North and South Western Junction Railway: Difference between revisions
Afterbrunel (talk | contribs) Minor corrections |
Afterbrunel (talk | contribs) Typo |
||
| Line 36: | Line 36: | ||
Continuing to enter territory that the LSWR considered its own, the N&SWJR got authority to make a branch to the developing rural town of Hammersmith; the line opened to goods trains on 1 May 1857, and to passengers the following year.<ref name = williams6/> |
Continuing to enter territory that the LSWR considered its own, the N&SWJR got authority to make a branch to the developing rural town of Hammersmith; the line opened to goods trains on 1 May 1857, and to passengers the following year.<ref name = williams6/> |
||
However the branch was not commercially successful; the junction with the N&SWJR main line faced away from London and made business journeys to London inconvenient: the first station off the branch was Kew. When the [[Metropolitan Railway#Hammersmith & City Railway|Hammersmith & City Railway opened in 1864, it provided faster services to Central London from a more convenient Hammersmith location, and the N&SWJR branch suffered. |
However the branch was not commercially successful; the junction with the N&SWJR main line faced away from London and made business journeys to London inconvenient: the first station off the branch was Kew. When the [[Metropolitan Railway#Hammersmith & City Railway|Hammersmith & City Railway]] opened in 1864, it provided faster services to Central London from a more convenient Hammersmith location, and the N&SWJR branch suffered. |
||
Revision as of 17:26, 24 August 2013
| Overview | |
|---|---|
| Locale | London, England |
| Dates of operation | 1853–1871 |
| Successor | Joint ownership: London and North Western Railway, Midland Railway, North London Railway |
The North and South Western Junction Railway (NSWJR) was a short railway in west London, England. It opened in 1853, connecting Willesden on the London and North Western Railway (LNWR) with Brentford on the London and South Western Railway (LSWR). After a difficult start it became an important freight route and that usage continues today. A passenger service linked LSWR stations with the North London Railway, and a branch was built to Hammersmith.
Today the part of the original main line between South Acton Junction and a point near Willesden Junction carries the heavily used Richmond to Stratford passenger service, and the whole of the main line remains as an important freight connection, but the Hammersmith branch has closed and no regular passenger service remains on the main line.
Main line
The proximity of the unconnected LNWR amd LSWR railways immediately west of London led to a number of failed schemes, until in 1851 the North and South Western Junction Railway (N&SWJR) obtained its authorising Act for a 4½ mile line[note 1] from Willesden (N&SW Junction, near West London Junction), to Brentford (actually Kew Junction, later renamed Old Kew Junction).[1][2]
The little company had understood that the line would be worked by the LSWR and the London & North Western Railway (LNWR) jointly, but when the line was complete, those companies were reluctant to provide train services. Williams suggests that this was to protect existing road cartage business across London. A goods service was started on 15 February 1853, nine months after being passed as fit by the Board of Trade Inspector. Passenger traffic started on 1 August 1853: four North London Railway trains daily ran from Hampstead Road (with a connection there from Fenchurch Street) to Kew; the N&SWJR had its own station there just short of the LSWR line—a temporary platform at first; there was an intermediate station at Acton.[2][3][4]
Disregarding the hostility of the LSWR, the N&SWJR pressed to run through to Windsor, and three additional trains ran from Hampstead Road to Windsor started on 1 June 1854; the journey time from Fenchurch Street, changing at Hampstead Road, was two hours. The service lasted until October 1854 only.
A Hammersmith branch opens
Continuing to enter territory that the LSWR considered its own, the N&SWJR got authority to make a branch to the developing rural town of Hammersmith; the line opened to goods trains on 1 May 1857, and to passengers the following year.[2]
However the branch was not commercially successful; the junction with the N&SWJR main line faced away from London and made business journeys to London inconvenient: the first station off the branch was Kew. When the Hammersmith & City Railway opened in 1864, it provided faster services to Central London from a more convenient Hammersmith location, and the N&SWJR branch suffered.
Goods traffic too was handled more conveniently at locations on other lines. In an attempt to staunch the loss of business, the N&SWJR opened a new station at South Acton in 1880, renaming the Hammersmith station Hammersmith & Chiswick. The South Acton station had a bay for the branch line. The Richmond line generated a more frequent train service on what is now the North London Line. Acton and South Acton, and the earlier Kew, were the only stations on the N&SWJR.
