Vauxhall station

Vauxhall London Underground National Rail
Vauxhall
Location of Vauxhall in Greater London
Location Vauxhall
Local authority London Borough of Lambeth
Managed by South Western Railway
Station code VXH
DfT category B
Number of platforms 8
Accessible Yes (National Rail only)
Fare zone 1 and 2
London Underground annual entry and exit
2013 Increase 25.15 million[1]
2014 Increase 27.51 million[1]
2015 Decrease 26.83 million[1]
2016 Increase 32.23 million[1]
2017 Decrease 30.83 million[1]
National Rail annual entry and exit
2012–13 Increase 19.066 million[2]
2013–14 Increase 19.402 million[2]
2014–15 Increase 21.111 million[2]
2015–16 Decrease 20.932 million[2]
2016–17 Increase 22.483 million[2]
Key dates
11 July 1848 Opened (LSWR)
23 July 1971 Opened (London Underground)
Other information
Lists of stations
External links
WGS84 51°29′07″N 0°07′22″W / 51.4854°N 0.1229°W / 51.4854; -0.1229Coordinates: 51°29′07″N 0°07′22″W / 51.4854°N 0.1229°W / 51.4854; -0.1229
London transport portal
UK Railways portal

Vauxhall (/ˈvɒksɔːl/, VOK-sawl) is a National Rail, London Underground and London Buses interchange station in central London. It is at the Vauxhall Cross road junction opposite the southern approach to Vauxhall Bridge over the River Thames in the district of Vauxhall. The mainline station is run by the South Western Railway and is the first stop on the South Western main line from London Waterloo towards Clapham Junction and the south west. The underground station is on the Victoria line and the station is close to St George Wharf Pier for river services.

The station was opened by the London and South Western Railway in 1848 as "Vauxhall Bridge Station". It was rebuilt in 1856 after a large fire, and given its current name in 1862. In the early 20th century, Vauxhall saw significant use as a stop for trains delivering milk from across the country into London. The tube station opened in 1971 as part of the Victoria line extension towards Brixton, while the bus station opened in 2004. It remains an important local interchange on the London transport network.

Location

The station sits just to the east of Vauxhall Bridge, on a viaduct with eight platforms, straddling South Lambeth Road and South Lambeth Place, alongside Vauxhall Cross.[3] On the National Rail network it is the next station on the South Western main line along from London Waterloo, 1 mile 29 chains (2.2 km) to the south-west. On the Underground it is on the Victoria line between Pimlico to the north and Stockwell to the south.[4] The area has several surrounding railways, including the line from Victoria to Streatham.[5] The station is on the boundary of zones 1 and 2 of the London Travelcard area and, although a through station, it is classed as a central London terminus for ticketing purposes.[6]

There is a bus station located north next to the station offering services to various parts of London. The bus station, at ground level across the road from the rail station, has a photovoltaic roof supplying much of its electricity. It is the second-busiest London bus station, after Victoria.[7]

History

Mainline station

A 1912 Railway Clearing House map of lines around Clapham Junction. Vauxhall station is at the extreme right of this map

The station is incorporated within the Nine Elms to Waterloo Viaduct. It was opened by the London and South Western Railway (LSWR) as "Vauxhall Bridge Station" on 11 July 1848 when the main line was extended from Nine Elms to Waterloo, then known as "Waterloo Bridge Station". The viaduct was constructed to minimize property disturbances; nevertheless some 700 properties were demolished extending the line past Nine Elms and through Vauxhall.[8]

When Vauxhall was opened, there was no conventional way of an inspector moving through the length of a train to check tickets, so it was used as a ticket stop, like several other stations. As a train arrived at Vauxhall, it would stop for as long as necessary while all tickets could be examined and collected.[9][10]

On 13 April 1856, the station caught fire and was almost totally destroyed. The line was quickly repaired and services through to Waterloo resumed without much delay.[11] After being rebuilt, the station was renamed "Vauxhall" in 1862.[12][lower-alpha 1] In the same year, the LSWR widened the main line through the station.[14] Vauxhall was remodelled in 1936, which included an overhaul of the signalling system up to Waterloo.[15]

Milk trains

In 1921, United Dairies opened a major creamery and milk bottling plant opposite Vauxhall station.[16] Subsequently, milk trains regularly stopped at the station.[17][5] The regular daily milk train was from Torrington, but services from all over the West Country would stop at Clapham Junction in the evening,[18] and reduce their length by half so that they did not block Vauxhall station while unloading. They would then proceed to Vauxhall, and pull into the Up Windsor Local platform, where a discharge pipe was provided to the creamery on the other side of the road.[17][19] There was also pedestrian access from below the station, under the road to the depot, in the tunnel where the pipeline ran. Unloaded trains would then proceed to Waterloo, where they would reverse and return to Clapham Junction to pick up the other half of the train. The procedure was then repeated, so that the entire milk train was unloaded between the end of evening peak traffic and the start of the following morning.[19]

Modern developments

In 2017, work begun to modernise the station layout and reduce congestion as part of an £800 million works programme to improve access to Waterloo. The existing lift was replaced with a new staircase between platforms 7 and 8.[20]

Underground

Vauxhall with a train to London Waterloo in 2002.

