Memories of Holborn Viaduct

[NorthKent1989]

There’s probably already a similar threads but I did search and nothing came up so here goes

Much like the Broad Street thread what are your memories of using Holborn Viaduct?

Unlike Broad Street, HV was at least replaced with City Thameslink (I wish for it to be renamed Holborn Thameslink as a nod to its predecessor)

 

[ChiefPlanner]

None really - but I am advised it had an Area Manager at MS1 at one time- the lowest BR management grade - on a par with Huntingdon and Newton Abbott. Jobs that ware easily cut out.

Myself and the wife did travel on the last service train - 2 and 4 EPB for the record , and it was a freezing cold January evening. We retired to the Cheshire Cheese to warm up.

 

[John Webb]

A few years ago St Albans South applied to the NRM for an eNtrance-eXit demonstration panel that was surplus to their requirements. The first time they delivered it it was not the demo panel we'd asked for but the N-X panel for Holborn Viaduct:

We asked if we could keep it because of the association with the 'Thameslink' line, but they said "No", alas!

 

[yorksrob]

Alas, Holborn Viaduct is the Southern Terminus I never got to (I have experienced The Cheshire Cheese though )

 

[Snow1964]

I only took a train there once (on the day of Prince Charles and Lady Diana’s wedding, so we could see some of the procession from Ludgate Hill bridge)

Vaguely remember it only had 3 working platforms by then, and a gap where presumably another double sided one had been removed. Wasn’t very pretty, the buffer stop ends had an ugly 1950s style office block with a roadway for parcels and newspaper vans cutting through one end of the building. Never considered going back again as it was so bland.

 

[30907]

I used it regularly to get to a summer holiday job in 1973(?), and I can recall leisure trips too before that. Offpeak it was pretty dead even back then.
The 3 short platforms were used by parcels traffic - specifically Fleet Street papers for Kent until they were transferred to Victoria mid 70s.

 

[John Webb]

Lot of information on Holborn Viaduct at http://www.disused-stations.org.uk/h/holborn_viaduct/index.shtml

 

[Grumbler]

I used to use it quite regularly. Often my morning train would arrive at the eastermost platform, which was so narrow it could take ages to file out, particularly if I was usually in one of the rear carriages because the front carriages were always full.
I did not mourn its passing.

 

[nlogax]

Lot of information on Holborn Viaduct at http://www.disused-stations.org.uk/h/holborn_viaduct/index.shtml

I'm always fascinated by the almost complete lack of clues that Holborn Viaduct station even existed! The eraser of redevelopment has had a profound impact on that part of the city.

 

[frodshamfella]

I used it a few times from Bexleyheath. There used to be an odd up working at 17.31, I used to catch. It cut out a lot of the usual stations on the Bexleyheath Line and terminated at HV, it then went off somewhere else. It wasn't particularly fast as it was behind a stopping service at 17.28, but was convenient for me as I needed to go to Farringdon on Wednesday evening. This was in the mid 80s apx. Holborn Viaduct then seemed almost a forgotten terminus.

 

[Richard Scott]

Went there January 1989, it was dark and had an old film camera so rubbish photo. EPB 5286, if I remember rightly (would need to check records to confirm).

 

[jfollows]

I had a summer job June-September (or so) 1983, in which I worked as an IBM mainframe operator at Philips in West Croydon. I lived in relatively cheap college accommodation (Imperial College) just south of the concrete jungle at Shepherd's Bush, nearest mainline station being Kensington Olympia.
One route I took to work was tube to St. Paul's and Holborn Viaduct to West Croydon, and if I did so it'd be in the mornings so in the opposite direction to the main traffic flow.
I don't have many memories, mainly of an unimpressive station crouched beneath some kind of concrete 1960s office block development. I mainly used it because I knew it wouldn't be there for much longer, I should have done the same for Broad Street but I have to admit that I never visited the latter.
Other routes, very much depending on time of day, were Olympia-Clapham Junction for an onward service to East Croydon - I usually chose the faster service at the price of a longer walk once I got to Croydon.

