1.
London Overground
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The London Overground is a suburban rail network in the United Kingdom. Established in 2007, it serves a large part of Greater London and parts of Hertfordshire, the network forms part of the National Rail network, but under the franchise control and branding of Transport for London. Operation has been franchised to Arriva Rail London since 13 November 2016, the Overground has been assigned the colour orange as a mode specific colour by Transport for London. This colour is used in the Overground version of the TfL roundel, for the representation of Overground routes on the map, in train interiors. Rail services in Great Britain are mostly run under franchises operated by train operating companies. The concept of developing a network of services around London goes back to the independently produced Ringrail proposals in the early 1970s. The proposal from Barren was for several overlapping services mainly using the North London Line and this was given the marketing name Cross Town Link-Line, and operated with basic 2-car diesel units. The next initiative came from the GLC in 1984, when the government supported the Broadgate development that would entail the demolition of Broad Street Station. The closure process was convoluted because of problems in making arrangements for the North London Line. These would eventually run to and from Liverpool Street via a new section of track and this used a name once associated with a semicircular service that operated from Broad Street to Mansion House, but ceased during World War 1. The pamphlets and briefings, first issued in 1997, initially suggested a route from Clapham Junction to the Greenwich Peninsula, intended to improve access from south London to the Millennium Dome. However, this was thwarted by architect Richard Rogers who considered a railway route on an elevated viaduct could cause community severance, nothing further happened to develop this network until after the new GLA was set up in 2000. But the lobbying discreetly continued with a series of short briefings published by one RDS member based in North London, mayoral and GLA candidates were approached to discuss the viability of the Outer Circle concept. The principle was widely supported and was adopted into the first Mayors Transport Plan, meanwhile, a pilot scheme was launched in 2003 to bring several National Rail local services, mainly in South London and operated by multiple companies, under the ON – Overground Network brand. TfL introduced consistent information displays, station signage and maps on the routes in South London. The pilot scheme was later dropped, in January 2004 the Department for Transport announced a review of the rail industry in Great Britain. As part of review, proposals were put forward by TfL for a London Regional Rail Authority to give TfL regulatory powers over rail services in. A result of consultation was agreement by the then Secretary of State for Transport, Alistair Darling
2.
Penge
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Penge is a suburb of south east London in the London Borough of Bromley. It has entered popular culture as the archetypal commuter suburb, but was an entertainment district in the 19th century. Notable residents have included Bill Wyman of The Rolling Stones, Prime Minister Andrew Bonar Law, Penge is made up of the Penge and Cator Ward which had a Population of 17,326 in 2011. Penge was once a town, which was recorded under the name Penceat in an Anglo-Saxon deed dating from 957. Most historians believe the name of the town is derived from the Celtic word Penceat which means edge of wood and refers to the fact that the surrounding area was once covered in a dense forest. The original Celtic words of which the name was composed referred to pen, as in the Welsh pen, Penge was an inconspicuous area with few residents before the arrival of the railways. A traveller passing through Penge would have noticed the large green with an inn on its boundary. Penge Green appears as Pensgreene on Kips 1607 map, the green was bounded to the north by Penge Lane, the west by Beckenham Road and the southeast by the Crooked Billet. Penge Lane was the road from Penge to Sydenham which is now named St Johns Road, there was also an old footpath crossing the Green leading to Sydenham that was known as Old Penge Lane. After the London, Chatham and Dover Railway was built, Penge Lane crossed the line by level crossing, when this crossing was closed Penge Lane was renamed and Old Penge Lane became the present day Penge Lane. The 1868 Ordnance Survey map shows the Old Crooked Billet located to the southeast of the current location and this earlier location was on the eastward side of Penge Green, which disappeared as a result of The Penge Enclosure Act,1827 which enclosed the whole Green. This left the Crooked Billet with no frontage to Beckenham Road, so new premises were constructed on the present site in 1827 and this was severely damaged by enemy action in World War II and subsequently rebuilt. The Crooked Billet is by far the oldest public house in Penge, peter Abbott states that it was there in 1601 and speculates that it might be much more ancient. In modern times it is well known for lending its name as a bus route terminus. From 1914 General Omnibus routes 109 and 609 both operated between Bromley Market and the Crooked Billet following different routes, the 109 was renumbered 227 by London Transport and continued to terminate at the Crooked Billet. Around 1950 some services were extended past the Crooked Billet to the Crystal Palace, eventually nearly all buses traveled the extended route. The 354 buses now use the terminus, as do so short running buses on route 194 which carry the destination Penge High Street, William Hone wrote about a visit to the Crooked Billet in 1827 and included a detailed sketch of the last building on the original site. The London and Croydon Canal was built across Penge Common along what is now the line of the railway through Penge West railway station, there is a remnant at the northern corner of Betts Park, Anerley
3.
