Wimbleware

Well colour me embarrassed - in fact I blush at telling you this story, but here goes.

(Sorry this is a little late, my District line discussion got very out of hand and I didn't finish, so - to clarify - this is Monday's post :P)

I woke up with my alarm this morning and was out of bed quite promptly. I don't know what it is, but I've not been in the best of moods this weekend and you know what - I just didn't feel up to my Hindi lecture this morning, so I pretty much decided to give it a miss. So I set about my business in a fairly slow and lethargic manner - after indulging my cats for a good while - and the time when I needed to leave the house came and went. Still, I'd initially decided just to take my time a bit and laze around, essentially, but I was still gonna make it in for the tutorial and Sanskrit. But then I thought - well, if I'm missing the Hindi lecture, I may as well miss the Hindi tutorial too. In for a penny, in for a pound and all that.

However, I was definitely gonna go to Sanskrit - that was going to happen. Sanskrit is at 15:00 on Mondays - there was plenty of time for me to be as much of a lazy bum as I liked and I could still make it no problem. Unfortunately, I can be a bit of a creature of habit, really, and auto-pilot rather kicked in. By now, I'm used to going to class for 16:00 on Thursdays and I guess the afternoon timetable just got loaded into my brain. As a result, I left "nice and early" at 14:45, or so (which would be easily early enough to make the 14:54 and get in to class for 16:00) - feeling pleased with myself that I had timed it so well (a 4-6 minute wait I think it must have been). I changed at WOO for a nice, prompt NOR service and enjoyed a smooth journey in to LIS. Only when I was on the escalators at LIS did my brain finally think - wait a minute - have we got this right? We hadn't, obviously - it was something like 15:25.

So what's a man to do? I toyed with the idea of rocking up very late and coming up with some excuse, but at the end of the day I didn't really want to go and, hey, no point having the worst of both worlds. Half of me wanted to just turn back, but what would have been the point of that? (And besides, my mother knows I'm meant to be back late on Mondays and that would have led to awkward questions.) So I came up with a marvellous plan.

Now, as I understand it, way back on Friday 07/02/2014 - when I was running around on the H&C in a C stock - the first S7 did a training run in passenger service on the Wimbledon branch of the District line. There had been a good number of training runs out of service, but for the first time passengers on the Wimbledon branch could board an S7. I think one of them did a few High Street Kensington - Wimbledon trips and one of them ran from Barking to Wimbledon and back (in fact, I think I saw it at Barking). I think an S7 may have done the whole Wimbledon - Edgware Road branch on Saturday (and possibly before) as well. This then became a regular thing, with one S7 being used regularly on the branch after that (one out of the eight trains used, I think). Then, yesterday, we moved up to four of the trains being operated by S7s and the rest by C stock (and, obviously, D stock from the city to Wimbledon). This is how it's expected to remain until enough District line T/Ops are trained on the S stock.

So, anyway, I thought to myself - why not have a look? So I got onto a Circle line train to Hammersmith and headed to Edgware Road. We had a bit of a wait at Baker Street (hardly the worst place in the world for it), while we were held to timetable and then we made Edgware Road and I was delighted (in luck this time) to see an S7 displaying District line to Edgware Road in the platform. I was even more delighted when I was able to get on it and set off on a lovely trip. And it is wonderful, it really is, on that branch, I could go up and down it all day long. I certainly approve of the S7s on that route, too, although I noticed the one I got on at Wimbledon (as there was another one already there, I thought I might as well take it, rather than waiting for mine to depart afterwards) didn't have the best PA in the world - although that might have been imperfect use of the handset, I don't know. It also announced, as we approached Edgware Road - I'm sure of it:

"The next station is Edgware Road, where this train terminates. Change here for the Central and Hammersmith & City lines."

Come again.

