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London's Lost Railways Ep.3 - Mill Hill East to Edgware
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- čas přidán 1. 04. 2021
- It's Episode 3 of London's Lost Railways, here we're walking the path of the line old that used to exist between Mill Hill East and Edgware, with 'Mill Hill (The Hale)' station abandoned along the way ...
You should also watch Jay Foreman's excellent video about the Northern Heights : • The unfinished Norther...
Download the London's Lost Railways map here: www.geofftech....
More station info:
Mill Hill (The Hale) station - www.disused-sta...
Edgware GNR station - www.disused-sta...
Many thanks to illustrations by David Kirwin.
"the rest of the line is now: a bridge over nothing, this footpath no one ever uses, another bridge over nothing, and this nature reserve I'm currently trespassing on!"
I know, right?
@@JayForeman That? These? This? This? That? Him? What?
@@ninjawarrior8994 this!
Haha
Jay Foreman
"a bridge over nothing, this footpath no-one uses and this nature reserve i'm currently trespassing on"
that joke was made in 2009 and it gets me every dam time
Jay Foreman vibes
@@BusesFromHanworth thats because it was made by jay foreman lol
czcams.com/video/jjuD288JlCs/video.html
@@BusesFromHanworth i wondered about that
@@lam6786 mhm
2:53 perfect opportunity for Jay Foreman cameo, driving a Mini up the A1
Geoff's like a coiled spring let loose this week. Good to see him in his natural environment.
Ah yes, the Northern Heights. I knew he would do it eventually.
Yep
@Charlie TavaresWhen it comes to transport....
I'm everywhere
Well, it's not really Northern Heights, that's the Edgware to Watford Junction extension. This is the 1869 GNR from Finsbury Park to Edgware, with branches to High Barnet and Ally Pally.
If you've ever thought of turning all the 12 episodes into a full documentary Geoff & presenting it to Netflix, Amazon Prime, etc., I am sure loads of people will love to watch it!!
Out of all the closed lines where people say "If it was still open hundreds of people would use it", this one really is that!
Honestly!! It would save me the trip from edgware to high barnet by bus or going all the way to camden just to go all the way back!!
so surreal watching Geoff walk through the area I grew up in.
Can see how much effort goes into these videos geoff! Keep it up!
Thank you Reece! lots of hard work, yes!!
Have lived in Mill Hill 25 years and never knew you could walk this 👍🏻
At 0:07 I’m sure that’s Jay Foreman’s nan’s house in the background 😂
"we shouldn't have built this stupid house"
*Stomp
She didn't want her house pulled down to reinstate the track. 😉
The way she says: nO
Yes hahaha
there's part of me wishes that, when they cut the line back, they'd just diverted it from Mill Hill (the Hale) to terminate at Mill Hill Broadway- and formed a useful connection in the process
As a resident near this former railway line, I must say things are more obscure than I have imagined, especially the fact that this used to be a double-track line back in the 19th century. I would ride my bike around the area and wonder whether there was more to it. I guess that there isn't really much to see here, but Geoff has really made it interesting and has actually given me facts and locations that I have never known before. Well done Geoff!
yo same
Now I know where Jay was trespassing.
A bridge over nothing,
Another bridge over nothing,
And this nature reserve I am currently trespassing on.
Good to know people haven’t forgotten that
Amazed how professional these films are.
thank you Michael, it's nice when people recognise all the effort I put in to make them as best i can!
If you've watched Geoff for a while, you won't be amazed as you'll know his videos are consistently professional (and brilliant too)
Quite agree!
@@geofftech2 Something in return...this is a very rare trip here in Switzerland on a line that lost passenger services at the start of the millenium...it is the original line from Lenzburg to Zurich before a tunnel was built (I believe in the 1960's), opening up a much more direct route to Zurich - also for all the long-distance services from Berne and Basel.
