London Bridge Station
London Bridge is a central London railway terminus and connected London Underground station in Southwark, south-east London. It occupies a large area on three levels immediately south-east of London Bridge, from which it takes its name. 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) and is the fourth-busiest station in London, handling over 50 million customers a year.
The station was originally opened by the London and Greenwich Railway as a local service. It subsequently served the London and Croydon Railway, the London and Brighton Railway and the South Eastern Railway, thus becoming an important London terminus. It was rebuilt in 1849 and again in 1864 to provide more services and increase capacity. Local services from London Bridge began to be electrified in the beginning of the 20th century, and had spread to national routes by the 1930s. The station was extensively rebuilt by British Rail during the 1970s, along with a comprehensive re-signalling scheme and track alignment. It was further redeveloped in the 2010s to better accommodate the Thameslink route which provides a connection to Gatwick Airport, Luton Airport and Crossrail.
London Bridge is served by Southeastern services from Charing Cross and Cannon Street to destinations in southeast London, Kent and East Sussex and is a terminus for many Southern commuter and regional services to south London and numerous destinations in South East England. Thameslink services from Bedford, Cambridge and Peterborough to Brighton and other destinations in Sussex and Kent began serving the station in 2018.
Contents
Location
The main line station is one of 19 UK stations managed by Network Rail. It has a ticket hall and entrance area with its main frontage on Tooley Street, and other entrances on Borough High Street and within the main line station concourse. It is one of two mainline London termini south of the River Thames, the other is Waterloo. The Underground station is on the Jubilee line and the Bank branch of the Northern line. River buses use the nearby London Bridge City Pier.
History
London Bridge station was opened on 14 December 1836, making it the oldest London railway terminus that is still running.[8] It was not the earliest station in the London metropolitan area, as the London and Greenwich Railway had opened stations at Spa Road (in Bermondsey) and Deptford on 8 February 1836. The completion of the line into London Bridge was postponed because of delays in constructing a bridge at Bermondsey Street. From 10 October 1836, trains were able to operate as far as the east end of this bridge, with passengers having to walk the last 300 yards (270 m).[9] The station has had several changes of ownership and complete rebuilds since opening.
Stations of Southwark
London and Greenwich Railway station
The original London and Greenwich Railway station in December 1836 The original station had four tracks and was 60 feet (18 m) wide and 400 feet (120 m) long. It was approached through a pair of iron gates.[10] Three tracks led into two platforms as a stub end of a viaduct. The station was entirely exposed to the weather until a tarred canvas roof was erected in 1840. Sixteen columns and fourteen beams from this structure were retrieved in 2013 and given to the Vale of Rheidol Railway in Aberystwyth, Wales for use in a planned railway museum. Before completing the train shed, the London and Greenwich Railway entered into an agreement with the proposed London and Croydon Railway for the latter to use its tracks from Corbett's Lane, Bermondsey, and to share its station. However, the Greenwich railway had underestimated the cost of building the long viaduct leading to London Bridge and was not able to build a sufficiently large station for the traffic for both companies, and so in July 1836 it sold some land adjacent to its station (then still under construction) to the Croydon railway to build their own independent station.
London and Croydon Railway station
The London and Brighton Railway and the South Eastern Railway (SER) were also planning routes from London to Brighton and Dover respectively, and the British Parliament decided that the London and Greenwich line should become the entry corridor into London from South East England. The two railways were therefore required to share the route of the London and Croydon Railway from near Norwood (which in turn shared the route of the London and Greenwich Railway from Bermondsey to London Bridge). As a result, in 1838 the London and Croydon Railway obtained powers to enlarge the station it was then constructing at London Bridge, before it had opened for traffic.
The London and Croydon Railway opened its line and began using its station on 5 June 1839; the London and Brighton Railway joined it on 12 July 1841, followed by the South Eastern Railway in 26 May 1842.[14] It was soon found that the viaduct approaching London Bridge would be inadequate to deal with the traffic generated by four railways, so it was widened by the Greenwich Railway between 1840 and 1842, doubling the number of tracks to four. The new lines, intended for the Croydon, Brighton and South Eastern trains, were situated on the south side of the existing Greenwich line, whereas their station was to the north of the London Bridge site, leading to an awkward and potentially dangerous crossing of one another's lines. The directors of the companies involved decided to exchange sites; the London and Greenwich Railway would take over the newly completed London and Croydon Railway station, whilst a new joint committee of the Croydon, Brighton and South Eastern companies would demolish the first station and build a new one on its site.