Network Rail
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Network Rail is the owner and infrastructure manager of most of the rail network in England, Scotland and Wales. Network Rail is an arms length public body of the Department for Transport with no shareholders, since 1 September 2014, Network Rail has been classified as a public sector body. Britains railway system was built by companies, but it was nationalised by the Transport Act 1947. Infrastructure and passenger and freight services were separated at that time, between 1994 and 2002 the infrastructure was owned and operated by Railtrack. The Hatfield train crash on 17 October 2000 was a moment in the collapse of Railtrack. The costs of modernising the West Coast Main Line were also spiralling, the purchase was completed on 3 October 2002. The SRA was abolished in November 2006, the company moved its headquarters to Kings Place,90 York Way, from 40 Melton Street, Euston, in August 2008. In October 2008, Sir Ian McAllister announced that he would not stand for re-election as chairman of Network Rail and he had held the position for six years. He noted that as Network Rail moved to a new phase in its development it was appropriate for a new chairman to lead it there, many track safety initiatives have been introduced in the time Network Rail has been responsible for this area. This ruling came into force in January 2009 for maintenance and property workers and in April 2009 for infrastructure, in 2009, allegations appeared in the media from the Transport Salaried Staffs Association concerning treatment of Network Rail employees. Former chief executive Iain Coucher was also accused of financial impropriety involving unspecified payments to his business partner Victoria Pender during his tenure at Network Rail, an internal investigation held by Network Rail in 2010, vetted by its auditors PricewaterhouseCoopers, uncovered no evidence of wrongdoing. An independent enquiry headed by Anthony White QC in 2011 further examined the claims, critical commentary appeared in the media concerning the knighthood awarded to John Armitt in the 2012 New Year Honours for services to engineering and construction. The reorganisation has been interpreted as a move back towards vertical integration of track, in 2016 Network Rail failed to check whether the Flying Scotsman could fit through tunnels along the Borders Route resulting in the cancellation of a trip just 24 hours before departure. Scottish Transport Minister Derek Mackay branded the affair a debacle, Network Rails attempt to electrify the West Coast Mainline has been dogged by poor planning and cost overruns, the projected cost has ballooned from by £1.2 billion to £2. It however owns a fleet of departmental stock, although it owns over 2,500 railway stations, it manages only 18 of the biggest and busiest of them, all the other stations being managed by one or other of the various train operating companies. Network Rail has a 15-year lease on Square One in Manchester with 800 staff in one of Manchesters largest refurbished office spaces, Network Rail should not be confused with National Rail. National Rail is not an organisation, but merely a brand, used to explain, the majority of Network Rail lines also carry freight traffic, some lines are freight only. A few lines that carry passenger traffic are not part of the National Rail network, conversely, a few National Rail services operate over track which is not part of the Network Rail network
4.