As street tramways flourished, the owners of the N&SWJR responded by opening three new halts on the branch, at Bath Road, Woodstock Road and Rugby Road. New low cost passenger vehicles with a self-contained steam engine unit, called railmotors, were intorduced in an attempt to increase passenger convenience and reduce cost. However the competitive transport methods intensified and the branch was hopelessly uneconomic. The passenger service was withdrawn on 1 January 1917. Goods trains continued to serve a coal depot and asphalt plant at Hammersmith until 3 May 1965, when the branch finally closed.
Serving Richmond
Turning up the heat even further, the N&SWJR flirted with the idea of an extension to Richmond, and this gained considerable support but failed in Parliament. Feeling itself under pressure, the LSWR arranged with the N&SWJR to run a Twickenham - Richmond - Hampstead Road service, reversing at Barnes and again at Kew; some LSWR coaches apparently worked through to Fenchurch Street. The service started on 20 May 1858.
The two reversals were obviously extremely inconvenient, and the LSWR, warming to the N&SWJR, obtained powers to build an east curve at Kew and a west curve at Barnes; they opened on 1 February 1862. Williams points out that the passenger timings hardly improved, the Kew Junction to Richmond times reducing from 19 minutes to 16 minutes.[2] At the same time, some passenger trains continued to call at the original N&SWJR station at Kew until October 1866.[5]
The original junction with the LSWR had been Kew Junction, and it was now renamed Old Kew Junction, with the new east-facing junction being New Kew Junction. The LSWR had its Kew station just west of the point of junction, and it built adjacent platforms on the new curve. (Kew station was later renamed Kew Bridge.)[3][5]
Train services
After opening in 1853 the main line was operated by the North London Railway (NLR). From 1865 Broad Street in the City of London was the most important passenger station connected to the line. From 1864 some trains went on to Kingston. The line between Willesden and Richmond carried services to and from Broad Street and was used by other companies serving Richmond. In 1869 the LSWR opened the direct connecting line from South Acton to Richmond via Gunnersbury and services west beyond Richmond ceased.
From 1868
In 1868 Kew station (LSWR) was renamed Kew Bridge, and the following year the LSWR opened a line from Richmond through Gunnersbury (at first called "Brentford Road") passing Turnham Green and Hammersmith. This gave a considerable boost to Richmond traffic, which was carried over the N&SWJR between Acton Junction (at the site of the later South Acton station) and Old Oak Junction, where the Hampstead Junction Railway connected.
The N&SWJR had been worked by the North London Railway, the Midland Railway and the LNWR jointly since its beginning. In 1871 the line was taken over by those companies jointly.
In 1874 the Metropolitan District Railway ran through trains along the LSWR alignment to the West End of London and the City. The LSWR 1869 opening included a fork from Brentford Road to Acton Junction, at the site of the present day South Acton station.[6]
The LNWR electrified the lines to both Richmond and Kew Bridge in 1916 on the 4th rail DC system. This provided a more frequent and pleasanter travel experience and was very successful.
The passenger service to Kew Bridge ended in 1940. After Broad Street closed in 1986 the N&SWJR line carried North London Line services between Richmond and North Woolwich in east London.
In June 2013, the Mayor of London and the London Boroughs of Brent, Ealing and Hammersmith & Fulham released 'vision' consultation documents[7] about the Old Oak Common area of west London. This involves a major development area for London, based around a new Old Oak Common railway station for High Speed 2 and Great Western Main Line, including Crossrail.
The vision mentions a new branch of the Transport for London London Overground system, connecting Old Oak to Hounslow, via Kew Bridge.
