as a market, and provided frequent,
electric commuter trains. The other 3 of the big 4 basically ignored this
market, and the system that became London Underground built the lines
instead. This leaves us now with London Underground extending way out to
the north, east and west, but the railways doing the job to the south.

I always understood that the reason for the lack of tube lines, south of the
river, was due to the intensive network of tram lines operated by the local
councils down there. The main line railways set up a network of electric
trains in competition with the trams, which meant that the case for tube
lines was not strong.
--
Terry Harper, Web Co-ordinator, The Omnibus Society
http://www.omnibussoc.org
E-mail:
URL: http://www.terry.harper.btinternet.co.uk/

Robin Payne:
I tend to beleive the more probably explanation that the Southern
Railway took suburban commuters seriously as a market, and provided
frequent, electric commuter trains. The other 3 of the big 4
basically ignored this market...

I tend to believe this one as well. And I'll add that the reason behind
the reason is that London is in the southeast of Great Britain -- so that
lines running north or west from London could carry lucrative long-distance
traffic, but other lines could not, because there were no long distances.
The southern railways, and later the Southern Railway, *had* to concen-
trate on short- and middle-distance traffic, because except for one line
to Exeter that competed with the GWR, that was all there was.

The GNR, of course, not only had its long-distance traffic, but *did*
go after suburban traffic in a big way as well, building branch lines
in north London -- and they came to regret it, calling these services
their suburban incubus". In the end, this added to the growth of tube
lines in north London. First the GN&CR and GN&SR were successively
promoted as ways to relieve the GNR, then abandoned to eventually become
parts of the Underground (also the former, of course, didn't stay one);
then some of the branches were handed over to the Underground as extensions
of the Northern Line.
--
Mark Brader, Toronto "'Run me,' Alice?"
-- Tom Neff

My text in this article is in the public domain.

"Mark Brader" wrote in message
...
Robin Payne:
I tend to beleive the more probably explanation that the Southern
Railway took suburban commuters seriously as a market, and provided
frequent, electric commuter trains. The other 3 of the big 4
basically ignored this market...

I tend to believe this one as well. And I'll add that the reason behind
the reason is that London is in the southeast of Great Britain -- so that
lines running north or west from London could carry lucrative
long-distance
traffic, but other lines could not, because there were no long distances.
The southern railways, and later the Southern Railway, *had* to concen-
trate on short- and middle-distance traffic, because except for one line
to Exeter that competed with the GWR, that was all there was.


Of course, the SER and the LCDR did have the lucrative route to Dover and
other Channel ports (and the South Coast resorts to a lesser extent, if you
include the LB&SCR), but this only increased railway penetration in what was
northern Kent and Surrey, as the railway companies sought to gain some
return on the massive capital outlay they made on competing lines and rival
West End and City terminii.

In the inter-war period, the SR simply had greater financial advantages than
LU. Slapping on a third rail brought in as many new surburan passengers as a
Tube line would, at much less cost (even if an existing line had simply been
converted for use by Tube stock). I think the SR in these years could boast
a 14% return on capital for electrification against the 1% for an
Underground extenstion produced. The SR wasn't going to give up any of these
profits to the Tube easily, and fought so hard over the extension to Morden
that expanding elsewhere in South London just wasn't practical.

I sometimes wonder whether I would gain from a Tube line serving me locally.
I live on the Hayes line, which would be a prime candidate for incorporation
into an extended Bakerloo line (for example). As it stands (assuming normal
service and no nasty surprises in forthcoming timetables) I can reach large
parts of both the West End and the City within 30-40 minutes of my
departure. If the line were wholly given over to LUL, the City would no
longer be directly accessible, and journey times to London would probably be
slower on the most likely route. There should be no problem about ensuring
the off-peak 4tph to London could still be maintained if both services were
allowed to run, but NR trains at peak times would still be fairly crowded.

"juvenal" wrote in message ...
I sometimes wonder whether I would gain from a Tube line serving me locally.
I live on the Hayes line, which would be a prime candidate for incorporation
into an extended Bakerloo line (for example).

