South Kentish Town disused station; London Underground : 1997 : "manufacturer's tile"

            A series of images taken from a presentation I used to give on London Underground's Disused or non-operational stations when I was one of the curators at the London Transport Museum in the 1990s. Part of the day job was inspecting disused stations to see what was still there and the sites ranged from places abandoned nearly a centuty earlier, such as King William Street station that closed in 1900, up to stations such as Aldwych that had just closed.

There was only one 'easy' way to visit the site of South Kentish Town station that had opened as part of the Northern line (Charing Cros, Euston & Hampstead Railway) in 1907 and that closed in 1924 and that was by hopping off a service train. This is the scene in May 1996 when we travelled up, by arrnagement, in the cab of a now long gone 1959-tube stock train and the train operator stopped in the tunnel alongside the long removed platform. You had to be carefully hopping out of the front cab door so as not to step on the negative current conductor rail directly below you or the postive 'juice' rail to the side nor the running rails! Anyhow, here we are about to be left to exploring, the driver making sure we are 'all clear' before be proceeds north towards Kentish Town station. He may have told the guard the reason for the unscheduled stop in the middle of nowhere but there may have been some curious passengers looking out of the front cars wondering what was going on!

The 1906/07 stations featured extensive use of ceramic tiles at street and platform level. Those at lower levels were all manufactured by Maws & Co., of Shropshire, who entered into an agreement with the London based concern of W. B. Simpson who had the massive contract to fit the enormous quantity of tiles needed to complete stations. A very few of these manufacturer's tiles still exist on the Underground to this day despite widespread removal or replacement of tiling.

Taken on: July 17, 2023

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London

Transport

tube

tube station

underground station

abandoned station

disused station

non-operational station

Northern line

Charing Cross Euston & Hampstead Railway

Leslei Green

Charles Tyson Yerkes

Underground Electric Railways of London

UERL

1907

tiles

public transport

infrastructure

cosntruction

architecture

station architecture

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1997

staff visit

Mike Ashworth Collection

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Sets appears in: • London Underground 'disused' stations • London Transport

Groups appears in: • UK Flickr users • Tiles Tiles Tiles more » • Public Transportation • Lost London • That Old Timey Feeling • A Picture of Britain • Public Transport Around the World • * L O N D O N - T R A N S P O R T * • All Safe Pics Welcome • Old London • "U.K. Photo Gallery" ( All Welcome ) • PLANET EARTH BACK IN THE DAY « less

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