Today was the highly anticipated 1938 tube train run along the modern Jubilee Line extension, and a rare chance to visit the disused platforms at Charing Cross station. Although I have been on the train several times – the last one booking an entire carriage for a private group, this was still a chance not to be missed.

As the excited crowd gathered at Stratford station, the tannoy repeatedly asked passengers for the 1938 heritage train to assemble by platform 13. Unlucky for those on the platform waiting for a normal train who were politely evicted – but lucky for the rest of us!

Shortly before the train arrived, we were let onto the platforms and I noticed a nice touch in that the display indicator mentioned the train trip. Previous trips on the Northern Line have usually just said “train not in service”. Small things like this make me a happy person.

As the train pulled in, the usual rush to get photos of it arriving, and I also managed to snap a shot of the old train and a modern one sitting next to each other before the modern train took off with conventional passengers.

A few people I recognised were there, so we traveled together for much of the journey – The Charlton dwelling author of the 853 blog and fellow tube geek, London Stuff (who snuck into the drivers cabin for a while)

After a short wait we were off!

As before, the trip was basically a run along the train lines without stopping – so in itself it shouldn’t  be that exciting. Somehow though, the nostalgia, and the sheer unusualness of the trip makes it worthwhile – and as before, watching the dumbfounded looks of people on the platforms as this bizarre old train passes through the station is a sheer delight.

After leg-stretching at West Hampstead as the train was stopped and turned around, we re-embarked and headed back down the line towards Green Park. Here the excitement got palpable, as the train deviated from the usual line and hurtled down the old tracks to the disused platforms at Charing Cross. Even though that was my normal station for many years, it was really nice to see the old platforms again.

We were given a very healthy 20 minutes to take photos of the old platforms and wander around a bit, while various people posed in the drivers cabin for photos. Then back on the train and off up to West Hampstead again where our trip ended. A second trip later in the day took people back along the line to Stratford.

Even though I have been on the train a few times, two new things struck me today. One was that the old lights never ever flickered throughout the journey. Considering how often modern strip lights flicker or go out on trains, this was an interesting oddity. The other, is that I was able to see a lot more of the tunnel infrastructure as we went along. I suspect a fair bit was lit up, but the lack of double glazing on the old trains does seem to make it a lot easier to peer out in to the tunnel gloom.

The tickets to this trip, even though it was mid-week rather than at the weekend, sold out so fast that I really wouldn’t be surprised if they try to squeeze another run in before the signaling upgrade makes it impossible to run the old train along the tracks.

As an end-point, as I got off at West Hampstead, I was approached by the press officer who had overheard my chatter on the train and asked if LBC Radio could ask me a few questions. It is actually quite difficult to put into words why I enjoy taking these heritage trips, especially when a microphone is pointed at you, so I fluffed my lines a bit. Maybe the train racing past in the background means they might not use the interview. Erk!

Photo credit to darryl853

As usual, some photos on my Flickr account.

I get emails from a person within TfL letting me know of upcoming heritage trips, so I usually post a note on the blog when I get told about them.

Just an update to the blog posting earlier this week re the 1938 heritage train visit to the disused Jubilee Line platforms at Charing Cross station…

Tickets are now on sale at the London Transport Museum website.

As it is my birthday that week, I decided to treat myself to a ticket.  See you there if you are coming along!

How about this – a chance to take the tube to the closed Charing Cross tube station – and not just any tube train, but the heritage 1938 stock.

Just had an email from TfL letting me know that there will be another excursion of the heritage train in a few weeks time, but this time along the Jubilee Line – and the trip will include a stop at the disused Charing Cross platforms on the old part of the Jubilee Line.

They say it is likely to be the last time a heritage train can run along the Jubilee Line, as the new signalling system being installed will make future trips impossible. As that new signalling is itself shutting the Jubilee Line most weekends (DiamondGeezer passim), this heritage trip will take place on a Wednesday, not at the weekends as would be normally expected. Specifically, Wednesday 5th August. Still, I’d expect a fair number of tube fans will jump at the chance, especially for the chance to get to the closed tube station (we tube geeks like things like that).

This is part of the Jubilee line’s 30th/10th anniversary celebrations, and likely to be the last opportunity to ride on 38 stock on the Jubilee line before their new signalling is commissioned.

There are two trips:

Trip a) Stratford to West Hampstead, down to Charing Cross and then back to West Hampstead: costs £25 per person
Trip b) West Hampstead to Stratford: costs £10 per person

The train arrives at Stratford, platform 14 at 11:00 and leaves at 11:22 (plenty of time for photo opportunities), there’s also 20 minutes scheduled at Charing Cross disused Jubilee line platforms for more photo opportunities. The train arrives at the end of trip a) at West Hampstead at 13:18.

