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INITIAL DEVELOPMENT Early schemes The first half of the 19th Century saw rapid development in Train services to London, but many mainline termini (particularly those whose railways came from the north and west) were situated some distance from the City Of London . When the “New Road” (now Farringdon Street) was being constructed in the 1830s, the plan was formed to build a railway in a covered way along its route through the River Fleet valley. It was the time of the Railway Mania and many schemes for shallow underground railways, to counteract the ever-increasing traffic congestion in the capital, were put forward from 1844 onwards: few were successful. In 1851, following the , near whose terminus at King's Cross the line was to pass, also backed the scheme. On 7 August 1854 the whole scheme was reincorporated, and the name ’’’Metropolitan Railway’’’ (MetR) was adopted. Metropolitan Railway (1863) The driving force behind the new railway was Charles Pearson (1793-1862). For some years the building of the railway lapsed as it proved impossible to raise the capital. When in 1858 Pearson advocated the provision of “cheap railway accommodation to enable working classes to reside in their adjacent country districts” the money at last became available, and work began. Between Paddington and Kings Cross the form of construction was Cut-and-cover ; from there onwards the line was left in open cutting. Mixed-gauge (both standard- and broad-gauge) track was laid. The terminal station at Farringdon was originally called Farringdon Street: the road itself was Victoria Street, renamed Farringdon Road in 1863. Public traffic, after many delays caused by excavation having fallen in and by the Fleet Ditch Sewer bursting into the works at Farringdon; and including additional work required after a Board of Trade inspection, began on 10 January 1863. 40 000 passengers were carried over the line that day. The Railway was worked initially by the GWR with its broad-gauge locomotives: later Sir (GNR) and the London And North Western Railway both loaned rolling stock. The GNR in particular loaned a few smoke-condensing locomotives (intended for its line from Kings Cross to Farringdon); and other locomotives which had been adapted. By 1 October the MetR were running its own services and the GNR suburban service had also began. The GWR itself ran some broad-gauge trains from Windsor to Farringdon and between Addison Road (later Kensington Olympia and the City later in the year. The MetR operated steam trains for forty years. : ''for further notes on MetR line openings see'' Metropolitan And Metropolitan District Railways From the outset the MetR banned smoking from its carriages, to avoid adding to the difficulties of steam operation in tunnel. Eventually it provided smoking carriages in acknowledgement of public opinion in 1874. A pioneer of workmen's fares, the MetR introduced them on two early morning trains, at first for 3pence return fare; that was later reduced to one penny single on one train each way daily. By 1880 the 'Met' was carrying 40 million passengers a year. The MetR began expanding its network into the suburbs in 1868. Railways always had a great deal of influence on the areas through which they ran, not least in this case: in the 1930s the term "Metroland" was coined by the Metropolitan's marketing department to tempt house purchasers into their territory: the railway bought up extra land adjacent to the railway and built houses in a spectacularly practical example of demand creation. Metropolitan District Railway The Metropolitan Railway and the Metropolitan District Railway (District) are inextricably linked. Both were empowered to complete the ( London, Brighton And South Coast Railway ) via the southern part of the Circle; and MetR trains to New Cross via the northern route. The trains used the Thames Tunnel . : ''for further notes on District line openings see'' Metropolitan And Metropolitan District Railways DEEP-LEVEL TUBE LINES Advances in deep-level tunnel design came thick and fast. Tunnelling Shields allowed stable tunnels to be constructed deep underground, and the world's first underground tube railway was the Tower Subway beneath the River Thames south of Tower Hill in 1870 . While this was soon discontinued as a rail service because of poor patronage, better shields and electric locomotive traction appealed to engineers for more ambitious schemes. The result was the City & South London Railway , which linked King William Street (close to today's Monument Station ) and Stockwell . The ride was unpleasantly rough and the lack of windows seemed to have a detrimental psychological effect. In due time five tube railways were operating:
: ''see individual articles for each line give its history'' The presence of six independent operators running different Tube lines was inconvenient. In many places passengers had to walk some distance above ground to change between lines. Also, the costs associated with running such a system were heavy, and as a result many companies looked to financiers who could give them the money they needed to expand into the lucrative suburbs. CHARLES YERKES Charles Yerkes was an American tycoon who first bought the powers of the failing Hampstead tube in 1900; the following year he secured effective control of the District Railway with a view to its electrification. A few months later he formed the Metropolitan District Electric Traction Company (MDETC) with those two lines and arranged to build Lots Road Power Station . Having then acquired control of Piccadilly and Bakerloo railways the MDETC was reconstituted as the Underground Electric Railways of London Ltd (Underground) on 9 April 1902. That company also owned many tram lines and proceeded to buy the London General Omnibus Company, creating an organisation colloquially known as the Combine. LATER CHANGES
The only railways outside the Underground network were the Waterloo & City (which remained separate until 1994 ) and Metropolitan Railways. In 1933 , a public corporation called the London Passenger Transport Board was created. The Underground Group, the Metropolitan line and all the independent bus and tram lines were placed under the Board, an organisation which approximated the scope of the current Transport for London. Expansion took place at a rapid pace, driving the Northern and Bakerloo Lines out into the suburbs of northern London. Architect Charles Holden 's memorable station designs have brightened the commuters' journey both on these lines and elsewhere with a style which still looks fresh today. World War II The outbreak of World War II , and especially The Blitz , led to the use of many Tube stations as Air-raid shelters. They were particularly suited to this purpose, but sadly a small number of horrific accidents occurred, notably at Bethnal Green . Other stations and sections of line were given other uses:
POST-WAR DEVELOPMENTS Following the war, travel congestion continued to rise. The construction of the carefully planned Victoria Line on a diagonal northeast-southwest alignment beneath central London attracted much of the extra traffic caused by expansion after the war. It was designed so that almost all of the stations along its length allowed interchange with other lines, and it was the first underground line to use Automatic Train Operation (ATO). Remarkably, Steam Locomotive s continued to be used on the Underground (as engineering trains) until as late as 1971 , several years after steam had been phased out on the national railway network. In 1977 , the Piccadilly Line was extended to Heathrow Airport . Jubilee Line The Jubilee Line was named in honour of Queen Elizabeth 's Silver Jubilee in 1977 , but did not open until two years later. During design and into initial construction it had been known as the ''Fleet Line'' as the route was planned to follow much of London's hidden River Fleet along The Strand and Fleet Street to Bank . During the 1990s it was diverted from the original route through Charing Cross to a new tunnel via Westminster and extending through the Docklands to Stratford in East London. The stations on the Jubilee Line Extension are particularly spacious and stylish, each designed by a leading architect. London Underground states that North Greenwich Station , for example, ''"is large enough to contain 3,000 double-decker buses or an ocean liner the size of the RMS Queen Mary within its walls."'' Canary Wharf station is larger in volume than 1 Canada Square , one of the huge towers that dominates the Docklands area; it was built on a barge that was then sunk into the Thames to move it to its final position. Canary Wharf is also notable for being the first London Underground station to play host to a wedding; this event took place in 2003 . All Platforms between North Greenwich and Westminster incorporate automated platform-edge doors which are designed to minimise the wind resistance of the train and for noise abatement purposes; as a side benefit they also assist in the prevention of Suicide s. They are a predominant feature of the Jubilee Line Extension , and there are no plans at present to extend their installation to the rest of the Line or overall system. These modern stations include Lifts (elevators) to ease access to all parts of the station complex and were the first stations on the London system to be fully Wheelchair accessible. Public-Private Partnership Since January 2003, the London Underground has been operated as a , WS Atkins , Bombardier , EDF Energy and RWE Thames Water . Creation The Mayor Of London , Ken Livingstone , was sceptical about the practicality of the PPP plan, and brought in the American Bob Kiley to repeat his success with the New York City Subway using public bond finance. Taking office in 2000 as London's first directly elected Mayor, it was difficult for Livingstone to block the PPP process, which was entirely in the national Government's hands as it still owned London Transport. Livingstone mounted a legal challenge, but eventually dropped it as it was unlikely to succeed, and Metronet and Tube Lines began operations in January 2003 . It was later revealed that the legal challenge had cost £ 4.2m directly, as well as £36m reimbursed to the bidders for costs incurred because of the six-month delay. {Link without Title} In March 2005 the House Of Commons Public Accounts Committee , charged with ensuring value for money in public spending, published a report {Link without Title} concluding that this remained to be demonstrated, primarily because of the untested structure of the 30-year contracts. These are to be revised every 7.5 years, meaning that the ultimate price for the promised £15.7bn of investment is still unknown. It notes that using public bond finance would have saved £90m a year in financing costs, even though the Government guaranteed repayment of 95% of costs in the event of premature termination, and the contracts place limits and exemptions on financial risk transferred to the infrastructure companies. The system still receives an annual public subsidy of £1bn, but its spending is now determined entirely by the infracos' interpretation of their 2000-page PPP contracts. And although the private operators are expected to receive 18–20% returns on capital, for the type of risk associated with major upgrades, most of the work is low-risk maintenance and replacement. The public sector procurement option (using private companies for specific major projects) would also have saved the £455m cost of concluding the PPP contracts, not to mention the five years' delay the contract negotiations caused. Performance In April 2005, Bob Kiley pressed for an urgent review of the PPP, describing its performance as "bordering on disaster". A week later the chief executive of Metronet was sacked, after complaints that it had made £50m profit {Link without Title} despite being behind on all its major works. By April 2005 it had started work on only 13 station refurbishments (instead of 32 as scheduled), and was more than a year behind on the refurbishment of 78 District Line trains. It was also behind on its track replacement programme, having completed 28 km instead of the anticipated 48 km. TfL commented in April 2005 that new equipment promised by Metronet had failed to materialise—"We were supposed to be getting private sector expertise and technology with the PPP (Public Private Partnership) but instead they are just using the same old kit." A TfL spokesman said that Tube Lines was performing much better than Metronet because it had competitively tendered contracts for its capital programme. Metronet, by contrast, had handed the work to its shareholders. In March 2005, the House of Commons Transport Select Committee noted that "Availability is the most important factor for Tube travellers. All the infracos needed to do to meet their availability benchmarks was to perform only a little worse than in the past. On most lines, they did not even manage that." {Link without Title} Metronet was also declared at fault by an accident investigators' report into a May 2004 derailment at White City, for failing to implement sufficient safety checks despite being ordered to do so by TfL.[http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,,1286880,00.html Flooding Flood ing is an increasing problem for the system. The ground water of London has been rising since the 1960s , after the closing of industries such as Breweries and Paper Mill s that had previously extracted large volumes of water. By mid 2001 , London Underground was pumping 30,000 cubic metres of water out of its tunnels each day. Until the completion of the Thames Flood Barrier in 1986 , there was also a strong danger of flooding from the Thames itself. A series of floodgates were erected in the tunnels such that they would seal the affected sections of tunnel closed, allowing services to continue to run elsewhere on the line. The floodgates were no longer necessary once the Thames flood barrier came into service, but they remain in place and are tested three times a year. NOTES
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