Tramlink
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Tramlink is a light rail tram system serving Croydon and surrounding areas in South London, England. It began operation in 2000, the first tram system in London since 1952 and it is owned by London Trams, an arm of Transport for London, and operated by FirstGroup. The Tramlink is the fourth-busiest light rail network in the UK behind Manchester Metrolink, Tyne and Wear Metro, in 1990 Croydon Council with London Regional Transport put the project to Parliament and the Croydon Tramlink Act 1994 resulted, which gave LRT the power to build and run Tramlink. In 1996 Tramtrack Croydon Limited won a 99-year Private Finance Initiative contract to design, build, operate, TCL was a partnership comprising FirstGroup, Bombardier Transportation, Sir Robert McAlpine and Amey, and Royal Bank of Scotland and 3i. TCL kept the revenue generated by Tramlink and LRT had to pay compensation to TCL for any changes to the fares, TCL subcontracted operations to CentreWest Buses. One of the leading to its creation was that the London Borough of Croydon has no London Underground service. There are four routes, Route 1 – Elmers End to Croydon, Route 2 – Beckenham Junction to Croydon, Route 3 – New Addington to Wimbledon, and Route 4 – Therapia Lane to Elmers End. Route 2 runs parallel to the Crystal Palace to Beckenham Junction line of the Southern network between Birkbeck and Beckenham Junction – the National Rail track had been singled some years earlier. At Woodside the old station buildings stand disused, and the platforms have been replaced by accessible low platforms. From Woodside to near Sandilands and from near Sandilands almost to Lloyd Park, Tramlink follows the former Woodside and South Croydon Railway, including the Park Hill tunnels. The section of Route 3 between Wimbledon and West Croydon mostly follows the single-track British Rail route, closed on 31 May 1997 so that it could be converted for Tramlink, a partial obstruction near this point has necessitated the use of interlaced track. A Victorian footbridge beside Waddon New Road was dismantled to make way for the flyover over the West Croydon to Sutton railway line, the footbridge has been re-erected at Corfe Castle station on the Swanage Railway. In March 2008, TfL announced that it had reached agreement to buy TCL for £98m, the purchase was finalised on 28 June 2008. The background to this purchase relates to the requirement that TfL compensates TCL for the consequences of any changes to the fares, in 2007 that payment was £4m, with an annual increase in rate. In October 2008 TfL introduced a new livery, using the blue, white and green of the routes on TfL maps, the colour of the cars was changed to green, and the brand name was changed from Croydon Tramlink to simply Tramlink. These refurbishments were completed in early 2009, the tram stops have low platforms,35 cm above rail level. They are unstaffed and have automated ticket machines, in general, access between the platforms involves crossing the tracks by pedestrian level crossing. There are 39 stops, most being 32.2 m long and they are virtually level with the doors and are all wider than 2 m
5.
London
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London /ˈlʌndən/ is the capital and most populous city of England and the United Kingdom. Standing on the River Thames in the south east of the island of Great Britain and it was founded by the Romans, who named it Londinium. Londons ancient core, the City of London, largely retains its 1. 12-square-mile medieval boundaries. London is a global city in the arts, commerce, education, entertainment, fashion, finance, healthcare, media, professional services, research and development, tourism. It is crowned as the worlds largest financial centre and has the fifth- or sixth-largest metropolitan area GDP in the world, London is a world cultural capital. It is the worlds most-visited city as measured by international arrivals and has the worlds largest city airport system measured by passenger traffic, London is the worlds leading investment destination, hosting more international retailers and ultra high-net-worth individuals than any other city. Londons universities form the largest concentration of education institutes in Europe. In 2012, London became the first city to have hosted the modern Summer Olympic Games three times, London has a diverse range of people and cultures, and more than 300 languages are spoken in the region. Its estimated mid-2015 municipal population was 8,673,713, the largest of any city in the European Union, Londons urban area is the second most populous in the EU, after Paris, with 9,787,426 inhabitants at the 2011 census. The citys metropolitan area is the most populous in the EU with 13,879,757 inhabitants, the city-region therefore has a similar land area and population to that of the New York metropolitan area. London was the worlds most populous city from around 1831 to 1925, Other famous landmarks include Buckingham Palace, the London Eye, Piccadilly Circus, St Pauls Cathedral, Tower Bridge, Trafalgar Square, and The Shard. The London Underground is the oldest underground railway network in the world, the etymology of London is uncertain. It is an ancient name, found in sources from the 2nd century and it is recorded c.121 as Londinium, which points to Romano-British origin, and hand-written Roman tablets recovered in the city originating from AD 65/70-80 include the word Londinio. The earliest attempted explanation, now disregarded, is attributed to Geoffrey of Monmouth in Historia Regum Britanniae and this had it that the name originated from a supposed King Lud, who had allegedly taken over the city and named it Kaerlud. From 1898, it was accepted that the name was of Celtic origin and meant place belonging to a man called *Londinos. The ultimate difficulty lies in reconciling the Latin form Londinium with the modern Welsh Llundain, which should demand a form *lōndinion, from earlier *loundiniom. The possibility cannot be ruled out that the Welsh name was borrowed back in from English at a later date, and thus cannot be used as a basis from which to reconstruct the original name. Until 1889, the name London officially applied only to the City of London, two recent discoveries indicate probable very early settlements near the Thames in the London area
6.