czcams.com/video/ucYAMDuWejY/video.html
I think you missed a bit out. After the Page Street bridge the line went under what was once the car park for the Laing building, now a housing estate, and nothing left. However, the line went under the A1/A41 (which was built in the early 1920s, hence the space for the line, which can be seen), and Bunns Lane takes a strange turn, this is for the bridge (now gone). A new road, Roseberry Place, more or less follows the railway on the south side of Bunns Lane. After this the line went through what's now the industrial estate, and, at a strange angle, passed under the M1/Midland. The office block was once a government building, from the 1950s I suspect by the original style (now restyled), and the carpark entrance now to the north was a small wooded area, which follows the line of the railway. To this day from a map or picture one can see the strange line. Thence, as said, the next bridge under Bunns Lane. However, at Edgware, a strange bit of line remains, and can be walked! At the back of the Sainsbury's/Broadwalk car park, at the diagonal, is the bridge that carried the 1869 line over the 1923 Northern Line, and then through what's now the car park. Edgware station was at 90 degrees to Station Road, so the trains turned, and then had what seems to be a through platform. I still remember the station, going to school opposite, so walking down the path there. The reason Edgware was a through station design, despite being as terminus, was that the line was due to be extended to Watford Junction, and an Act was passed to allow it. This Act, with a change for a different Edgware station site, gave the Underground the running powers to Watford Junction (the Northern Heights scheme) - and loads of bits of that still remain, just watch Summer Holliday to see Cliff Richard in the Northern Line railway works! (used for building Halifax bombers, and repairing buses)
Peter, that is TOP INFO, thanks! i've just found the bridge on Google Maps and zoomed in for a look .. can you get to it though, is it walkable, i wonder? amazing, thanks!
@@geofftech2 sadly whilst you can stand at the start of the bridge, and view it easily through the fence, you can't walk on it. BTW, original Edgware, new Edgware stations were built as through stations to Watford Junction, so was Stanmore Metropolitan/Bakerloo/Jubilee station. As the Metropolitan railway was supposed to goto Watford Junction from Watford station (under Clarendon Road, with Watford Central station now a Moon pub), it would have meant two Metropolitan lines to Watford Junction, as well as the Northern Line! Also High Barnet station was supposed to be a through station to Potters Bar, and Morden to Sutton, so Battersea as terminus but a potential through has history!
Didn't the footpath under Page Street used to come out the other side of the road? I seem to remember it used to be open around 30 years ago, but it was boarded up after it became a crime hotspot.
@@KrisPeter Yes it did. Geoff could have walked down a foot-path opposite, running parallel with Longfield Avenue and the train line, that exits around Bunns lane, before the bridge. There used to be a Featherstones Garage the line ran behind and Bunns Bridge has an unused access road that I believe was part of the old track bed too. I lived near there and the wooded cutting over the other side of that subway in Page Street was my childhood playground. I was most distressed to see the bulldozers from Laings coming to rip it all up. When my folks moved to Page Street in the 50's, that subway was a hump-back bridge. I think it was turned into a subway when the Copthall School annex was built next to it (now demolished) in the '70's.
Who ever heard of a nature reserve being closed in the week? Thanks Geoff, that looked like hard work
thanks Daz, appreciated!
@@geofftech2 hi, nice video! Related to the northern line, can you make a video more about the extension?
Premier House started its life as an office block, but has been converted to flats.
In its earlier life, it housed the headquarters of the Green Shield Stamp Company. The stamps acted as a form of loyalty card for retailers. There was a catalogue which allowed collectors to exchange completed books of stamps for consumer goods. What killed it was inflation, as the number of books required for a purchase soared, so did the amount of stamps disgorged by the retailers, and eventually they realised that it was too much effort for no insight into consumer behaviour.
I think some of the catalogue centres became Argos stores, though I may be wrong about that.
I'm sure you're right about the Argos stores - it was the successor business to Green Shield stamps
Premier House is unrecognizable to me now. And that development behind it there's going to be a 17 story apartment building which is three stories taller than Premier House. And an Irish company bought Broadwalk Shopping Centre and they're having that redeveloped.
My first ever job after I left school (Edgware Secondary Modern) was working for Greenshields there on the third floor. Does anyone remember Bob, the doorman? Lovely guy! Worked there for about six months before moving on to greater things at Chas Wrights just round the corner. And then.........
You should do a collab with jay again.... if possible
literally walked this the other day to see my mates, very nostalgic now knowing what it was used for and not just some random path
Fantastic video Geoff! This is so informative and I think as a 12 year old that loves trains I can’t find anything to beat this. Keep up the hard work.
I walked the Copthall to Mill Hill East section on Tuesday, so slightly too late to see Geoff! That's by far the best section to walk, and as you mentioned, is surprisingly undulating in places - if you ignore the left over posts, it feels less like a disused railway than the Highgate to Finsbury Park and Muswell Hill sections.