The first proposed underground station at Vauxhall was as part of the West and South London Junction Railway. The line intended to connect Paddington to Oval via Vauxhall, crossing the River Thames slightly downstream of Vauxhall Bridge. It was rejected in January 1901 for failing to comply with Standing Orders and giving correct notice of eviction, and the plans were quietly shelved.[21] Another abandoned scheme to connect Cannon Street with Wimbledon would have seen an interchange at Vauxhall; these plans were scrapped in 1902 owing to lack of funds.[22]

The current deep tube London Underground station is on the Victoria line, which was the first major post-war underground project in Central London. The line was given approval to be extended from Victoria underneath the Thames to Vauxhall (and onwards to Brixton) in March 1966. To construct the escalator shaft, the ground beneath it was frozen with brine.[23] The station platforms were designed by Design Research Unit and decorated with a motif from the 19th century Vauxhall Gardens.[24][25] At the same time, Vauxhall Cross road junction was rebuilt in order to accommodate the new underground station.[26] It was opened on 23 July 1971 by Princess Alexandra.[12][24]

In October 1982, the first automated ticketing system on the Underground was installed at Vauxhall on an experimental basis. The two machines were a "Tenfare" which sold the ten most popular single tickets, and "Allfare" which supplied single and return tickets to any tube station. The experiment ran until July 1983, and was subsequently used in the design of the rollout of the Underground ticketing system across the network.[27]

Bus

The bus station opened in 2004. It was designed by Arup Associates and features a distinctive metallic design.[28]

Services

National Rail

Vauxhall railway station platforms from the western end.

Vauxhall rail station is served by South Western Railway to and from London Waterloo. The typical off-peak service is 26 trains per hour to/from London Waterloo, consisting of:

Underground

Vauxhall underground station is between Pimlico and Stockwell with a peak time service frequency of 36 trains per hour, or around one every 100 seconds.[29]

River

London River Services are available from nearby St George Wharf Pier.[30]

Preceding station   London Underground   Following station
towards Brixton
Victoria line
National Rail
London Waterloo   South Western Railway
South Western Main Line		   Clapham Junction or
Queenstown Road
(Battersea)

Incidents

  • On 11 September 1880, a light engine collided with a service from Waterloo to Hampton. Five passengers were killed.[31]
  • On 29 August 1912, a light engine collided with a rake of nine carriages. One passenger was killed and 43 were injured.[32]
  • On 20 September 1934, two electric suburban trains collided at Vauxhall. The driver of one train and a passenger were taken to St Thomas' Hospital for treatment.[33]
  • On 9 October 2000, an untrained student worker was hit by a train near Vauxhall station while unsupervised. An inquest in May 2002 returned a verdict of unlawful killing.[34]
  • On 5 May 2016, a fire broke out in one of the signal cables at Vauxhall station. Services from Waterloo through the station were cancelled and the next major down station, Clapham Junction was closed as an overcrowding measure.[35][36]

Name

The name Vauxhall is phonetically similar to the Russian word for railway station, вокзал (vokzal). One theory for this similarity is that Tsar Nicholas I visited Britain in the mid-19th century to study the railway network. At the time, every train on the South Western Railway called at Vauxhall as a ticket stop. From this, the Tsar concluded that Vauxhall was a major transport interchange, and the word was introduced as the generic term in Russian.[37]

References

Notes

  1. ↑ A station in Birmingham called "Vauxhall" had been opened by the London and North Western Railway on 1 March 1869; it was renamed "Vauxhall and Duddeston" on 1 November 1889 and "Duddeston" on 6 May 1974.[13]