Southern (Govia Thameslink Railway)
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Southern is the brand name used by the Govia Thameslink Railway train operating company on the Southern routes of the Thameslink, Southern and Great Northern franchise. In July 2015, the franchisee was subsumed into GTR, but the existing Southern and Gatwick Express brand identities were retained alongside those of Thameslink and it also provides services between Milton Keynes and Croydon via the West London Line. It also operates services from Brighton to Ashford, Brighton to Seaford, Brighton to Southampton, following the end of British Rail, Connex South Central was awarded the Network SouthCentral franchise by the Director of Passenger Rail Franchising. Operations began on 26 May 1996, in March 2000, the Shadow Strategic Rail Authority announced its intention to relet the franchise from May 2003 with Connex and Govia the shortlisted bidders. In October 2000 the SSRA announced that Govia had been awarded the franchise, Govia negotiated a deal with Connex to buy out the remainder of its franchise, this was completed in August 2001. Govia trading as SouthCentral took over operations on 26 August 2001, in May 2004 the franchise was rebranded as Southern in a recall of the pre-nationalisation Southern Railway, using a green roundel logo with Southern in yellow in a green bar. In April 2007 the Department for Transport announced that the Gatwick Express franchise was to be incorporated into the main South Central franchise. This was part of a plan to increase capacity on the Brighton Main Line, involving the extension of services from Gatwick to Brighton. This doubled the number of London to Brighton express trains during those periods, in December 2008, Southern took over the services on the Redhill to Tonbridge Line from Southeastern. However, such a transfer never took place and the DfT put out the franchise for tender. In August 2008 the DfT shortlisted Govia, National Express, NedRail, in June 2009 the DfT announced that Govia had retained the franchise, to start on 20 September 2009. In March 2012 the Department for Transport announced that Abellio, FirstGroup, Govia, MTR and Stagecoach had been shortlisted for the new Thameslink, Southern, the Invitation to Tender was to be issued in October 2012, with the successful bidder announced in spring 2013. However, in the wake of the collapse of the InterCity West Coast refranchising process, in December 2012, Southerns London Victoria to London Bridge via Denmark Hill service ceased, being partially replaced by London Overgrounds new Clapham Junction to Dalston Junction service. However the Southern brand was retained, Southern was criticised for major changes to its timetables in December 2007 and December 2008. In December 2007, Southern changed the arrangement for the splitting of services to and from London Victoria on the Arun Valley Line, in December 2008 further timetable changes included the introduction of the extended Gatwick Express services. However, reliability and timekeeping on some of the new services were considered poor, on 22 January 2009, Southern responded to some of these criticisms. During 2009 these services have recorded improved timekeeping and criticisms have since subsided, the new timetable also led to unhappiness due to the difference in speed and frequency of service between East Coastway services and those on the Brighton Main Line. Further changes to the timetable were made in December 2010, the first timetable change to many of the requirements of the new franchise
7.
Thameslink and Great Northern
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Thameslink and Great Northern services were merged into one franchise in 2006 due to the Thameslink Programme. In 2012, it was announced that services of First Capital Connect, Southern, the Invitation to Tender was to have been issued in October 2012, with the successful bidder announced in Spring 2013 and TSGN originally due to start in September 2013. However, due to the collapse of the InterCity West Coast re-franchising process, in September 2013 a revised invitation to tender was issued. Govia Thameslink Railway was awarded the franchise on 23 May 2014, on 14 September 2014, Thameslink and Great Northern took over from First Capital Connect, serving 122 stations and operating a fleet of 226 trains. In December 2014, full control was taken of the Sevenoaks Thameslink service, on 21 January 2016 Transport for London announced that it intends to take over the London suburban parts of the franchise in 2021, to form a new suburban metro service. 1, ^ The Northern City Line between Moorgate and Drayton Park is also electrified at 750V DC using third rail, in 2011 the consortium Cross London Trains Ltd. This was a controversial decision as the competing bidder Bombardier Transportation had a train factory in the UK. Both the procurement process and final close of contract were significantly delayed, the trains are known as Class 700s and the £1.6 billion contract to manufacture and provide service depots for the trains was finalised in mid 2013. A fleet of 115 8- and 12-car trains are expected to service between 2016 and 2018. Associated rolling stock depots are being built at Hornsey and Three Bridges, because of the delay in procuring the Class 700 trains,29 Class 387 trains were ordered for the Thameslink route, facilitating the release of existing Class 319 trains to newly electrified routes. Delivery was completed in 2014 and the trains entered service later that year, the order includes provision for an extra 140 vehicles. It was originally planned that once the Class 700s begin entering service, however a change of plans saw GWR order an entirely new fleet of Class 387s with the ex-Thameslink examples expected to be cascaded to the Great Northern routes upon delivery of the Class 700s. This will allow Great Northern to operate fast services at up to 110 mph, something which the old fleet was incapable of. › London Moorgate, in December 2015 it was announced that Siemens would be providing these new trains as a follow-on to the Class 700 order. Former units operated by Thameslink and Great Northern include, This franchise is different from other franchises let since privatisation in 1996, now the operator, in this case Govia, gives all revenue to the government, rather than paying set premiums. The Department for Transport will pay Govia, totalling around £8. 9bn over the period of seven years. With this Govia expects to make a 3% profit, and the risks on costs will be Govias, Govia plans to invest £50m in all 239 stations it will manage. It plans to, Enhance all 239 stations including improving access, replace electronic information screens and working with authorities on the redevelopment of St Albans. Increase staffing hours at many stations, with the 100 busiest stations staffed from first to last train, extension of the key smartcard which Southern has been introducing
8.
