Ernst S Blofeld wrote:
There appears to be work going on beside Holloway Road tube station,
on some old railway land. Does anyone know what that apparent old
alignment was? Were there plans for a high-level station at any point?

http://www.islington.gov.uk/Council/...road_brief.asp

The Piccadilly stations between Kings Cross and Finsbury Park (including
York Road) were replacements for surface stations which shut as soon as (I
think) the underground stations opened.

The economics of closing 4 existing surface stations and building
underground ones have never entirely made sense to me, when they could have
built a pair of (larger) tunnels for GN trains and given over two surface
tracks, with stations, to the Piccadilly.

On Sat, 16 Dec 2006, John Rowland wrote:

Ernst S Blofeld wrote:

There appears to be work going on beside Holloway Road tube station,
on some old railway land. Does anyone know what that apparent old
alignment was? Were there plans for a high-level station at any point?

http://www.islington.gov.uk/Council/...road_brief.asp

The Piccadilly stations between Kings Cross and Finsbury Park (including
York Road) were replacements for surface stations which shut as soon as (I
think) the underground stations opened.

The economics of closing 4 existing surface stations and building
underground ones have never entirely made sense to me, when they could
have built a pair of (larger) tunnels for GN trains and given over two
surface tracks, with stations, to the Piccadilly.

Perhaps because bigger tunnels would have cost rather a lot more, could
not have been worked by steam trains, and would have required some
complicated portal shenanigans at King's Cross to bring the big trains up
to the station whilst the little trains dived down to go to Russell
Square.

That said, i wonder if it was also a cultural thing - the idea of putting
suburban railways in tubes was already popular, but nobody had done it for
a main line. Indeed, we still haven't - not until the CTRL opens!

tom

--
THE DRUMMER FROM DEF LEPPARD'S ONLY GOT ONE ARM!

Tom Anderson wrote:
On Sat, 16 Dec 2006, John Rowland wrote:

The economics of closing 4 existing surface stations and building
underground ones have never entirely made sense to me, when they
could have built a pair of (larger) tunnels for GN trains and given
over two surface tracks, with stations, to the Piccadilly.

Perhaps because bigger tunnels would have cost rather a lot more,

More than 4 underground stations?

could not have been worked by steam trains, and would have required
some complicated portal shenanigans at King's Cross to bring the big
trains up to the station whilst the little trains dived down to go to
Russell Square.

That said, i wonder if it was also a cultural thing - the idea of
putting suburban railways in tubes was already popular, but nobody
had done it for a main line. Indeed, we still haven't - not until the
CTRL opens!

There were already numerous mainline steam railways in tubes.... or do you
think the Severn Tunnel was cut-and-cover and electrified? I think there are
two lots of tube tunnels on the mainline between Kings Cross and Caledonian
Road anyway.

On Mon, 18 Dec 2006, John Rowland wrote:

Tom Anderson wrote:
On Sat, 16 Dec 2006, John Rowland wrote:

The economics of closing 4 existing surface stations and building
underground ones have never entirely made sense to me, when they
could have built a pair of (larger) tunnels for GN trains and given
over two surface tracks, with stations, to the Piccadilly.

Perhaps because bigger tunnels would have cost rather a lot more,

More than

More than the Picc tunnels. I meant that the marginal cost of the wider
tunnels, plus the costs associated with the factors i mentioned in the
rest of that paragraph, might have come to more than the cost of ...

4 underground stations?

After all, what's an underground station but a section of bigger tunnel
with some nice tiling and a few bits of furniture?

could not have been worked by steam trains, and would have required
some complicated portal shenanigans at King's Cross to bring the big
trains up to the station whilst the little trains dived down to go to
Russell Square.

That said, i wonder if it was also a cultural thing - the idea of
putting suburban railways in tubes was already popular, but nobody
had done it for a main line. Indeed, we still haven't - not until the
CTRL opens!

There were already numerous mainline steam railways in tubes.... or do
you think the Severn Tunnel was cut-and-cover and electrified?

Oh, as far as i'm concerned, the west country was, and remains, entirely
fictional. Certainly didn't seem very convincing when i was last there.

I think there are two lots of tube tunnels on the mainline between Kings
Cross and Caledonian Road anyway.

Point taken. Forgive my ignorance.

Although out of interest - where? Tunnels yes, but i'd never realised they
were tubes. When was the GN built? Was there an on- or near-surface
alignment to begin with, or was it tubes from the start?

tom

--
Orange paint menace

John Rowland wrote:
Tom Anderson wrote:
On Sat, 16 Dec 2006, John Rowland wrote:

The economics of closing 4 existing surface stations and building
underground ones have never entirely made sense to me, when they
could have built a pair of (larger) tunnels for GN trains and given
over two surface tracks, with stations, to the Piccadilly.

Perhaps because bigger tunnels would have cost rather a lot more,

More than 4 underground stations?

The difficulty here is that your original assertion is wrong - the only
GN station duplicated by a tube station was Holloway and Caledonian
Road, and that didn't shut until 1915.

Gillespie Road (now Arsenal), Caledonian Road, and York Road didn't
have surface stations nearby.

Gillespie Road, by the way, seems to have been a remarkable bit of
luck. In order that it could be near some potential traffic, two
houses on Gillespie Road were demolished, and the station frontage
built into the terrace (a third house was subsequently demolished when
the station was modified in the 1930s). This put the station building
so far from the line of route that the shallowly sloping tunnel to the
platforms was provided. In 1913 Arsenal moved to their new Highbury
Stadium, right across the road. Ever since, the fortuitously
convenient access design at the tube station has proved invaluable on
match days, both throughout the life of Highbury and at the new
Emirates Stadium.


could not have been worked by steam trains, and would have required
some complicated portal shenanigans at King's Cross to bring the big
trains up to the station whilst the little trains dived down to go to
Russell Square.

That said, i wonder if it was also a cultural thing - the idea of
putting suburban railways in tubes was already popular, but nobody
had done it for a main line. Indeed, we still haven't - not until the
CTRL opens!

There were already numerous mainline steam railways in tubes.... or do you
think the Severn Tunnel was cut-and-cover and electrified? I think there are
two lots of tube tunnels on the mainline between Kings Cross and Caledonian
Road anyway.

I don't think that a twin-track, brick-lined tunnel quite fits the
generally accepted definition of 'tube'.