Anyway, in the end, I made it back home at pretty much the normal time. We were actually held for a while outside Edgware Road, due to a signal failure - as I later found out - outside Edgware Road. This meant we actually ended up on platform 2, which was the only platform that could be reached, as it turned out - something that took me by surprise at first :P (Platform 2 is normally used to terminate Circle line services, which then return to Hammersmith via High Street Kensington and Victoria (and, ultimately, Edgware Road :P)) Still, I changed at Edgware Road for a Circle line train that took me to LIS, where I just made it onto the GRH via WOO (without running, of course). I achieved this by filling up what I was sure was the last available space in the carriage, but the guy behind me thought otherwise. Made for a fairly cramped journey to BEG, especially as people hadn't removed their rucksacks. At BEG I was able to find myself a nice corner to stand in and things thinned out soon enough. Made it home, as I say, in good time.

Anyway, while I've got you - Wimbledon to Edgware Road, quite possibly the best branch in the world :P

My journey begins at one of my all time favourite stations - Edgware Road:

Edgware Road (Circle, District and Hammersmith & City lines) station. I believe this image was taken before the Circle line was extended to Hammersmith and it is my understanding that, at the very least, certain aspects of the signalling have changed since then, but this gives a good feel for the place. (Image courtesy "Sunil060902" (via Wikipedia))

A station which is as pretty, I think, as it is operationally interesting. Admittedly, the above picture doesn't begin to do it justice, but I think it shows off some of the nice points and Edgware Road is well worth a visit.

From the operational side of things, the track layout around Edgware Road looks like this:

A diagram showing the track layout around Edgware Road (Circle, District and Hammersmith & City lines) tube station. Because I have neither the will nor the way, signals have been left off this diagram

Because it would be much too difficult and ugly to include the colours of all three lines, I've just done it in yellow for the Circle line, since that is the one line which can use all of that track. To compensate, let me explain a few points.

As you can see, platforms 1, 2 & 3 are all accessible to eastbound trains from both Paddingtons, meaning eastbound trains from the direction of Hammersmith and from the direction of High Street Kensington can all use platforms 1, 2 & 3. As you can also see, it is possible to go eastbound to Baker Street from all three of these platforms.

Similarly, platforms 3 & 4 are both accessible to westbound trains from Baker Street. Additionally, again, you can go westbound from both of these platforms and from platform 2 and you can go to both Paddingtons. In other words, you can head down towards High Street Kensington or Hammersmith from all three platforms.

Also, platforms 2 & 3 can both be used to terminate trains from either direction and (as we saw above) trains can then proceed in either direction from these platforms. There is also a siding (26 road) and, doubtless, shunt signals at various locations permit shunting between platforms and various non-standard reversing moves.

What this means is that trains on the Circle, District and Hammersmith & City lines can all use all platforms. Naturally, however, District line trains do not head eastbound to Baker Street (and, of course, they cannot arrive westbound from Baker Street) and do not head to Paddington (Suburban) (i.e. towards Hammersmith) and nor can they arrive from there. Similarly, H&C line trains don't go to or from Paddington (Praed Street) (i.e. towards High Street Kensington). However, in reality, there's nothing to stop a Hammersmith & City line train being reformed into a Circle line train, since - operationally - they are essentially treated as one line. In times of real chaos, then, I do believe it's perfectly possible that an H&C line train could arrive at Edgware Road only to "become" a Circle line train and then get sent round the loop.

Which is all very well, however, the standard service pattern is shown in the following diagram which some of you may recognise from a previous post:

A diagram showing the standard, timetabled service pattern through Edgware Road (Circle, District and Hammersmith & City lines)

From Edgware Road, we head straight on at Praed Street Junction and arrive at the gorgeous Paddington (Praed Street), with its wonderful roof and beautiful architecture:

A picture showing as many of the sights as possible of Paddington (Bakerloo, Circle and District lines) (aka Paddington (Praed Street)) on the Circle and District line platforms. (Image courtesy Chris McKenna (via Wikipedia))

The next stop is Bayswater which, for me, is one of the my least favourite stations on the branch and it is still well-worth a visit in itself:

Bayswater courtesy "Sunil060902" (via Wikipedia)

Between Paddington and Bayswater is the famous 24 Leinster Gardens - a false façade (along with number 23). Numbers 23 and 24 are entirely fake houses, built solely to hide the unsightly gap that would have been left when the original houses were demolished to allow smoke from the tunnels (back when the railway was operated by steam locomotives) to be vented by condensers.