London Bridge station
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The main line station is the oldest railway station in London fare zone 1 and one of the oldest in the world having opened in 1836. It is one of two main line termini in London to the south of the River Thames, the other being Waterloo. Historically, trains from Cannon Street and Thameslink services from Bedford to Brighton also called at the station, in terms of passenger arrivals and departures it is the fourth-busiest station in London as well as the United Kingdom as a whole, handling over 54 million customers a year. The main line station is one of 19 UK stations managed by Network Rail, the Underground station is served by the Jubilee line and the Bank branch of the Northern line. It consists of a hall and entrance area with its main frontage on Tooley Street, along with entrances on Borough High Street. London Bridge station was opened as the London station on 14 December 1836 south of the River Thames in Tooley Street, making it the first and oldest of the current London railway termini. It was not the earliest station in the present London metropolitan area, as the London and Greenwich Railway opened stations first at Spa Road, delays in the completion of a bridge at Bermondsey Street postponed the opening of the line into London Bridge station until December. This meant that from 10 October 1836 trains were able to operate as far as the east end of Bermondsey Street bridge, since then the station has had a most complex history, involving frequent rebuilding and changes of ownership. The original station was 60 ft wide and 400 ft long and it was later covered with a wooden trussed pitched roof,56 ft by 212 ft, shortly after opening. Sixteen columns and fourteen beams from this structure were retrieved in 2013, thus these two railways were required to share the route of the London and Croydon Railway from near Norwood. As a result, in 1838 the London and Croydon Railway obtained powers to enlarge the station it was constructing at London Bridge. The directors of the companies involved therefore decided to exchange the station sites, plans for a large new station were drawn up, designed jointly by Lewis Cubitt, John Urpeth Rastrick and Henry Roberts. Drawings were published in the Illustrated London News and George Bradshaws Guide to the London and Brighton Railway 1844 and they show a quasi-Italianate building with a picturesque campanile. This line opened in 1844 and most of the services from two companies were withdrawn from London Bridge, leaving only the Greenwich and Brighton companies using London Bridge station. The following year the Croydon and Brighton companies merged with others to form the London Brighton, as a result of these amalgamations, there were now only two companies wishing to use the two adjoining stations at London Bridge. As a result, the LB&SCR used the joint station until 1849. The SER took over the second London and Greenwich station and sought to develop that site rather than continue to invest in the joint station. The SER station was rebuilt and enlarged between 1847 and 1850, to a design by Samuel Beazley
9.