That'd be fantastic! Elephant & Castle, Camberwell, Peckham,
Brockley, Lewisham, Ladywell, Catford Bridge, Lower Sydenham, New
Beckenham, Clock House, Elmers End, Eden Park, West Wickham and Hayes.
Does any freight run on the Hayes line? If it's passengers only, it
surely wouldn't be too hard to come to some sort of arrangement to
hand the line south of Lewisham over to LU. And the cost of the
tunnel from Walworth Road to Lewisham would surely be far cheaper than
the JLE, to deliver similar benefits. I wonder if such a scheme has
ever been considered by LU?

Patrick

"The Only Living Boy in New Cross" wrote in
message om...
"juvenal" wrote in message
...
I sometimes wonder whether I would gain from a Tube line serving me
locally.
I live on the Hayes line, which would be a prime candidate for
incorporation
into an extended Bakerloo line (for example).

That'd be fantastic! Elephant & Castle,

Walworth next, surely...

Camberwell, Peckham,
Brockley, Lewisham, Ladywell, Catford Bridge, Lower Sydenham, New
Beckenham, Clock House, Elmers End, Eden Park, West Wickham and Hayes.


Personally, I'd rather see it head along the more direct route down the Old
Kent Road:

Elephant & Castle, Bricklayer's Arms, Surrey Canal Road, New Cross, St
Johns, Lewisham.

I don't even know if it would be needed any further - passenger capacity
would get pretty tight, and Lewisham would be a good change for a lot of
passengers; plus it would prevent the Hayes line from losing its service to
the City.

Jonn

"The Only Living Boy in New Cross" wrote in
message m...

One of the commonest explanations you hear for
the lack of tube lines south of the river is that the
soil is unsuitable for the tunnelling equipment in
use in the early years of the 20th century. If that's
the case, though, how did the Morden end of the
Northern Line get built?

It got built at high cost, that's how. Nobody said that it was impossible.
It was the difficult and expensive experience of building the Northern Line
that deterred anyone from putting any more tubes in South London.

In any location and era, building a railway on the surface costs a certain
amount, and building it in a tunnel costs a different amount. Over the
years, land values change, and tunnelling technology improves, and safety
legislation affecting tunnelling becomes stiffer, and political opposition
to demolition changes, so there is no reason why the cheaper option couldn't
switch between overground and underground every decade or so.

--
John Rowland - Spamtrapped
Transport Plans for the London Area, updated 2001
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Acro...69/tpftla.html
A man's vehicle is a symbol of his manhood.
That's why my vehicle's the Piccadilly Line -
It's the size of a county and it comes every two and a half minutes

In m,
The Only Living Boy in New Cross typed:

One of the commonest explanations you hear for the lack of tube lines
south of the river is that the soil is unsuitable for the tunnelling
equipment in use in the early years of the 20th century. If that's
the case, though, how did the Morden end of the Northern Line get
built?


Well, as far as the City Branch is concerned, I guess that they heard that
the equipment was going to be unsuitable for use in the early years of the
20th century - and so built it in the 19th century instead.



Bob

(The Only Living Boy in New Cross) wrote in message om...
One of the commonest explanations you hear for the lack of tube lines
south of the river is that the soil is unsuitable for the tunnelling
equipment in use in the early years of the 20th century. If that's
the case, though, how did the Morden end of the Northern Line get
built?

Patrick

According to our friend Clive, http://www.davros.org/rail/culg/northern.html
says that services between Clapham Common and Morden were inaugurated in 1926.
IIRC there were tunnels in the King William Street area, of a size for Tube
stock in the 1890s (I may be very wrong on this), so the tunnelling equipment
itself may not have been an issue.

Checking this site, http://www.btinternet.com/~ptaffs/pe.../personal.html,
shows that Morden is located near a narrower portion of the Thames, which meant
that sending tunnels under the riverbed would have been a bit easier due to
simply having less water to worry about.

Either way, this won't be much of an issue for south/southeast London much
longer - as long as no one else tries to screw things up, the East London Line
extensions will be open in 2005 (?) and those parts of London will have tube
service. http://www.ellp.co.uk/route_map.htm is a map of what the line will
look like when it opens.

Hope I helped,

Brad