After Bayswater, we reach another station I've talked about before on this blog - Notting Hill Gate. This station has the most wonderful blend of old:

Notting Hill Gate, with its wonderful, Paddington-like roof still intact (Bayswater lost its) (Image courtesy "Sunil060902" (via Wikipedia))

And modern. There's some rather nice, white and black tiling - which I happen to quite like - further up the platform. Unfortunately, I can't find a decent picture, so you'll have take my word for it. Or go. I recommend going.

Then things get really good fun at High Street Kensington.

High Street Kensington station. (Image courtesy "Oxyman" (via Wikipedia))

As you can tell by the tube map, this is where the Circle and District lines diverge (or, in the other direction, converge). High Street Kensington is also generally used to terminate the Olympia shuttle, which - when it's running - usually runs Kensington (Olympia) - High Street Kensington - Kensington (Olympia) - High Street Kensington and so on and so on: every T/Op's favourite :P This service is mainly operated by D stock - which can't go any further - but is, on occasion, operated by C stock - which can go further, but probably don't do so very often. (Note it is also possible to route Olympia trains on to the city and route trains from the city to Kensington (Olympia).) It also makes for a useful reversing point in general - with two bay platforms - and can be used to terminate trains at any time of day. This would mainly be done during service disruption, but I believe the bay platforms see plenty of use at the start and close of traffic.

High Street Kensington forms one point of a large, rough triangle, consisting of Earl's Court, High Street Kensington and Gloucester Road:

A diagram of the track layout around High Street Kensington showing also the triangle formed by High Street Kensington, Gloucester Road and Earl's Court

You can see the 5 roads of the "Triangle Sidings" (and one extra road used by battery locos) which are used to stable C stock trains. Sadly these sidings are very short - too short even for D stock trains - and it seems unlikely that they'll be usable for very much longer. For now, however, they form an important stabling point for trains on the "Wimbleware" and can also be used as a convenient reversing point if necessary (particularly by Circle line trains, although this is not shown on the diagram).

You can also see that Wimbleware trains and trains operating the Olympia service leave Earl's Court and travel via the "west curve", past the Triangle Sidings (which is always fun). They can then reach the two bay platforms and eastbound platform 2.

Additionally, trains from all four platforms can travel via the west curve to Earl's Court. This is the route normally taken by District line trains.

Another thing to point out is that trains from the Triangle Sidings can reach all four platforms and the Triangle Sidings can be reached from all four platforms.

As well as this, trains from both platforms 1 and 2 can travel to Gloucester Road via the "east curve," meaning that High Street Kensington can also make a useful reversing point for the Circle line too - even without using the Triangle Sidings. (Note also a reversing siding and crossover at Gloucester Road.)

Trains from platforms 1 and 2 can also all go to Notting Hill Gate, however a train in westbound platform 1 would have to proceed out of the platform and reverse into platform 2 via the crossover - but this does give the option of running Edgware Road - High Street Kensington.

Trains from Gloucester Road's platform 2 (and, presumably, 3 via the crossover) can reach High Street Kensington via the east curve - this being the route normally taken by Circle line trains.

At Gloucester Road, trains in platforms 1 and (less commonly) 2 can also proceed via the "south curve" to Earl's Court, as usually done by District line trains from the city.

On the subject of Earl's Court...

Earl's Court station with a great view of another spectacular roof. (Image courtesy "mattbuck" (via Wikipedia))

That's where I was off to next and Earl's Court really is very pretty too. I'm very fond of the old style "describers" informing you of the destination of the next train. Again we have a marvellous, old-fashioned roof to look at and I really like the effect of the new, modern glass lifts and walkways.

Now, Earl's Court is even more fun than High Street Kensington. The slightly over-used word "hub" is really the only one that truly suits Earl's Court:

A diagram showing the track layout around Earl's Court station

As well as there being a crew depot here, there are a multitude of different routes which can be taken through Earl's Court (almost every District line trip, apart from some which are turned short somewhere and some runs into depots, will involve passing through Earl's Court) and trains can also be reversed here using the crossovers.