Citations

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 "Multi-year station entry-and-exit figures" (XLSX). London Underground station passenger usage data. Transport for London. January 2018. Retrieved 22 July 2018.
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 "Station usage estimates". Rail statistics. Office of Rail Regulation. Please note: Some methodology may vary year on year.
  3. ↑ "Vauxhall (Ground Floor)". National Rail Enquiries. Retrieved 12 September 2018.
  4. ↑ Brown, Joe. London Railway Atlas. Ian Allan. p. 39. ISBN 978-0-7110-3819-6.
  5. 1 2 Davies & Grant 1983, p. 68.
  6. ↑ "Section A" (PDF). National Fares Manual 98. Association of Train Operating Companies. Retrieved 2 January 2010.
  7. ↑ Glancey, Jonathan (11 April 2005). "Architecture – Route master". The Guardian. Retrieved 26 June 2018.
  8. ↑ Jackson 1984, p. 213-215.
  9. ↑ Patmore 1982, p. 171.
  10. ↑ Bradley 2015, p. 52.
  11. ↑ "Destruction Of Vauxhall Railway Station". The Times. London. 14 April 1856. Retrieved 19 September 2018. (Subscription required (help)).
  12. 1 2 Butt 1995, p. 238.
  13. ↑ Butt 1995, pp. 83,238.
  14. ↑ "Railway Intelligence". The Times. London. 11 April 1862. p. 10. Retrieved 12 September 2018. (Subscription required (help)).
  15. ↑ "Southern Railway Improvements". The Times. London. 16 May 1936. p. 8. Retrieved 19 September 2018. (Subscription required (help)).
  16. ↑ "United Dairies, Limited". The Times. London. 12 November 1921. p. 17+. Retrieved 12 September 2018. (Subscription required (help)).
  17. 1 2 Course 1962, p. 92.
  18. ↑ Maidment 2015, p. 15.
  19. 1 2 "The Torrington Milk Train". SVS Films. 21 January 2012.
  20. ↑ "Network Rail invites passengers to learn more about Vauxhall station improvements". Network Rail (Press release). 13 March 2017. Retrieved 12 September 2018.
  21. ↑ Badsey-Ellis 2005, p. 98.
  22. ↑ Badsey-Ellis 2005, p. 135.
  23. ↑ Day & Reed 2010, pp. 163,168.
  24. 1 2 Day & Reed 2010, p. 171.
  25. ↑ Lawrence 1994, p. 197.
  26. ↑ "Vauxhall takes on new look". The Times. London. 9 April 1970. p. 5. Retrieved 19 September 2018. (Subscription required (help)).
  27. ↑ Day & Reed 2010, p. 184.
  28. ↑ "An Ode To Vauxhall Bus Station". September 2016. Retrieved 12 September 2018.
  29. ↑ "Victoria line trains now run every 100 seconds making it the second most frequent line in the world". London Evening Standard. 22 May 2017. Retrieved 19 September 2018.
  30. ↑ "MBNA Thames Clippers Timetable" (Timetable). 21 May 2018. Retrieved 14 September 2018.
  31. ↑ "The Vauxhall Railway Accident". The Times. London. 28 September 1880. p. 4. Retrieved 12 September 2018. (Subscription required (help)).
  32. ↑ Brodrick, Nick. "LSWR "lavatory brake third"". Steam Railway. Bauer Media (375, 30 April – 27 May 2010): 56.
  33. ↑ "Electric Trains In Collision". The Times. London. 21 September 1934. p. 12. Retrieved 19 September 2018. (Subscription required (help)).
  34. ↑ "Student rail worker 'unlawfully killed'". BBC News. 20 May 2002. Retrieved 12 September 2018.
  35. ↑ "Vauxhall Station fire: Ongoing disruption follows blaze". BBC News. 5 May 2016. Retrieved 12 September 2018.
  36. ↑ "Vauxhall station fire disrupts London rail services". 5 May 2016. Retrieved 12 September 2018.
  37. ↑ Reeves, Phil (21 September 1997). "From Vauxhall to Vokzal". The Independent. Retrieved 12 September 2018.

Sources

  • Butt, R. V. J. (1995). The Directory of Railway Stations: details every public and private passenger station, halt, platform and stopping place, past and present (1st ed.). Sparkford: Patrick Stephens Ltd. ISBN 978-1-85260-508-7. OCLC 60251199.
  • Badsey-Ellis, Antony (2005). London's Lost Tube Schemes. Capital Transport. ISBN 185414-293-3.
  • Bradley, Simon (2015). The Railways - Nation, Network and People. Profile Books. ISBN 978-1-84668-209-4.
  • Course, Edwin (1962). London railways. B. T. Batsford.
  • Davies, R; Grant, M.D. (1983). London and its railways. David & Charles. ISBN 0-7153-8107-5.
  • Day, John R; Reed, John (2010) [1963]. The Story of London's Underground. Capital Transport. ISBN 978-1-85414-341-9.
  • Jackson, Alan (1984) [1969]. London's Termini (New Revised ed.). London: David & Charles. ISBN 0-330-02747-6.
  • Lawrence, David (1994). Underground Architecture. Capital Transport. ISBN 978-1-854-14160-6.
  • Maidment, David (2015). A Privileged Journey: From Enthusiast to Professional Railwayman. Pen and Sword. ISBN 978-1-473-85949-4.
  • Patmore, John Allan (1982). A Regional History of the Railways of Great Britain: Southern England. David & Charles. ISBN 978-0-715-38365-0.
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