Alphabetical London: Abbey Road - Addiscombe

On 17th November, I embarked on the stupidest project I've ever thought of; to visit all 598 Greater London rail, light rail and cable car stations in alphabetical order. Great things often start small, and so it was the case here, as I began this caper with...

Abbey Road (ABR)

Station opened: 31st August 2011

Railway opened: 1846 (part of the Eastern Counties & Thames Junction Railway)

Served by: Docklands Light Railway

Zone: 2/3
Passenger entries/exits (2016/17): 1.204 million

Stations served (frequency):

• Stratford International (6 trains per hour)
• Woolwich Arsenal (6 trains per hour)

Abbey Road lies on the section of DLR between Canning Town and Stratford International, originally built in 1846 by the Eastern Counties & Thames Junction Railway, and later part of the North London Line between Richmond and North Woolwich. Opened in 2011, it has a small residential catchment area to the east, and light industry to the west, with the Stratford Market Jubilee Line Depot immediately adjoining the station site. Upon exiting the station you are deposited on a bridge that gives the station its name (which itself takes its name from the former nearby Stratford Langthorne Abbey, once the 5th largest abbey in the country until Henry VIII started dissolving them). It's not the most inspiring view it has to be said, faced with construction hoardings on the other side of the road and a row of houses to the left, with a distant sighting of the gleaming rooftops of Canary Wharf over warehouses to the south. The station itself is a standard 2 platform affair, quiet late on a Friday morning. Of particular note is a poster filled with puns on Beatles songs advising confused tourists that this isn't *that* Abbey Road (that one's in St John's Wood).

 

 

Trains to Woolwich Arsenal are every 10 minutes, so I don't have to wait too long to get on with the first proper journey of the project, down to Woolwich Arsenal itself (won't be here properly for quite some time), then onto an almost empty Southeastern National Rail service to arrive at...

Abbey Wood (ABW)

Station opened: 30th July 1849

Railway opened: 30th July 1849 (part of the South Eastern Railway)

Served by: National Rail (Southeastern) (& Crossrail in 2018)

Zone: 4
Passenger entries/exits (2016/17): 2.989 million

Stations served:

• Barnehurst (2tph)
• Dartford(2tph)
• Gillingham (2tph)
• London Cannon Street (6tph via Woolwich Arsenal, 2tph via Sidcup)
• London Charing Cross (2tph)

Abbey Wood lies on the section of the North Kent Line between Dartford and Charlton, built and opened in 1849. The station is currently a building site, as the southeastern terminus of Crossrail prepares for services to Reading from 2019 (fingers crossed). One section of the refurbishment that is already operational is the new ticket hall, a bright, open space with wood beams lining the roof and very new ticket machines in the corner. The area outside the station is currently covered with more building works, so there's not much to see other than blue hoardings and orange hi-viz everywhere; the station opens onto a wide road bridge, from the other side of which there's a decent view over some of residential southeast London. It also allows for a wide view of the new sweeping station roof and gives an idea of the extent of the refurb of the station. One quirk is that, in preparation for Crossrail services, management of the station has been transferred to MTR, which creates the strange situation of a station being managed by one company but having all its trains managed by another.

 

One of the "rules" for this project is not planning my journeys between stations in advance, and it's as a result of this that I end up "missing" my first train, as the Charing Cross service departs just a minute or two before I arrive back at the station from the massive Sainsbury's just down the road. So it is that I have to wait for a Southeastern service to Cannon Street instead, where I change to take the District line all the way to Gunnersbury, where I change again for an Overground train to...

Acton Central (ACC)

Station opened: 1st August 1853 (as Acton; renamed Acton Central 1st November 1925)

Railway opened: 1853 (as the North and South Western Junction Railway)

Served by: London Overground
Zone: 3

Passenger entries/exits (2016/17): 1.932 million

Stations served:

• Richmond (4tph)
• Stratford (4tph)

Acton Central today lies on the stretch of Overground between Richmond and Willesden Junction, opened by the North and South Western Junction Railway in 1853 to link between the London and North Western Railway at Willesden and the London and South Western Railway at Kew (hence the name of the company). Acton Central station itself is a two-platform affair, with flower planters dotting the platforms at the southern ends and adding some colour to what is otherwise a very blandly coloured station. Some traces remain of the station's history, including ornate ironwork at the top of the platform canopy supports, but London Overground have very much stamped their orange brand everywhere. Immediately upon taking a picture a very deep voiced man comes on over the tannoy, but I can't make out whether he's telling me off or announcing next weekend's engineering works. Exiting the station brings me to the bustling Churchfield Road, with a row of shops and cafes to the west, and a level crossing immediately to the east (which surely causes quite some congestion in the evening; a steady stream of traffic passes by even in the early afternoon). The area definitely feels a lot busier than my first two locations, both in and out of the station.

 

There are a number of stations with Acton in the name; Acton Central is the first of 3 that start with Acton, and the next would be a right pain in the arse to get public transport to, so I decide to take a 10 minute walk, along residential streets filled with properties which regularly sell for over a million pounds. Goldsmith, Grafton, Messaline and Emanuel combine to bring me to...