Trip b) from West Hampstead at 13:48 and arrive back at Stratford at 14:28.

Tickets for both trips are being sold from next week by the London Transport Museum via their website www.ltmuseum.co.uk or their ticket line 020 7565 7298.

Huge cheers to TfL for letting me know about this – and while I have done the heritage run a few times, the sight of the train inside the disused Charing Cross station might make it worth another go. Not to mention the look on the faces of the bankers and financial whizzes when travelling through Canary Wharf station in an ancient tube train

Update:

Tickets now on sale at the London Transport Museum website.

A few months ago, I went to a lecture on tunnelling technologies, given by Professor Robert Mair FREng FRS, and specifically on what is known as compensation grouting. Meant to write up about it at the time, but it was not the sort of talk that was easy to write about, as the core of the talk needed the slides to illustrate what was being talked about.

However, the Royal Society – who hosted the talk – put podcasts of their lectures on their website, and today I finally got round to reviewing the details (mainly as the podcast page only works in Microsoft browsers!).

Today, I am going to focus only one aspect of the talk, which was also one of the more famous instances of compensation grouting, and that is the Jubilee Line work around the Clock Tower, more famously known as Big Ben. Timely, as the Clock Tower is 150 years old this week.

As a Jubilee Line tunnel was tunnelled by the tunnel boring machines (TBM), despite the best efforts of the workers, there is always a slight gap between the tunnel wall and the soil outside, leading to some subsidence at ground level. The gap is only a few millimetres, but when amplified around the entire tunnel diameter, that actually adds up to quite a bit of missing soil, and can cause significant problems. Before work starts on any tunnel now, ground surveys and measurements are taken to calculate the subsidence risks and effects on buildings.

In some areas, where the tunnels are likely to cause significant problems, compensation grouting is used.

This is basically steel pipes that are drilled into the ground above where the tunnel is due to be dug – before it arrives – that pump in a slurry type concrete mixture into the ground to “compensate” for the missing soil below.

For the Jubilee Line, this was complicated by the architecture of the location and the fairly shallow foundations of the infamous clock tower. The big risk, which was gleefully latched onto by the news media was that the tower would start to lean sideways towards the tunnel work and may even start to develop cracks or damage. As the TBM worked its way through Westminster, electronic monitors on the tower checked how far it was starting to topple, and then pumped grouting into the soil to basically push the tower back upright again.

The compensation grouting was only carried out at night – as the hole in the ground where they worked was right in the middle of the road, so covered during the day to allow road traffic.

At night the grouting machine was lowered into the hole, shown by the yellow circle.

The pipes drilled reaching under the ground were on average 60 meters in length. The black circles show where the grouting was inserted – and  on average about 150 litres of cement grout was pumped in at each point.

The following slide shows the movement of the tower. They knew the tower could withstand about 15mm of movement, measured at the height of the clock face, before action was needed – and you can see here how the tower started tilting, then a period where the compensation grouting was applied and after tunnelling, the period where the tower more slowly (and safely) settled.

Incidentally, the tower was already leaning before the tunnelling work started – by about 22cm to the North-West, which is said to be just noticeable to the eye.

Without compensation grouting, it is expected that the tower would have tilted by some 10cm at the top – which would have been obviously unacceptable.

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The sides are taken from the podcast on the Royal Society, where you can watch the entire lecture. Note, the slides wont display in either Firefox or Chrome web browsers – so I had to use MSie to watch see them.

I’ll later do a write up about the work at Kings Cross as some aspects of that sound quite interesting, but needs more research work to be carried out.

Incidentally, if you want to climb up the Clock Tower, visits are fairly easy to arrange – a review of the details here.

Of all the tube stations which were built for the Jubilee Line extension – my favourite has to be the little noticed one at Southwark. While I like Westminster and (obviously) Canary Wharf, there is something almost serene about Southwark, probably due in part to it being quieter than other stations – and the design of the station.

Going in from the street level, there is a fairly generic entrance and set of escalators down to a middle level – and it is here that people should stop and admire the view. This high space with a blue glass wall to one side and a high concrete wall marked with three tiny holes in the wall looks more like a modern day church than a tube station.

According to the station’s architect Richard MacCormac, the design of this and the lower level concourse were inspired by the designs of the 19th century Prussian architect Karl Friedrich Schinkel.

It is a quite wonderful space which seems to be little noticed by people rushing through.

Along the wall are three tiny “mouse holes” in the wall, and these lead to very narrow tubes with escalators leading down to a lower level which is starting to look more tube-like. Then a flight of stairs to each end take you finally down to the level of the tube trains.

I think this is a really quite under-rated station – and well worth stopping at one day, as it is only a short walk to Waterloo if that is where you were aiming for originally.

More photos at my usual Flickr account