Joint station
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 Bradshaw's Guide to the London and Brighton Railway 1844. They show 'a quasi-Italianate building with a picturesque campanile'. It opened for business in July 1844 while only partially complete, but events were taking place which would mean that the bell tower would never be built, and the new building would only last five years. In 1843 the SER and Croydon railway companies became increasingly concerned by the high tolls charged by the London and Greenwich Railway for the use of the station approaches, and gained Parliamentary approval to build their own independent line into south London to a new station at Bricklayers Arms, which was vaguely described as a "West End terminus". This line opened on 1 May 1844 and most of the services from these two companies were withdrawn from London Bridge, leaving only the Greenwich and Brighton companies using London Bridge station. The Greenwich company was on the brink of bankruptcy and so was forced to lease its lines to the SER, which took effect from 1 January 1845.[20] The next year the Croydon and Brighton companies, along with other small railways, merged to form the London Brighton and South Coast Railway (LB&SCR). Consequently, there were only two companies serving London Bridge. The LB&SCR used the unfinished joint station until it was demolished in 1849 and a larger building constructed.
South Eastern Railway station
The South Eastern Station (left) and the temporary Brighton station c. 1850 after the demolition of the Joint station The SER took over the second London and Greenwich station (which had been built for the London and Croydon Railway) and sought to develop that site rather than continue to invest in the former joint station, which became the property of the LB&SCR. The SER station was therefore rebuilt and enlarged between 1847 and 1850, to a design by Samuel Beazley. At the same time yet further improvements were made to the station approaches, increasing the number of tracks to six, which entirely separated the lines of the two railways. Once these extensions were complete the SER closed its passenger terminus at Bricklayer's Arms and converted the site into a goods depot in 1852. London Bridge station remained the London terminus of the SER until 1864 when its station was again rebuilt. Five of the existing platforms were converted into a through station to enable the extension of the main line into central London and the opening of Charing Cross railway station, and in 1866 to Cannon Street station.[25] In 1899 the SER entered into a working amalgamation with the London Chatham and Dover Railway (LC&DR) to form the South Eastern and Chatham Railway Companies Joint Management Committee. Junctions were laid to enable trains through London Bridge to reach the LC&DR stations at Holborn Viaduct and St Pauls.
London Brighton and South Coast Railway station
The LB&SCR took over the unfinished joint station, which they demolished in 1849 and opened a temporary station in 1850.[27] This was rebuilt and enlarged in 1853–4 to deal with the additional traffic from the lines to Sydenham and Crystal Palace. A three-storey box-like structure in Italian style was erected, with the name of the railway emblazoned on the top parapet.[21]
Plan of the stations by 1888, with the SER's separate high- and low-level tracks, and the LB&SCR's new platforms 4, 5 and 6 and Terminus Hotel
In 1859 the LC&DR applied to the LB&SCR for running powers from Sydenham to London Bridge, but was refused.[28] However, some ticketing arrangement was made between the two companies as the LC&DR advertised connections to and from London Bridge in its timetables in The Times and Bradshaw's Railway Guide for July 1861.[29][30] This arrangement was short-lived pending the construction of the LC&DR line to Holborn Viaduct.[31]
The LB&SCR also built the Terminus Hotel at the station in 1861. It was designed by Henry Currey, architect for St Thomas's Hospital, and had 150 public rooms over seven stories.[32] It was unsuccessful because it was on the south bank of the river, so was turned into offices for the railway in 1893. It was destroyed by bombing in 1941.[33]
An Act of Parliament of 1862 gave the LB&SCR power to enlarge the station further.[34] Over the next few years under the direction of new Chief Engineer Frederick Banister,[35] the company built four more platform-faces in an adjoining area to the south of its existing station to cope with additional traffic generated by the completion of the South London Line and other suburban lines to Victoria station.[36] This had a single-span trussed-arch roof measuring 88 by 655 ft (27 by 200 m), and was designed by J. Hawkshaw and Banister.[35] During the first decade of the twentieth century LB&SCR station at London Bridge was again enlarged, but overall London Bridge station remained a "sprawling confusion".