 

[contrex]

I can still remember the ride up the slope from Blackfriars in a green EPB one summer Saturday in 1964. Head out of the window, I still recall catching sight of the overall roof that can't have been there much longer. Five years later, roof gone, most the EPBs now rail blue.

 

[frodshamfella]

Off Peak was the only regular service to Sevenoaks via Catford ?

 

[Journeyman]

Off Peak was the only regular service to Sevenoaks via Catford ?

Yeah. It can't have been a particularly thrilling place to work! The service survives in the form of Thameslink trains that run into the terminal bays at Blackfriars.

 

[station_road]

It was always very quiet off peak - Cannon Street, although a much bigger station, was also eerily empty off peak in the 80s, the platforms full of empty units waiting for the evening rush hour and I think just a token shuttle to/from London Bridge

 

[steamybrian]

Off Peak was the only regular service to Sevenoaks via Catford ?

No- there was also the half hourly service to West Croydon via Herne Hill, Tulse Hill, Streatham, Wimbledon, Wall of Death, Sutton to West Croydon then I believe to London Bridge via Forest Hill (possibly?).

For the last 8 months of its life from about May 1989 to its closure in January 1990 platform 1 was taken out of use and only the island platform 2/3 was in use.
I was on the last train out of the station..!

 

[chrisdoward]

My moves for the Holborn Viaduct's last evening 26/01/90

3310/3209 Blackfriars - HolbornViaduct
3211/3202 Holborn Viaduct - Blackfriars
5602/5248 Blackfriars - Holborn Viaduct
6256/5491 Holborn Viaduct - Blackfriars
5466/5524 Blackfriars - Holborn Viaduct
3203/5623 Holborn Viaduct - Blackfriars
5615 Blackfriars - Holborn Viaduct
5462 Holborn Viaduct - West Dulwich
5170/5274 West Dulwich - Holborn Viaduct
5614/6241 Holborn Viaduct - Bickley (via Catford) Last Service Train

Without a timetable to refer to I'm unable able to remember which trains the units were on, apart from the last one

 

[NorthKent1989]

My great Uncle lived in Woolwich in the 1960s, and he recalled the only time he got on a HV train from Woolwich, he recalled that it called at all stations to Lewisham then non stop to Elephant & Castle the onto Blackfriars and HV, he said there was a diversion hence why they ran HV trains that one time.

 

[nw1]

No memories of Holborn Viaduct itself sadly, but I do have one memory of trains (EPBs) crossing the Thames on the Blackfriars rail bridge (is that its name?) which must have originated there. Can't remember the occasion but obviously in the 80s sometime, perhaps about 1983.

Remember the Holborn-Sanderstead service at East Croydon in 1986 operated by a mixture of 455s and EPBs (this came up in another thread a while back).

In fact the area that the Holborn Viaduct line traversed once south of the river is still, even now, a bit of a blind spot in my London geography. Not sure if I've ever visited, either by road or by rail, the polygon bounded by the A3, the Chatham main line through Brixton, the Dulwich-Crystal Palace-Gipsy Hill area, and the London Bridge-East Croydon main line.

 

[Jim Jehosofat]

None really - but I am advised it had an Area Manager at MS1 at one time- the lowest BR management grade - on a par with Huntingdon and Newton Abbott. Jobs that ware easily cut out.

Myself and the wife did travel on the last service train - 2 and 4 EPB for the record , and it was a freezing cold January evening. We retired to the Cheshire Cheese to warm up.

I remember a colleague of mine getting promotion to be Chief Clerk at Holborn Viaduct. It was graded as a CO3 at the time.

 

[Gloster]

I only used it once in the late 1980s when it already had closure hanging over it and I had a few hours to spare in London before heading back to France. The only thing I can remember was being desperate for a pee by the time I reached Otford and considering baling out there to find a loo. For some reason I had assumed that as the service was going to Sevenoaks, it would be corridor stock: it wasn’t. (I did make Sevenoaks’ loos safely: just.)

 

[greyman42]

I'm always fascinated by the almost complete lack of clues that Holborn Viaduct station even existed! The eraser of redevelopment has had a profound impact on that part of the city.

