How much of The Underground have you used?

With over 50 years of travelling but without any deliberate track bashing I have travelled over most of the underground but not to the extremity of every line. I think that I have managed the District and Central from end to end and all of the current Met except between Croxley and Watford. I never managed the GN&C in it's Underground guise but have ridden what my ex wife described, after one BR livery change, as an "inter city tube train".

Not Underground but I am please to have managed North London Line both from Broad Street and Stratford and the combined T&HJ / T&FG from both Kentish Town and Gospel Oak.

Are members of the public allowed to travel on the Kennington loop? Or if you try and stay on a terminating train are you asked to get off?

Well the Kennington loop is a reversing loop easily visible on the carto.metro map. It runs from platform 2 (southbound Charing Cross branch plaform) to platform 1 (northbound Charing Cross branch platform) passing underneath the lines to Morden.

In this way, it allows Charing Cross branch trains to reverse without crossing the Morden or Bank branches on the flat, bearing in mind that the inner two platforms from Elephant and Castle and towards Oval had existed on the C&SLR for some time and the extension of the Hampstead line came later. When it came the Hampstead line (now the Charing Cross branch) flanked the existing lines, with cross platform interchange provided in both directions. The diagram at carto.metro will make all of this a lot clearer.

It also allows for a nice fast turnaround - no need to change direction or anything - and there's space in the loop to hold trains to time and to actually put three trains for as long as necessary. Hence you can also build in some recovery time into your timetable.

The significance of it is that it's obviously a bit of a secret extra, since you'd normally get off at Kennington southbound and almost nobody will want to sit on the train for another, say, 3-5 minutes just to get to Kennington northbound.


The loop is up to passenger standard and used to have colour light signals back in the old days, so it's safe for passengers to ride a train round the loop and does not count as a carry over.

Obviously, most people do not want to go around the loop and it can be a bit of a problem for the worse for wear who may find themselves extremely confused to leave Kennington only to arrive back at Kennington. I also believe I've heard a story of a staff member being assaulted in the loop by an angry drunk, but that might have been somewhere else.

This being the case, it's rare for more than an announcement that the train is terminating to be made, but staff could easily come over and tell you that the train is now out of service and direct you onwards. If you are asked to leave a train by a member of staff, you must comply.

One thing to bear in mind is that, as I say, the loop can be used during service disruption to stable trains and if you go for a ride around the loop, you could be there for a long long time and as passengers aren't generally on those trains, getting trains out of the Kennington loop will not be a priority.

Another thing to point out is that it's also possible to go from the southbound Charing Cross branch platform at Kennington into the Kennington reversing siding, for train stabling or to reverse. This is not a passenger move and you'd rather not be on a train that does that. In that case, though, I would expect the train to be tipped out carriage by carriage by staff.

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At Watford you have the Watford triangle. North of Moor Park, you have a junction - Watford South Junction - where the line towards Croxley branches off from the line towards Rickmansworth (see carto.metro).

The line towards Croxley takes what is called the Watford South Curve and then meets up at Watford East Junction with the Watford North Curve.

The Watford North Curve is a link between Rickmansworth and Croxley allowing trains to run from Rickmansworth on to Watford. It branches off from the main line towards Watford South Junction and Moor Park at Watford North Junction.

Obviously, this is not generally used. I believe it sees use very early in the morning by passenger trains and empty trains. And late at night as well. But usually it's Rickmansworth to Moor Park. Croxley to Moor Park. Moor Park to Rickmansworth or Croxley. Rickmansworth to Croxley and Croxley to Rickmansworth are rare. Generally, if you wanna ride over it, engineering work is your best bet. When I rode it, they were running trains: Amersham(I believe) to Watford to Northwood and back. Trains may also have been running from Chesham to Watford.

Theoretically, yes, because it is a colour light move. No idea what would happen if when asked to leave by a member of staff, you refused. Of course, with my mod hat on, we would always ask that passengers follow instructions from staff.

St Mary's curve: the original extension of the District through Aldgate connected up with the East London line just south of its Whitechapel station. Later on , the Whitechapel & Bow line branched off the District just west of the junction with the ELL (hence the kink entering the high level station at Whitechapel), leaving the connection to the ELL as a spur. This spur remained in use for empty stock movements for many years, but closed when the ELL was converted from 4rail to 3rail as part of the Overground.

Going off topic open air gigs are being run at the Dalston Eastern Curve gardens every Tuesday this summer.

LU - everything except the West Ruislip branch of the Central, and Barking - Upminster.

Overground, only covered Richmond - Stratford, Gospel Oak - Haringey and the ELL.

Agree with a previous poster that research can help and it is easy to do a trip to the suburbs as a round trip taking in two termini! For example going to Cockfosters, catch a service 384 bus to High Barnet, stop for lunch somewhere along the way.

@geofftech and the Londonist team have ridden the Kennington loop, apparently they also produce a T-Shirt:


Of course, if you are asked to alight, you must.

I can't provide any evidence for this, however I seem to recall it was used in passenger service for the odd football special train from Surrey Quays (for Millwall) through to at least Aldgate East or beyond. Presume this was during 1980s or early 1990s.

The only bits I haven't done are non passenger carrying sidings, crossovers, depots etc Did Watford Junction and the ELL on 38 stock, Epping - Ongar, and done every move possible on the Vic and the Northern including the ground frame crossover at Totteridge!

From Connor & Butler's Abandoned Stations of London Underground, A Photographic Record by JE Connor:

sarfacton


Could indeed be one-man oppo, but not as we know it, Jim-looks like a lady guard there to me.


No sign of a mildly-surprised bicycle this time, though.

The second man was definitely a man but whether he was a guard or merely the driver's helpful friend is something that at the age of 10 I wouldn't have been able to tell...

Difficult to be 100% sure, but it looks like a Guard's bag perched on that seat, with the lady hovering over it.

Unfortunately, my ex-NUR & ASLEF friends don't go back as far as 1959 in personal experience of union matters. But the consensus this morning was that one-man operation, even on the Tea Run, would never have been contemplated, simply because it would have given LT management the key to pursuing that agenda elsewhere on the Underground. There's three staff members in the pic & even South Acton station wouldn't have needed more than one, so that suggests the driver & guard are present in the shot.

The consensus re female guards was that, in those days, women generally were not expected to have a career progression and that, as the decision-makers regarding who became a driver were all men, there could have been women guards. The point was also made that women taking men's jobs whilst WW2 was on were not as peremptorily sent back to the kitchen-sink with a nice thank you letter as they were after WW1 & that may very well be pertinent.



Being three and a bit years younger than you, I remember at that time being confused as to whether a spokesman was the same as a nightwatchman, and sat around Parliament or Whitehall with a brazier outside his little wooden sentry hut, and more pertinently, why Fishermen had friends & what that job entailed.

I've done all the underground, including numerous cab rides (most memorable in a battery loco from Earls court to Ealing Common and through the thames tunnel when the east London line was around), Ruislip depot, Stratford Market depot, Wood green siding and down street siding (of what I remember off the top of my head; the latter four being on foot). I've also walked around the Kennington loop so I guess that also counts