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HISTORY The first such deep-level railway, the City & South London Railway (C&SLR) had opened in 1890 and its success had resulted in spate of proposals to Parliament for other deep-level routes under the capital. However, by 1901 few of these railway companies had actually made a start on construction due to financing problems. In 1901 and 1902 , Yerkes purchased the struggling Metropolitan District Railway (MDR) - now the District Line - and four of these embryonic companies and proceeded quickly to begin construction work. The three lines built were:
The BS&WR and GNP&BR both opened in 1906 and the CCE&HR opened in 1907 . Informally, the UER lines became known as the "Yerkes tube". Although the four railway lines were in common ownership under the UER and shared directors, technology and, in the case of the three new lines, Architectural style; they were not initially one company. Combined branding as the "Underground Group" and shared ticketing arrangements between the lines enabled the UER to develop a dominant position in relationship to London's other underground railways of the time and in 1910 the UER's lines formally merged as the '''London Electric Railway Company''' (LER). In 1913 the LER was enlarged by the acquisition of the C&SLR and the Central London Railway (CLR), thereby bringing all but three of London's underground lines at that time into common ownership under the Underground Group brand. In the years after World War I the LER's lines saw greater integration and a series of improvements in rolling stock, station developments and extensions of lines to new areas away from the centre of London (see articles of individual lines for details). In 1933 The Underground Group was Nationalised along with the Great Northern & City Railway (GN&CR) and the Metropolitan Railway (MR) as part of the London Passenger Transport Board . EQUIPMENT AND ROLLING STOCK The MDR had begun . Eventually, the system would become standard for the whole of the London Underground. Like its chief director, Engineer-in-Chief and General Manager of the company was an American, James Russell Chapman , and much of the equipment used on the lines was imported from the United States . Specially-designed passenger rolling stock was required and because of the original American influence, these have been termed "cars" on the London Underground rather the more usual British term "carriages". Lifts were supplied by the Otis Elevator Company of New York . The first railway Escalator came into use on 4 October 1911 at Earl's Court between the Piccadilly and District Lines. The lines shared a Power Station at Lots Road in Chelsea , which later served the London Underground as a whole until the beginning of the 21st Century when its increasingly obsolete equipment lead to its closure. SEE ALSO Leslie Green - Architect of stations on the Underground Electric Railways Company's lines |