London Victoria station
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Victoria station is a central London railway terminus and connected London Underground station in Victoria, in the City of Westminster. It is near to Victoria Street, which along with the area and it is in Travelcard Zone 1. From the main lines, trains can connect to the Catford Loop Line, Dartford Loop Line, Southern operates the majority of commuter and regional services to south London, Sussex and parts of east Surrey, while Southeastern operates trains to south east London and Kent. Gatwick Express trains run direct from Victoria to Gatwick Airport, the Underground station is on the Circle and District lines between Sloane Square and St. Jamess Park, and the Victoria line between Pimlico and Green Park. With over 81 million passenger entries and exits in 2015/16, Victoria is the second-busiest station in London after Waterloo, combined with the Underground Station and interchanges in the national rail station, London Victoria handled about 170 million passengers in the 2015/2016 period. It is one of 19 stations managed by Network Rail, the area around the station is an important interchange for other forms of transport, a local bus station is in the forecourt and Victoria Coach Station is nearby. Victoria Station came about in a fashion to help address this problem for the London Brighton and South Coast Railway. It consisted of two adjacent main line railway stations which, from the viewpoint of passengers, were unconnected, the London and Brighton Railway terminus at London Bridge provided reasonable access to the City of London but was most inconvenient for travellers to and from Westminster. As early as 1842 John Urpeth Rastrick had proposed that the railway should build a branch to serve the West End, but his proposal came to nothing. During the summer of 1857 a scheme for an independent Grosvenor Basin Terminus in the West End of London, the station was originally referred to as the Grosvenor Terminus but later renamed Victoria as it was sited at the end of Victoria Street. Three other railway companies were seeking a terminus in Westminster, the Great Western, the London & North Western. The first two already had access to Battersea through their joint ownership of the West London Line with the LB&SCR. The new line followed part of the route of the Grosvenor Canal with Victoria station on the canal basin. It required the construction of a new bridge over the Thames, originally known as Victoria Bridge and it was of mixed gauge to cater for GWR trains. The LB&SCR had hoped to amalgamate with the VS&PR, and introduced a Parliamentary Bill to allow it to do so in 1860 and this was opposed by the GWR and LC&DR and rejected. By way of compromise the LB&SCR was permitted to lease Victoria station from the VS&PR, Victoria station proved to be unexpectedly popular for both the main companies, and by 1862 there were frequent delays due to congestion at Stewarts Lane Junction. In March 1863 the LB&SCR and the LC&DR jointly funded a new route into Victoria, avoiding Stewarts Lane. The work was completed during 1867/8, the LB&SCR side of Victoria station opened on 1 October 1860, the temporary terminus in Battersea having closed the day before
10.
Crystal Palace railway station
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Crystal Palace is a Network Rail and London Overground station in the London Borough of Bromley in south London. It is located in the Anerley area between the centres of Crystal Palace and Penge. It is one of two built to serve the site of the 1851 exhibition building, the Crystal Palace. The station was opened on 10 June 1854 by the West End of London and it was formerly known as Crystal Palace to differentiate it from the nearby and now demolished Crystal Palace railway station. The station serves trains running between London Bridge and London Victoria in addition to services terminating at Beckenham Junction and Sutton, since 23 May 2010, the station has also been a terminus of the East London Line of the London Overground. This has been the catalyst for plans for a redevelopment of the station. From the outset trains were operated by the London, Brighton, initially the station was the terminus of a spur line from Sydenham. In 1856 the station was able to take through train services to Wandsworth via West Norwood and Streatham Hill, in 1857, an eastward connection was made to Norwood Junction and in 1858 the WEL&CPR was extended as far as Beckenham. From 1860 direct services were extended to London Victoria and this is a description of the station trainshed roof above the staircases at the west end. Originally the whole length of the platforms beyond the bottom of the staircases was covered by an elegant dual bow-spring arch iron roof. This was removed as a precautionary measure shortly after the collapse of the structure at Charing Cross in 1905. He envisaged the construction of a tunnel which would run from Crystal Palace to Cricklewood in north-west London and it was to be operated with an unusual monorail system patented by Kearney which would be powered by gravity, like a type of underground roller coaster. Kearney failed to support for his scheme and the line was never built. The line was electrified between Balham and Crystal Palace on 12 May 1911, using the LBSCR overhead system, in time for the Festival of Empire coinciding with the coronation of King George V. Electric trains from Victoria were advertised to complete the journey in fifteen minutes - a running time that has never been equalled. The station is built on the junction of two lines, the station platforms lying on the Sydenham route, and the later platforms on the southern spur to Norwood Junction. The southern platforms became the pair and the entrance to the station was moved to the south side of the building in the 1980s. A glazed ticket hall, which echoed the profile of the Crystal Palace with its roof structure, was constructed at this time on the southern flank of the Victorian building
11.