Death of an anarchist
On 23 December 1895 the Russian exile and anarchist Sergey Stepnyak-Kravchinsky (usually known as Stepniak) was killed by a train on the Hammersmith branch at Woodstock Road; there was a pedestrian crossing there, and the site later became the Woodstock Road station. He was walking from his house in Woodstock Road to resume a conference in Shepherds Bush, a moderately short walk. Climbing the stile at the crossing, he seems not to have heard the approaching North London Railway passenger train, and he was run over by it and died of injuries. The following day the Times newspaper[8] reported
The accident took place between 10 and 11 o’clock in the morning at a point about three-quarters of a mile north of the Hammersmith and Chiswick terminus of [the N&SWJR]. M. Stepniak left his house in Woodstock-road, Beford-park in order to resume a conference ... with a number of his associates in Russian propaganda work at the house of his chief colleague, M. Felix Volkhovsky. M. Volkhovsky lives in Shepherd’s-bush, a walk of only a few minutes from Bedford-park. Woodstock-road runs northward to the railway, and crosses it at a level crossing. M. Stepniak ... was caught by the engine of a train which was travelling in the direction of Acton, knocked on to the line, and dragged some yards along it. When the train was stopped the body was found to be very much mutilated.
It is stated that the driver noticed a man on the rails, and blew his whistle, but M. Stepniak, whether he heard it or not, took no notice of the warning.
Garnett claims a plausible 28 mph for the train speed.[9]
The inquest found accidental death; the evidence added some minor details: the train left Chiswick for Acton at 10.20. The driver was a North London Railway man. In evidence, the Traffic Superintendent of the NLR said that the line was leased from the original N&SWJR by a joint committee of the Midland, LNW and North London Railways, and was worked by the NLR.[10]
Many books of recollections misreport several details: several state that the accident took place at the Bath Road level crossing; Reid,[11] claiming that Stepniak was visiting Lucien Pissarro, son of the painter, even includes a photograph of the crossing, but it was gated and staffed at the time, and there was a footbridge.[note 2]
These errors are repeated anecdotally by Hermynia zur Mühlen[12] and several other derivative works.
Notes
- ^ The actual route length now is from 0 m 00 ch at Willesden to "Route Boundary" at Kew Old Jn, at 3 m 39 ch according to the Kent Wessex Sussex Sectional Appendix, 2009, issued by Network Rail; "Route Boundary" may be a few chains short of the actual point of junction; Williams (p 176) says 3 miles 5 furlongs, i.e. 3 m 50 ch, which seems right; the authorising Act may have included sidings at Willesden.
- ^ Clearly visible on large scale Ordnance Survey maps of the time; part of the footbridge appears in one of Pissarro Senior's paintings, reproduced in Reid's book.
References
- ^ E F Carter, An Historical Geography of the Railways of the British Isles, Cassell, London, 1959
- ^ a b c d R A Williams, The London & South Western Railway, Volume 1: The Formative Years, David & Charles, Newton Abbot, 1968, ISBN 0-7153-4188-X, Chapter 6
- ^ a b Joe Brown, London Railway Atlas, second edition, 2010, Ian Allan Publishing Ltd, Hersham, ISBN 978 0 7110 3397 9
- ^ H P White, A Regional History of the Railways of Great Britain. Volume 3 - Greater London, David and Charles (Publishers) Limited, Newton Abbot, 1971, ISBN 0-7153-5337-3
- ^ a b Vic Mitchell and Keith Smith, Kingston and Hounslow Loops including the Shepperton Branch, Middleton Press, Midhurst, 1990, ISBN 0 906520 83 5
- ^ Col M H Cobb, The Railways of Great Britain -- A Historical Atlas, Ian Allan Publishing Limited, Shepperton, 2003, ISBN 07110 3003 0
- ^ Vision for Old Oak Consultation
- ^ The Times newspaper, 24 December 1895; original orthography maintained
- ^ Olive Garnett and Barry Cornish Johnson, Olive & Stepniak: the Bloomsbury diary of Olive Garnett 1893-1895, p 240, Bartletts Press, 1993, Birmingham, 1993
- ^ The Times newspaper, 27 December 1895
- ^ Nicholas Reid, Pissarro in West London, Lilburne Press, Folkestone, 1997, ISBN 978-1901167023
- ^ Hermynia zur Mühlen, The End and the Beginning: The Book of My Life, page 250, Open Book Publishers, Cambridge, 2010, ISBN 978-1-906924-28-7
The N&SWJR Hammersmith station is described on the Disused Stations website at [1]