London Rd Depot

[Deleted]

How far (in walking time) is LRD from Elephant and also are staff taxis used to take crews there from the booking on point? Also do any Queens Pk duties start/finish there?

[Deleted]

It's only about a 5 minute walk. It used to be all Elephant crews starting and finishing at London Road.

[Colin D]

jim said:

It's only about a 5 minute walk. It used to be all Elephant crews starting and finishing at London Road.

Didn't they also stable trains in the tunnel south of Elephant & Castle and a couple in the platforms? Is the booking on point still at the south end of the southbound platform?

[Deleted]

colindunkley said:

jim said:

It's only about a 5 minute walk. It used to be all Elephant crews starting and finishing at London Road.

Didn't they also stable trains in the tunnel south of Elephant & Castle and a couple in the platforms? Is the booking on point still at the south end of the southbound platform?

Yep, two trains stable in the sidings and the crews actually have to walk down the tunnel into and out of the sidings. The booking on point and crew accomodation has now moved upstairs.

[bakerloo38]

Mar 3, 2006 15:47:57 GMT @jim said:

It's only about a 5 minute walk. It used to be all Elephant crews starting and finishing at London Road.

qpk london road nights used to stable there and take out the first train in the morning,

[Oracle]

Brian P, whom everyone remembers was a Guard then Driver on the Northern, now off the LU, told me many years ago that he and his mate walked all the way down the sidings to see what was at the very end (Camberwell direction). He said that there was a brick wall, but someone had presumably also wondered what was beyond and had kocked a brick or so out to see! There also has been a recurrent rumour that the tunnels were extended as far as the proposed but never-built station. No doubt there is considerable protection now against over-running and the tunnel ends are reinforced.

[Deleted]

Aug 8, 2008 12:11:47 GMT Oracle said:

Brian P, whom everyone remembers was a Guard then Driver on the Northern, now off the LU, told me many years ago that he and his mate walked all the way down the sidings to see what was at the very end (Camberwell direction). He said that there was a brick wall, but someone had presumably also wondered what was beyond and had kocked a brick or so out to see! There also has been a recurrent rumour that the tunnels were extended as far as the proposed but never-built station. No doubt there is considerable protection now against over-running and the tunnel ends are reinforced.

When I was on the Bakerloo in the early 80s there was planks of wood at the end of the sidings, but more recently I have seen a photo from Tom which shows a plug at the end of the sand drag.

[Deleted]

Part of the plan of Doug Rose's new book, Tiles of the Unexpected, shows the original tunnel to have been walled off during changes at the station... When the extension to Camberwell was mooted, tunnels were dug on a new alignment, not a continuation of the original tunnels..

[Deleted]

is that 72 mk 1 still there?
I saw it not so long ago sitting in a pretty sad state

[Tom]

Aug 8, 2008 20:04:03 GMT @tubeoperator92 said:

Part of the plan of Doug Rose's new book, Tiles of the Unexpected, shows the original tunnel to have been walled off during changes at the station... When the extension to Camberwell was mooted, tunnels were dug on a new alignment, not a continuation of the original tunnels..

I'm not entirely sure about the sidings being a completely new alignment. The sidings themselves are, but I wouldn't be surprised if the tunnel from the NB platform over No. 28 crossover is the original alignment. It certainly corresponds with the drwings I've seen related to the changes.

[railtechnician]

Gosh I've not been down there since the Bakerloo resignalling of the late 1980s when I upgraded the tunnel telephones and commissioned new telephones-at -signals on the whole line. My recollection is that the siding tunnels looked of similar age to the rest of the tunnels and I always thought they were original. I'm sure that at the time one tunnel was bricked at the end and the other was possibly plugged although it resembled the old plasterwork that used to be found in the first few rings of the running tunnels at the ends of platforms on the Bakerloo and Northern lines.
Elephant & Castle was a site where I did a lot of work over the years, I installed all the replacement radiating cable for the train radio from Waterloo to E&C and London Road, worked on the station radio there and the UTS project too.
When I was commissioning the local TAS systems I used to walk the tunnels from Embankment to E&C and back each shift checking the progress of the installation work. My lasting memory is the eerie atmosphere walking the section under the Thames. Apparently the tunnels were 'rusting away' from the outside at the time exposed on the river bed and afterwards I discovered that tons of concrete was being poured onto the river bed to reinforce them. I don't think it was dangerous but it adds to the eerie recollection!

[Tom]

I spent six months there after I passed out. During that time I did get a number of photos of the entire Bakerloo Line without many trains, some of which can be seen at www.flickr.com/photos/signals/sets/72157606509641777/. I can't remember if I included some of the better shots of the ends of the tunnel, but there were metal plugs (for want of a better phrase) which would contradict the story from Oracle.

(P.S. Oracle, I remember Brian P as well )

[norfolkdave]

My O my how this has changed even London Road depot, when I was there in the 70s briefly, the depot was walked by crews from Elephant & Castle, and the canopy for storing wasnt there ( I dont think). Storing trains was only I believe on the southbound platform, and the mess room was downstairs, with the Stms office opposite. How long has it all been altered? Must seem eerie walking in the tunnel to get trains, how does one get on if the other siding is empty and you have just stored your train, (how long have you to get out before another train comes into the other storage yard)

[Deleted]

WRT the original question: 17 minutes walking time is allowed to/from London Road to the book-on point in South London House.

norfolkdave, not sure if you were talking about time to get out of the tunnels at Elephant & Castle or something else. If the former then there is key protection so you don't have to run to get out before the next train comes in! I think the walking time from platform to train (including operating the KPS) is around 8 minutes though I can't remember for sure.

[miztert]

Dec 29, 2008 16:59:32 GMT @gappe said:

WRT the original question: 17 minutes walking time is allowed to/from London Road to the book-on point in South London House.

17 minutes!!! Blimey - why? It's literally just down the road - on this streetmap the Bakerloo's London Road depot is the grey rectangle to the south of St. George's Circus (and the entrance is onto London Road), whilst South London House is situated at the location of the roundel at the bottom of London Road by the roundabout. It shouldn't take any longer than five minutes to walk this.

[Tom]

It doesn't take much more than five minutes once you're out of the gate, though I'd say seven minutes is closer to the mark.

But the 17 minutes is allocated to shut down and secure the train, leave it onto an authorised walkway, get off the track following said walkway and then leave the depot onto the public highway. The seventeen minutes also allows time to get from the front door at
South London House to the booking on point.

In reality, I would expect the booking off time to be allocated as eight minutes to secure train and reach public highway, seven minutes walking London Road - SLH and two minutes within SLH itself.

[miztert]

Thanks Tom, I thought I must have been missing something, and indeed I was - the time allowance is for more than just the walk down the street, it includes the whole 'journey' from the drivers seat including time to secure the train, and in that context the 17 minutes makes much more sense!

[Deleted]

And they timed our slowest driver so that nobody could complain about it not being enough!