Piccadilly Line Cockfosters extension
Encyclopedia
London Underground
The London Underground is a rapid transit system serving a large part of Greater London and some parts of Buckinghamshire, Hertfordshire and Essex in England...
's Piccadilly Line
Piccadilly Line
The Piccadilly line is a line of the London Underground, coloured dark blue on the Tube map. It is the fifth busiest line on the Underground network judged by the number of passengers transported per year. It is mainly a deep-level line, running from the north to the west of London via Zone 1, with...
. The extension through north London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
from to was opened in three stages between 19 September 1932 and 31 July 1933.
Need
When the Great Northern, Piccadilly and Brompton RailwayGreat Northern, Piccadilly and Brompton Railway
The Great Northern, Piccadilly and Brompton Railway , also known as the Piccadilly tube, was a railway company established in 1902 that constructed a deep-level underground "tube" railway in London. The GNP&BR was formed through a merger of two older companies, the Brompton and Piccadilly Circus...
(GNP&BR, precursor of the Piccadilly Line) opened in December 1906, its northern terminus was at Finsbury Park where it had an interchange with the Great Northern Railway
Great Northern Railway (Great Britain)
The Great Northern Railway was a British railway company established by the Great Northern Railway Act of 1846. On 1 January 1923 the company lost its identity as a constituent of the newly formed London and North Eastern Railway....
(GNR) and the Great Northern & City Railway
Northern City Line
The Northern City Line is a railway line from Moorgate to Finsbury Park in London, once part of the Great Northern Electrics line. It should not be confused with the City branch of the Northern line, nor with the North London Line...
(GN&CR). To obtain approval for the railway's construction, the GNP&BR had, like the GN&CR before it, had to accept a GNR veto over further extensions north in competition of latter's suburban passenger services from King's Cross
King's Cross station
King's Cross station may refer to::* London King's Cross railway station in London, England** King's Cross St. Pancras tube station for London Underground lines.** King's Cross Thameslink, a disused railway station in London, England...
.
Very soon after the GNP&BR opened it was clear that the termination of the line in urban Finsbury Park
Finsbury Park, London
Finsbury Park is an area in north London, England which grew up around an important railway interchange at the junction of the London Boroughs of Islington, Haringey and Hackney...
rather than further out of central London in more suburban Wood Green
Wood Green
Wood Green is a district in north London, England, located in the London Borough of Haringey. It is situated north of Charing Cross. The area is identified in the London Plan as one of the metropolitan centres in Greater London.-History:...
, Southgate
Southgate, London
Southgate is an area of north London, England, primarily within the London Borough of Enfield, although parts of its western fringes lie within the London Borough of Barnet. It is located around north of Charing Cross. The name is derived from being the south gate to Enfield Chase...
or Tottenham
Tottenham
Tottenham is an area of the London Borough of Haringey, England, situated north north east of Charing Cross.-Toponymy:Tottenham is believed to have been named after Tota, a farmer, whose hamlet was mentioned in the Domesday Book; hence Tota's hamlet became Tottenham...
had been a mistake. Passengers leaving the GNP&BR and the GN&CR at Finsbury Park preferred to transfer on to tram
Tram
A tram is a passenger rail vehicle which runs on tracks along public urban streets and also sometimes on separate rights of way. It may also run between cities and/or towns , and/or partially grade separated even in the cities...
s and bus
Bus
A bus is a road vehicle designed to carry passengers. Buses can have a capacity as high as 300 passengers. The most common type of bus is the single-decker bus, with larger loads carried by double-decker buses and articulated buses, and smaller loads carried by midibuses and minibuses; coaches are...
es for the continuation of their journeys, rather than use the GNR as it had hoped. This caused much inconvenience and congestion in and around the station at Finsbury Park.
Solution
Calls for a solution to the congestion at Finsbury Park were frequent almost from the GNP&BR's opening and after the First World WarWorld War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
the campaign for extending the line gathered strength. In 1921, the Municipal Borough of Tottenham
Municipal Borough of Tottenham
Tottenham was a local government district in north east Middlesex from 1850 to 1965. It was part of the London postal district and Metropolitan Police District....