Yes, i was looking at picture of the old Ludgate Hill bridge. Completely unrecognisable today.

 

[contrex]

No- there was also the half hourly service to West Croydon via Herne Hill, Tulse Hill, Streatham, Wimbledon, Wall of Death, Sutton to West Croydon then I believe to London Bridge via Forest Hill (possibly?).

That makes me feel old. When I was a lad they mostly went on from Norwood Junction to Crystal Palace, Balham and Victoria. Headcode 06, although there were peak headcode 21 services that went to London Bridge, as did 17s that started at Blackfriars.

 

[Pinza-C55]

I worked trains into it as a guard from 1989 till closure but can hardly remember it. The only thing I miss is the bridge over the road which seemed to add to the appearance of Ludgate Hill - "iconic" I would call it.

 

[DelphDonkey]

Only London terminus I never properly got to. I did visit it once, some time in the 1980s, but as it was a Saturday it was shut. And it was still busier than Broad Street. (Through the street entrance doors I could see units stabled in the platforms - was that normal weekend practice?)

 

[ls2270]

No- there was also the half hourly service to West Croydon via Herne Hill, Tulse Hill, Streatham, Wimbledon, Wall of Death, Sutton to West Croydon then I believe to London Bridge via Forest Hill (possibly?).

For the last 8 months of its life from about May 1989 to its closure in January 1990 platform 1 was taken out of use and only the island platform 2/3 was in use.
I was on the last train out of the station..!

I can also add my name to the list of forum members who were on the last service train (the 1928 to Orpington) although there was an SEG railtour formed of 4CEP units that departed shortly afterwards.

 

[frodshamfella]

It was always very quiet off peak - Cannon Street, although a much bigger station, was also eerily empty off peak in the 80s, the platforms full of empty units waiting for the evening rush hour and I think just a token shuttle to/from London Bridge

Yes thats all there was at one time London Bridge shuttle during off peaks.

My great Uncle lived in Woolwich in the 1960s, and he recalled the only time he got on a HV train from Woolwich, he recalled that it called at all stations to Lewisham then non stop to Elephant & Castle the onto Blackfriars and HV, he said there was a diversion hence why they ran HV trains that one time.

I remember the Bexleyheath Peaks, and the Dartford loops must have been the same, went Lewisham, Peckham Rye, and Elephant and Castle before BF and HV. Now the Victoria services are slower I believe.

 

[NorthKent1989]

Yes thats all there was at one time London Bridge shuttle during off peaks.



I remember the Bexleyheath Peaks, and the Dartford loops must have been the same, went Lewisham, Peckham Rye, and Elephant and Castle before BF and HV. Now the Victoria services are slower I believe.

Yes I do believe that prior to 1980 at least, very few trains coming from Lewisham called at Nunhead and Denmark Hill, now it seems more trains call at Denmark Hill these days, and a fair few skip Peckham Rye

 

[nw1]

No- there was also the half hourly service to West Croydon via Herne Hill, Tulse Hill, Streatham, Wimbledon, Wall of Death, Sutton to West Croydon then I believe to London Bridge via Forest Hill (possibly?).

Wall of Death? Typo or nickname for that line? (don't know much about it, have never visited the Sutton-Epsom area either by road or rail...)

In 1985 this went to Victoria via the main line (Selhurst) - not Crystal Palace. In the opposite direction it was advertised in the timetable as 'West Sutton' but then actually continued to Wimbledon and on to Holborn. I remember 'revising' the 10-minute-interval suburban stoppers out of Victoria in preparation for a visit to Clapham Junction, so I knew what was coming when - and the pattern was xx02 'West Sutton' (actually Holborn), xx12 West Croydon, xx22 Epsom Downs, xx32 West Croydon, xx42 'West Sutton' (Holborn again), and xx52 Beckenham Junction - alternating between main line (02, 22 and 42) and Crystal Palace (12, 32, 52). As an aside you also had Dorkings at xx19 and xx49, IIRC which omitted Battersea Park and Wandsworth Common.