So, as you can see, trains from High Street Kensington have access to westbound platform 4 only. This can potentially be a nuisance but, from here, Kensington (Olympia), West Kensington and West Brompton can all be reached. All three destinations are also available from westbound platform 3 and trains can be reversed west to east here too.

From Gloucester Road, both of platforms 3 and 4 are available.

From West Kensington, both of platforms 1 and 2 are available. It is possible to reach both High Street Kensington and Gloucester Road from both of these platforms. Trains can also be reversed east to west from platform 2 as well, by proceeding out of the platform on the eastbound (towards Gloucester Road), stopping and then reversing over the crossover

Both platforms are also available from Kensington (Olympia).

From West Brompton, however, only eastbound platform 2 is available. Again, though, this isn't the end of the world, since trains can be reversed here and reach any eastbound destination.

Speaking of West Brompton, that was my next stop. West Brompton, finally, is really not at all interesting from the operational perspective - apart from the interchange with the West London Line. My god, though, is it pretty:

West Brompton station. (Image courtesy "Sunil060902" (via Wikipedia))

After West Brompton, we reach Fulham Broadway. The thing that strikes me about Fulham Broadway is that it's a wonderful example of how to make concrete look pretty (although this picture doesn't fully do it justice):

Fulham Broadway's concrete (or, at least, it looks like concrete to me). (Image courtesy "Sunil060902" (via Wikipedia))

And then, just a few metres further down, you're back in the early 20th century again and could almost convince yourself you were in the 1920s were it not for all of the adverts for DVDs and things.

Next up is Parsons Green and Parsons Green really is good fun, mostly because of Parsons Green sidings. When I was there on Monday, there was a C stock train in one of the sidings and apparently it was still there on Wednesday - ready to take over from an S stock if necessary, I gather. This particular train includes car 5555 which is every trainspotter's favourite, for obvious reasons. I, though, am not a trainspotter and don't particularly care, but I do like it when numbers work out like that. I'm one of those people who enjoys dates like 12/12/12 and enjoys it when the time is, say, 11:11:11 :P This car is also quite notable, because the TBC (transmission brake controller) is faulty. Essentially this means that it can't go at the front of any train (and hasn't been able to for a while), it has to go in the middle, because the controls don't work.

Anyway, Parsons Green:

Parsons Green tube station. (Image courtesy Stacey Harris (via Wikipedia))

Parsons Green is nice, but mostly I like it because of the sidings, some of which you can see here. They, however, are best shown by another drawing:

A diagram showing the track layout around Parsons Green

As you can see, some of these sidings can actually accommodate two trains (whether they can accommodate two S7s, I don't actually know. I don't even know if the shorter ones can accommodate any.) 24 road and 31 road are a good example. Here, a train in 31 road actually has to shunt forward into 24 road before it can move into Parsons Green.

The next thing to note is that the sidings to the west can can be accessed from both platforms and both platforms can be reached from them. Additionally there're sidings to the east of the station which are each only accessible from one platform.

After Parsons Green comes Putney Bridge - a favourite station of mine and one which I've spoken about before.

Putney Bridge station - doesn't it look pretty? Visible in this image is the bay road - the track on the right, without a train on it. (Image courtesy "HTUK" (via Wikipedia))

Putney Bridge is a fairly important station because of that bay platform. You can see what the track layout is like there much better in this diagram:

A diagram showing the track layout at Putney Bridge

This bay platform is not used to reverse trains very often during the week, but sees frequent use - as I've mentioned before - on Sundays and public holidays. It is, however, only just long enough for C stock so heaven knows what'll happen to it soon - probably it'll be taken out of commission. There is, however, the crossover to the west of the station, which means that reversing facilities won't be lost completely at Putney Bridge. It's unlikely that this will be used regularly as part of the timetable, though, as it requires an involved shunt move, requiring the train to stop on the westbound mainline and shunt back into the eastbound platform wrong road.