Wow, I actually walked this today Geoff! I missed you by a couple of days. It really is amazing how much stuff is still left there, as you say the majority of the posts are there all the way up until Page Street. They bricked up the tunnels in Lyndhurst Park in the 1990s but I think what you saw was a platform as it stuck out the tunnel originally and you could access them. As for the Nature Reserve, you can access it through the park as well. Like you I could not walk it as today is not a Sunday.
The old Edgware Station has a very interesting bit of history for any that are interested. In the early 1960's, my father rented the old engine shed for his growing Military Vehicle Conversion engineering business. He would buy ex MoD vehicles form the Auctions at Ruddington, and convert them to LHD for Saudi Oil Companies. He worked alongside a guy called Don Searle, who sold old MoD furniture, in knock down kits. The name of his Company was Mullards Furniture Industries - after Mullards Yard, the old Station Goods Yard. You would know it as MFI. As a young boy in the early 1970's I used to play amongst the old tracks and buildings - there was even a massive rusty turntable there. But the real kicker, my dad sold 4 vehicles to a guy who claimed he worked in the fruit and veg business, the vehicles were the ones used in the Great Train Robbery!
I want to offer some more information re Northern Heights, Edgware to Bushey Heath and beyond. In the 1950s I lived in Oundle Avenue, Bushey. The layout then was Oundle Avenue was a dead end at a farmers field but you could turn left walking alongside the field and you came to the Sleeper Track. This was a stretch of closely spaced wooden sleepers Today this would be at the Chiltern Avenue end of Cotswold Avenue. My mother told me that this was reserved for a railway link down towards Bushey, and that there was a gap left between several houses. She grew up in the area as a child. I suppose the local council museum might have more detailed maps, etc.
A lovely park.... gated and padlocked. Pretty much sums up the spirit of London.
Like how Episode 3 is a 3 mile walk on this London Lost Railways, It was a nice walk indeed. Another great London Lost Railways.
Instead of mucking around with bridges and tunnels to get across the M1 and MML, use Bunn's Lane - it's closer to the railway alignment as well. They reused the railway's bridge under the A1, as a temporary M1 slip road, which is now very fenced off, as there was a danger in having a nice tarmacked (albeit unmaintained) path all the way to the crash barrier next to the M1.
An abandoned railway and an abandoned road in the same place - wonder how many other sites can claim that.
I might be wrong, but I think he did a video about it before and it is emergency turn around.
I knew this line a child living nearby in the 1950's it used to run from Mill Hill gas works to Edgware Station Road, next to the Railway Hotel. The line ran behind my school, Dollis Primary, playing field and can remember waving to the engine drivers in the days of coal gas fueling homes.
That bridge support at 2:40 was just the normal bridge for the railway. It was only single track, but would have been taller when in use as the ground level was lower (can be seen by the fact you walk up to it's entrance).
If you went to the other side of the Page Street tunnel, you’d have found a door to which has been open for quite some time and you could go inside.
Missed opportunity there!
Great to see them coming out very fast. Also been on a train again today only short but great fun.
The page street tunnel used to be a humped back bridge on the road above & about another 50 yards along the track was a large electrical sub station with a platform onto the railway as we used to play in it.
There is the tale of a Northern Line driver who was showing his destination as Bushey Heath and was asked by a passenger "Where's Bushey Heath?".
"Four stops past Mill Hill East" was the reply.
Bushey Heath would've been 5 stops from Mill Hill East:
Mill Hill (The Hale)
Edgware
Brockley Hill
Elstree South
Bushey Heath
I really love that this series has come bsck
We have those half original/half concrete bridges over here in NI too. Off the top of my head there's one on the old Belfast and County Down Railway path in East Belfast
This seems like a nice little walk up until you get to the A1.
Excellent video again, Geoff! I'm really enjoying this series!
As a child in the late 50s, my mother would take me on the 52 bus to Burnt Oak for Saturday shopping, and the route crossed over this railway line which was fully intact until the motorway obliterated it. I remember being so disappointed that it was no longer there!
Very nice to show me.
Thanks for the video and stay safe
Another cracking video Geoff, all your time and effort put into providing us with these videos is appreciated 👏
thanks John! i sincerely appreciate the accolade, i've worked very hard on all of these!
There is an original bridge that carries A1 Barnett Bypass over the railway. It was used for a temporary junction between M1 and A1 when the former was constructed, and currently just carries A1 over the disused slip road.
Hey Geoff, can you also add a map where all those places are located in London (not just the part of the city)?
For those that are watching overseas :)
The ones in this video are North/North West London.