East London Line
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The East London Line is part of the London Overground, running north to south through the East End, Docklands and South areas of London. It was previously a line of the London Underground, built in 1869 by the East London Railway Company, which reused the Thames Tunnel intended for horse-drawn carriages, the line became part of the London Underground network in 1933. After nearly 75 years as part of the Underground network, it closed in December 2007 for a refurbishment and expansion. Phase 2, which links the line to the South London Line with a terminus at Clapham Junction, opened on 9 December 2012, the latter two operated what are now the Metropolitan, Circle, District and Hammersmith & City lines of the London Underground. The incorporation of the ELR took place on 26 May 1865 with the aim of providing a link between the LB&SCR, GER and SER lines, the companies reused the Thames Tunnel, built by Marc and Isambard Kingdom Brunel between 1825 and 1843 for horse-drawn carriages. The tunnel had generous headroom and two carriageways separated by arches, despite being used by pedestrians. It connected Wapping on the bank of the Thames with Rotherhithe on the south bank. A triumph of engineering, it was a commercial failure and by the 1860s it had become an unpleasant. The tunnel was the most easterly land connection between the north and south banks of the Thames, close to the docks on both banks of the river and was not far from mainline railways at either end. Converting the tunnel to a railway thus offered a means of providing a cross-Thames rail link without having to go to the expense of boring a new tunnel. On 25 September 1865 the East London Railway Company took ownership of the tunnel at a cost of £800,000, over the next four years the company built a railway through the tunnel to connect with existing railway lines. The companys engineer was Sir John Hawkshaw, who was responsible for the major re-design. 13 March 1871, A spur opened from just south of what is now Surrey Quays station to the South London Lines Old Kent Road station, Passenger services were withdrawn from 1 June 1911 and freight last used the line in 1964, the track was subsequently removed. This alignment was relaid and restored to service by London Overground in late 2012. 10 April 1876, Wapping to Shoreditch, through a tunnel constructed in part along the bottom of an infilled dock. At Shoreditch a connection was made with the Great Eastern Railway to Liverpool Street, intermediate stations were at Shadwell and Whitechapel. 1 April 1880, A spur to New Cross opened,3 March 1884, A spur to the Metropolitan and Metropolitan District Railways opened south of Whitechapel using St Marys Curve. This enabled Metropolitan Railway and Metropolitan District Railway trains to commence services to the East London Railway later that year
12.
Crystal Palace Dinosaurs
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The Crystal Palace Dinosaurs, also known as Dinosaur Court, are a series of sculptures of extinct animals and mammals in Crystal Palace Park, now in the London borough of Bromley. The models were classed as Grade II listed buildings from 1973, extensively restored in 2002, the models represent fifteen genera of extinct animals, not all dinosaurs. They are from a range of geological ages, and include true dinosaurs, ichthyosaurs, and plesiosaurs mainly from the Mesozoic era. The grounds that surrounded it were extensively renovated and turned into a public park with ornamental gardens, replicas of statues. As part of renovation, Benjamin Waterhouse Hawkins was commissioned to build the first-ever life-sized models of extinct animals. Hawkins set up a workshop on site at the park and built the models there, the models were displayed on three islands acting as a rough timeline, the first island for the Paleozoic era, a second for the Mesozoic, and a third for the Cenozoic. The models were given more realism by making the level in the lake rise and fall. To mark the launch of the models, Hawkins held a dinner on New Years Eve 1853 inside the mould of one of the Iguanodon models. Hawkins benefited greatly from the reaction to the dinosaurs, which was so strong it allowed for the sale of sets of small versions of the dinosaur models. But the building of the models was costly and in 1855, several planned models were never made, while those half finished were scrapped, despite protest from sources including the Sunday newspaper, The Observer. With progress in palaeontology, the reputation of the models declined, in 1895, the American fossil hunter Othniel Charles Marsh scorned the dinosaurs friends as doing them a great injustice, and spoke angrily of the models. The models and the fell into disrepair as the years went by, a process aided by the fire that destroyed the Crystal Palace itself in 1936. A full restoration of the animals was carried out in 1952 by Victor H. C, martin, at which time the mammals on the third island were moved to less well-protected locations in the park, where they were exposed to wear and tear. The limestone cliff was blown up in the 1960s, in 2002, the display was totally renovated. Fibreglass replacements were created for the sculptures, and badly damaged parts of the surviving models were recast. For example, some of the legs had been modelled in lead, fixed to the bodies with iron rods. The models and other elements of Crystal Palace Park were classed as Grade II listed buildings from 1973, the models were extensively restored in 2002, and upgraded to Grade I listed in 2007. Fifteen genera of animals, not all dinosaurs, are represented in the park
0.506 million[2]
0.520 million[2]
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