Outside of Putney Bridge station, there is also a lovely bridge over the river Thames. The District line is the only London Underground line to cross the Thames by bridge (I've mentioned that before too :P) and also does so between Gunnersbury and Kew Gardens (and that :P). It's very nice doing so as well, although the sides of the bridge are quite high at Putney Bridge and I couldn't actually see that much on Monday. I'm sure I remember having better views from a C stock, but maybe not. Either way, it's still enjoyable.

To the west of Putney Bridge is also where National Rail signalling begins. It's my understanding that the section from here to Wimbledon was built by the LSWR (London and South Western Railway) and District line trains were allowed to run over it in exchange for allowing LSWR trains to run to Kensington. In the end, I don't know that the LSWR ever did so, but connections to National Rail tracks still exist - beginning at East Putney, as we shall see. I understand from Wikipedia that the LSWR did, however, run down to Wimbledon over the District, just not up to Kensington. Whether or not today's National Rail trains ever run over the District line tracks, I'm afraid I can't tell you for sure, but the National Rail part of the station at East Putney looked pretty woebegone to me when I was there and one platform is definitely disused. Wikipedia suggests that it's vary rare for this to happen, but it does occasionally happen during engineering work and the like and apparently one National Rail train a day does run to Wimbledon. The LSWR's regular service, however, was ended by the Southern Railway in 1941. Wikipedia also suggests that the National Rail station at East Putney and its connection to Clapham Junction is used quasi-frequently.

So, once you get over the bridge, you soon arrive here at East Putney:

East Putney station. Notice the platform (the other half of the island platform from which the photo was taken) and tracks on the right, which are the National Rail platforms and track. You can also see the disused platform on the very far right, which is covered in greenery and which you may have mistaken simply for a bank or something. (Image courtesy " Sunil060902" (via Wikipedia))

I do believe I've said most of what I need to say about the National Rail connection here. Whether its true or not, I don't know, but Wikipedia does have a rather pleasing note that the station itself was sold to London Underground, by British Rail, for all of £1. As I've said, this is where the first National Rail connection is located and National Rail trains can, in principle (and, very occasionally it seems, in practice), join the District line here and head down to Wimbledon - or leave the District line here. National Rail trains, however, cannot now proceed eastbound beyond East Putney. From the National Rail part of East Putney, trains can head on to Clapham Junction over their 'metals.' The connection is shown in the diagram below:

East Putney station and the track layout around it. The stripey platform is the disused National Rail platform

Some of you may have noticed a crossover to the west of the station, which I can only presume allows trains to reverse here. Whether or not they ever do, I don't know, but I don't believe the C stock can display 'East Putney' as a destination.

We then reach the extremely quaint Southfields station - the station of choice for Wimbledon:

Southfields station, if only I could find a picture that better shows how nice it is. (Image courtesy "Sunil060902" (via Wikipedia))

Next up, we reach Wimbledon Park - also very quaint and very similar (in original design and even today) to Southfields:

Wimbledon Park station. Just visible in the background you can see some of the tracks which make up the next National Rail link. (Image courtesy "Sunil060902" (via Wikipedia))

This is the location of the next connection to National Rail tracks. Regular services, as mentioned above, have long since been discontinued. The link is, however, very close to the Wimbledon Park depot and I imagine its used every now and then for ECS (Empty Coaching Stock) moves. Presumably back in the days of the LSWR, when the section was built, it was intended that trains could enter service here and run up to East Putney. The track layout is as shown below:

A diagram showing the track layout around Wimbledon Park, including the National Rail connection

Finally, of course, we reach Wimbledon, where this train terminates :P

Wimbledon station. (Image courtesy Lewis Clarke (via Wikipedia))

It's an important, sprawling station, with 4 District line platforms, six National Rail platforms and a Tramlink platform and makes for an important location. This, of course, is the location of the final link to the National Rail network. As I noted above, Wikipedia seems to think one train a day does make use of this link and I imagine Wimbledon in particular sees the odd ECS movement over the District line.

The track layout is shown below

The track layout around Wimbledon station, showing the National Rail connections

And that is the Wimbledon-Edgware Road ("Wimbleware") branch.