Nicely documented 👍
Small correction, Premier House was built before they pulled down the old Edgware station I played there in the 1970s, there are photographs of it about on the internet, the old station never faced Edgware high street, the entrance to the old station faced Edgware road and was up the side road next to Iceland about where Sainsbury's loading bay is.
Geoff:Makes a 6 minute video on this line
Jay:1 sentence
I used to Install those 6ft reinforced posts down the track many years ago, 2 posts per person per day, post and anchor, it was a bugger trying to dig out ballast with a shovel!!! the carried high voltage, comms and signal cables on brackets with "swingers" inbetween which hang off the airmain.
Glad I was able to help you. ;)
I remember as a kid in the 90s we used to find the old insulator mushrooms, highly prized by junior school kids!
I’ve explored this a number of times, there was a double line that went under Page Street, when you exit to the road, you can see where the track would of gone as it’s between the houses there opposite. Also, there is a side path to the left which is a lot closer to the track, this comes out to Rowlands Close, which is where the line use to follow up adjacent to Bunns Lane then switch back round towards The Hale and Edgware.
Really liking this series
Thank you Geoff
Love abandoned and disused buildings and infrastructure. Great video Geoff
Finally Northern Heights!! Amazing Geoff!
Omg wow I'm from Edgware for 29 years and I didn't even know anything about this I'm amazed
Subscribed after a few videos like this.
In the late 1980s and early 90s it was possible to cycle down the abandoned M1 off slip at Five Ways Corner. Part of this slip road, which went under the A41/A1 and Bunns Lane before turning to join it southbound, was the old track bed. You could cycle up as far as some breeze blocks placed along the top of the slip road. I guess that bit is no longer accessible.
Jay did a fantastic video on the history of this line. Nice to see this perspective
Congratulations for going to 4K, Looks awesome.
Lovely, loved to see my old neighborhood where I grew up.
Steam trains I remember in the late 50's running from Mill Hill along the disused line....haulage.... The house next to the station was used I think by the station master.... The barracks was the major employer.... Infantry back then and reme. Patrick McGoohan lived up near Mill Hill school and used to go in the cafe near the roundabout. Then after breakfast he occasionally walked one or two kids to the st. Vincent's school. In those days he was in Danger Man on TV
Geoff, I know this isn't your usual format, but I would love some lightly-edited footage of an entire walk along one of these old lines, with occasional commentary from yourself. Thanks for the great videos!
Amazing work on this Geoff! I hope the rest of the series/episodes that you are currently making, goes smoothly!😀❤️
I live far from London. But I am really interested in this sort of stuff. Keep up the wonderful work, Geoff!
Great stuff Geoff. Fascinating to see so much infrastructure that ultimately never even got used! 🤔🍻
Just south of Rosebery place and north of the Pentavia retail park (between the M1 and A1) you can also see a disused southbound sliproad from the M1, as this was the temporary end of the Motorway before Junction 2 was complete!
I believe this was where the railway went, and it was reused for the Motorway, the sliproad following the railway alignment under the Watford way before curving around to meet it
I absolutely love this series, so interesting!
Enjoying this series, Geoff! Thanks again.
Really enjoying this series, please keep them coming Geoff!
Having played on the hale station as a child I can confirm you were indeed standing on part of what's left of the Hale Lane Station platform
Pictures from 1926 suggest that Edgware station is still at its original location, not premier house
The filled in subway at the end of the Mill Hill stretch at page street used to take you to the builder John Lang's HQ before this too was knocked down to make way for houses
The better route to walk is right from this filled in subway and up page street, turning left onto Bunns Lane. Follow this down until you reach the footbridge that goes up to the A1. Go up these stairs and between you and what is the vacated Currys/Argos/Homebase site and you will see a stretch of road. This was originally the end of the M1, and was part of the route. After that the route went behind what is now Churchill House in Bunns Lane, following the route of the car parks.
Some of the soil used in the extension of the M1 was used to fill-in the Hale Lane Station under the arches at the Bunns Lane bridge, before it was all bricked up.
At Edgware, Abbey Nation Bank, Now Santander, used part of the railway for its vaults. It may still do.
Places to visit does not end there though. Head north on the A41, just before you get to the Spur Road Roundabout in Edgware, look right and you will see a small wall. This is the start of the arches that will elevate the track over the fields towards What would have been Brockley Hill Station, then on to Elstree South (Aldenham) Station, Bushey HeathStation and then Watford.. If you feel like taking a look in the fields behind Spur Road Roundabout it then you will see what is left of these arches.