, sent a resolution to the Government, suggesting the desirability of extending one of the two lines then terminating at Finsbury Park to Seven Sisters Corner
Seven Sisters, London
Seven Sisters is an area of North London in the United Kingdom and part of the London Borough of Haringey. It is located at the east end of Seven Sisters Road, which runs from Tottenham High Road to join the A1 in Holloway.-Etymology:...
. In the face of mounting pressure the London and North Eastern Railway
London and North Eastern Railway
The London and North Eastern Railway was the second-largest of the "Big Four" railway companies created by the Railways Act 1921 in Britain...
(LNER) continued the opposition of its predecessor, the GNR, to a northward extension of the Piccadilly Line although it did begin developing plans for the electrification of its own suburban services.
When the LNER cancelled the electrification of its routes due to lack of money, a petition from the Middlesex Federation of Ratepayers in 1923, finally spurred the government to act and, in 1925, "The North and North-East London Traffic Inquiry" was set up to examine options. When the Inquiry reported, it recommended an extension initially only one station to Manor House
Manor House tube station
Manor House tube station is a station on the Piccadilly line of the London Underground, on the boundary between Travelcard Zone 2 and Zone 3. It straddles the border between the London Boroughs of Hackney and Haringey, the postal address and three of the entrances being in the former, and one...
. The LNER was placed in the position of either carrying out the electrification of its own services or withdrawing its veto to an extension of the Piccadilly Line.
To make the extension financially worthwhile, the Underground Group
Underground Electric Railways Company of London
The Underground Electric Railways Company of London Limited , known operationally as The Underground for much of its existence, was established in 1902. It was the holding company for the three deep-level "tube"A "tube" railway is an underground railway constructed in a circular tunnel by the use...
needed to maximise the number of passengers using it by extending the new route as far as possible to the north and by building as much of it as possible on the surface for which construction is considerably cheaper than in tunnel. A route was proposed out to rural and Cockfosters although the Underground Group did not actually have the money to construct even the limited extension to .
The recession of the late 1920s eventually provided the economic imperative for the construction of the extension. The government introduced the Development (Loan Guarantees and Grants) Act in 1930 which provided government guarantees on loans raised for construction. The aim was to increase employment through a stimulation of public works projects and, with guarantees available on the money needed for the construction, the Underground Group was able to start work on the Cockfosters extension, the Piccadilly Line western extension as well as many other projects throughout the Underground network.
All the stations were designed by Charles Holden
Charles Holden
Charles Henry Holden, Litt. D., FRIBA, MRTPI, RDI was a Bolton-born English architect best known for designing many London Underground stations during the 1920s and 1930s, for Bristol Central Library, the Underground Electric Railways Company of London's headquarters at 55 Broadway and for the...
and colleagues in a modern European style, assembling the buildings from a collection of basic geometric shapes.
Despite the Underground Groups wish to construct most of the extension on the surface, the first four stations are underground. The line surfaces at Arnos Grove before going back into tunnel to pass through a hill at Southgate. North of Southgate, the line is on the surface for the rest of the route to Cockfosters. Therefore, five of the eight stations on the extension are underground.
Stations on the Extension
- Opened on 19 September 1932
- Harringay (St. Anns Road), proposed but not constructed
- , other proposed names; "North Harringay" and "Ducketts Green"
- , other proposed names; "Wood Green Central" and "Lordship Lane"
- , other proposed names; "Wood Green North" and "Brownlow Road"
- , other proposed names; "Arnos Park", "Bowes Road" and "Southgate"
- Opened 13 March 1933
- , other proposed names; "Chase Side" and "Southgate Central"
- , opened as "Enfield West" before changing to "Enfield West (Oakwood)" then in 1946 to its present name. Other proposed names; "Southgate North, Oakwood Park", "Oakwood", "Merryhills" and "East Barnet"
- Opened 31 July 1933
- , other proposed name "Trent Park"