Acton Main Line (AML)

Station opened: 1st February 1868 (as Acton; renamed Acton Main Line 1st November 1949)

Railway opened: 4th June 1838 (by the Great Western Railway)

Served by: Great Western Railway (& Crossrail from 2019)

Zone: 3

Passenger entries/exits (2016/17): 0.239 million

Stations served:

• Paddington (2tph)
• Hayes & Harlington (2tph)

Acton Main Line is the first station out of Paddington on the Great Western Main Line, opened in 1838 by the Great Western Railway. Despite its position, it actually gets a surprisingly sparse service; 2 trains an hour between Paddington and Hayes & Harlington. The station has three platforms, although at the moment only 2 are in use, and no real station building to speak of. The entrance is on a road bridge (are you spotting a theme here?), with a flight of stairs down to either platform, and ticket machines between. Outside the station is Harry's Bar Cafe, not looking particularly busy post-Friday lunchtime, and a few other shops past either end of the bridge. I finish taking pictures, and look to the information board by the top of the steps to see when my next train was; turns out I was in for a 25 minute wait. This gave me plenty of time to have a wander up platform 3 (some benches, a tiny shelter and not much else), have some lunch, realise I'd forgotten to tap in, go back to the top of the stairs, come back again, finish my lunch and watch someone on the opposite platform walk all the way to the end and back again.



Eventually the 13:51 came into view, and I boarded for the short hop to Ealing Broadway, where I changed for a District line service down to...

Acton Town (ACT)

Station opened: 1st July 1879 (as Mill Hill Park; renamed Acton Town 1st March 1910)
Railway opened: 1st July 1879 (by the District Railway)
Served by: London Underground District & Piccadilly lines
Zone: 3
Passenger entries/exits (2016): 6.27 million
Stations served:

• Upminster (6tph)
• Ealing Broadway (6tph)
• Cockfosters (~17tph)
• Rayners Lane (6tph [2tph continue to Uxbridge])
• Heathrow Terminal 4 (6tph)
• Heathrow Terminal 5 (6tph)

Acton Town, my first Underground station! The station is an important junction between the District and Piccadilly lines, and was opened by the District Railway in 1879 on an extension from Turnham Green to Ealing Broadway. There are 4 platforms, with 1 & 4 generally used by District line trains and 2 & 3 by Piccadilly line trains. Concrete features heavily in the design of the station, with the canopies and supports, and the bridge between platforms all cast in varying shades of unappealing grey. Approaching the ticket hall I pass the station book swap, or at least an empty shelf advertising a book swap. The ticket hall itself is high-ceilinged, with tall windows in the front wall, allowing some of the afternoon light through. The station is a Charles Holden design, or redesign I should say; the station was rebuilt twice, firstly in 1910, and then in 1932 in preparation for the arrival of the Piccadilly line (so maybe I should really say reredesign). Outside the station a steady stream of traffic rumbles over the bridge; on the other side one can see the Transport Museum depot to the north of the station, along with the tangle of tracks that take trains north or west to Ealing. One other feature Acton Town can boast is a toilet, something I'm very grateful for (although I do have to pay for the privilege).

Conveniences taken advantage of, I catch a Piccadilly service to South Kensington, change for a District service to Victoria, change again for a Southern service down to East Croydon then a final change onto a tram to reach...

Addington Village (ADV)

Station opened: 10th May 2000

Railway opened: 10th May 2000 (by Croydon Tramlink)

Served by: Tramlink

Zone: Tram

Passenger entries/exits (2014!): 1.35 million

Stations served:

• New Addington (8tph)
• Wimbledon (8tph)

Addington Village, also known as Addington Interchange, lies on the New Addington branch of the Tramlink system, built in the late 90s and opened in 2000. The station is a standard tram station, with two raised platforms and not a whole lot else; a couple of ticket machines, some information displays and a few bins. Outside the station the main feature is a large bus station (hence Addington Interchange), from which you can catch services to Bromley, Thornton Heath, Purley or even Caterham. The only other notable building I can see is a petrol station on the other side of the roundabout, hidden by trees; the actual Addington Village is a little way down the road.



While uploading a picture of the station to Twitter, I nearly fail to spot the tram pulling in to take me on to my next destination, leading to an embarrassing jog up the platform; I wave an apologetic hand to the driver as I board. The tram takes me to Sandilands, where I change for a tram towards Beckenham Junction to alight at...

Addiscombe (ADS)

Station opened: 23rd May 2000

Railway opened: 19th August 1885 (by the Woodside and South Croydon Joint Railway)

Served by: Tramlink

Zone: Tram

Passenger entries/exits (2014): 1.18 million

Stations served: 

• Beckenham Junction (6tph)
• Elmers End (8tph)
• West Croydon (8tph)
• Wimbledon (4tph)

Addiscombe is situated on the Beckenham Junction/Elmers End branch of the Tramlink system, and was opened on the site of the old Bingham Road Halt of the Woodside and South Croydon Joint Railway, a railway that the constructors of Tramlink found rather useful when it came to building the network. The station is again a standard Tramlink station (see above [I'm sorry, architecturally Tramlink stations are very boring and homogenous]), bounded at either end by a road; Bingham Road at the south and Lower Addiscombe Road at the north. The original railway crossed both of these roads by bridge, but now level crossings halt traffic every few minutes, which must be vaguely inconvenient for any drivers round here. Outside the station is the main shopping area of Addiscombe, including a cafe imaginatively named "The Tram Stop". Otherwise it's your usual mix of estate agents, charity shops, banks and fast food outlets, busy with families and schoolchildren free for the day.



My next destination is a bit of a pain to get to from here, and it's getting dark anyway, so Addiscombe ends up being my finishing point for the first day of this project. Importantly it's been fun, and interesting, so I have high hopes going forward. 7 down, 591 to go...