BR Connections to the Central Line

The connection just south of Leyton went in the 70's,it was used to transfer the first units of 67TS to Northumberland Pk in the late 60's.

Is the trackmap of Newbury Park showing the connection from Ilford online still please?

There were originally five connections with BR on the Central line, one at Greenford, one at WEst Ruislip, one at Ealing Broadway, one at Temple Mills Stratford and one at Newbury Park.

The West Ruislip and Greenford connections were removed when the Central line was extended to West Ruislip in 1948/49.

I am not entirely sure when the Ealing Broadway connection was removed, but was probably removed during one of the Paddington approach remodellings.

As I have said in other discussions, the Temple Mills connection was removed at the beginning of 1972, having last been used by regular passenger trains in November or December 1971. The Newbury Park Triangle, linking with the GE mainline at where the site of Ilford depot is today, was opened in 1903 and closed when Ilford depot was constructed in 1959. This also spelt the end of freight on the Central line, the last goods trains running in 1965/6. To answer your final point, 315s never ran over this section. Old as they look, smell, feel etc, they were only introduced in 1978/9.

I have not come across any evidence of any connection between the GWR (and British Railways) to the Underground at Greenford. connection with the bay platform is I think 'LUL bay Junction', and there never has been any connection into Greenford South or West Junctions.

Checking R A Cooke's Atlas of the GWR 1947 (as at 31 December), it shows: Then future link at W Ruislip; no link at Greenford (then Central Line terminus); removed links at North Acton; Ealing Broadway (note: junction removed 1945) and Wood Lane Jn (where the Central line tracks cross over).

It also notes that beyond White City the Central Line was not LPTB property: from there to Ealing Broadway was Ealing and Shepherds Bush ('built by GWR'); North Acton to Greenford opened by GWR 30 June 1947: both transferred to LPTB 1.1.1948 (sic - it was the LTE from that date)

The questioner mentions dmus. Were these ever used on this line? It seems unlikely as it was electrified to Epping in 1946, and the non-electrified shuttle to Ongar continued to use steam right up until electrification in 1957.



Being eight years too late to use the connection was not the only difficulty the ac-only 315s would have had on this line!
The original question was about J15s, not 315s!
tbn3.google.com/images?q=tbn:QJknNtZbS7_7SM:http://www.lner.info/locos/J/j15.jpg

The J15 has a tender. Tank engines, particularly F5 2-4-2Ts, were more common on the Ongar line in the last days of steam.

DMUs were used by BR on the eastern central till the 70's High density units; maybe class 125s? Ive certainly seen a picture of a DMU displaying the destination 'EPPING'. Presumably there were silver tubes at Leytonstone and Temple Mills?

Locos used on the City Widened Lines had to be trip-cock fitted OR double-manned. BR Sectional appendixes and "working over" books referred to this IIRC. There was a trip cock tester at Kings Cross York Road platform and it was the secondman's job on class 31s to reset the trip if the light didn't go out. It was virtually unknown in diesel days for a non-tripcock loco or DMU to be allowed on the widened lines.

I remember seeing 31s on freight trains on the east end of the Central into the mid 1960's. These would have come via the connection at Leytonstone. I'm sure there was also a mercury tube fitted to put signals back to danger should a BR train try to go down the hole!

DMUs certainly ran to Ongar. The Finsbury Park fleet had Ongar on the blinds. IIRC, there were early morning journeys from Liverpool Street BR to Ongar. I've never actually seen one there, but they were shown on the public timetables.

Remember too the BR/Central connection at White City mentioned above. This was latterly used by the daily Truro-White City milk train which also ran on Boxing Day! This connection was lifted when they built Westway, about 1969.