Finally, the stretch between the Bunns Lane Bridge and Deans Lane is not maintained by the council. The area behind Lyndhurst part is not maintained at all except for the occasional clean up.. However the reserve formally maintained by the London Wildlife Trust is now maintained by a group of volunteers (always looking for more!) to maintain the environment for the special inhabitants that live there. Why is it only open at weekends 10.00-4.00? That's because it's when the council permits it. Unlike the Mill Hill stretch, the reserve has properties that back on to it. Dryfield Road on the south and Hale Lane to the north. The residents objected to it being open 24/7. Note It was originally only open on a Sunday.
I went to school at Dollis Hill Primary, just over the Devonshire Road bridge, late 50s early 60s. It seemed to be a goods line then with diesel shunters going up and down, perhaps to the gasworks at Mill Hill East?
Keep up the good work geoff 😊!
Do the Alban Way which used to be part of the old Hatfield to St Albans railway line!
Your cast iron 'stuff' is what's left of a "Cable Bearer Bracket". My employer used to make thousands of them for London Transport.
aha! thanks Gordon! :-)
Hi, watching from Calcutta, India
Excellent stuff, as ever Geoff!
Great film!
The episode we were waiting for.
@geoff You should have gone to the back of Edgware station platform where you can see the end of the line and a tunnel that is blocked off, the tunnels for the northern heights northbound from Edgware are apparently still there and the banks on edgware high street have their vaults built into the tunnels... not sure if this is true or not but you can definitely see the blocked off tunnels in the station
Great video Geoff. Looking forward to future videos in this series.
Geoff, love this series so far! Keep them coming. An excellent piece of work. Keep up the great work!
Wow great video. There is a book what has trails that pas a lot of train tracks and old stations called[do not alight here]
The sign for the Edgware track depot has the archer from East Finchley station on it
The blocked up foot tunnel under-past at 2.40, if you walk down the path other the other side of the road you can see inside.
As a kid friends and i used to walk along there and the platform was still there then as it wasn’t blocked off.
Many a year ago in Lyndhurst park what is now a giant concrete wall you used to be able to see the tunnel through they blocked it up when the flats were built opposite.
Yes. Geoff has my backpack!
Love these videos...
Great video Geoff! I will say that when you're navigating the route from Page Street to Mill Hill (The Hale) it's best to head down Bunns Lane and step beneath the A1 through a little cutting to the affectionately named Bullet Wall where the old line used to run. You took the wider route, along Grahame Park Way, missing a couple of bridges hidden beneath the land. Also, having been down to the old Mill Hill Railway Nature Reserve several times on the weekend I can officially say that whoever has the keys very rarely opens it so you must nip over the fence!
Very interesting Geoff - Keep up the good work / info 🙂🚂🚂🚂
Nice one Geoff.
On my first ever ride to Mill Hill East, the track was still in situ beyond, with a single colour light signal (at red) at the end of the platform line. Such a waste of all the preparation work and so short sighted.
Another excellent video. Those unused concrete cable carrier posts looked familiar- I wondered if they'd been in another video- and I see Jay Foreman's nan gets a mention, so it's all probably connected. Well at least there's better weather in this video and nice sun and tweety birdies both here and in the video. But not for long. It's going to snow tonight.
I remember this video.
hey geoff, here wietze braem I find your information very interesting, here in Adinkerke (Belgium) and Bray Dune (France) there used to be a railway line, but 3 years ago they got rid of it and in Bray-Dune (France) they have a very clean bike path made in the plate of that railway to Duinkerke (France) with kind regards from wietze braem
well done Geoff. 1 question when are you gonna do another least used station video please. Your amazing 👏 .
I can't remember when the line closed down exactly, but I think it must have been about 1960. There was a coal merchants in the yard there, and they used to deliver the coal and the coke on a wagon drawn by two horses.
Saturday morning pictures at the ABC cinema anybody?! Mill Hill (open-air) swimming pool........ Scratch Woods, and the railway tunnel!
NOOOOOOOOOO!!!! 😭 My boyfriend’s station is Totteridge & Whetstone and mine is Edgware. A LINK BETWEEN THESE TWO NORTHERN LINE BRANCHES WOULD BE SOOOO SO SO SO SO CONVENIENT AND SAVE ME SO MUCH TIME!
Great video sir.
nice video Geoff!
I wonder what the different routes would have been like on the Northern line had this been realised? The in-train announcement would have to say something like "This is a Northern line train via Bank and Mill Hill East terminating at Edgware".