Two weeks to visit Colindale tube station before rebuilding work starts

You have just two weeks to visit the old Colindale tube station on the Northern line before it closes to be demolished and replaced with a new station.

Planned new station entrance (c) TfL

Candidly, it’d be difficult to say the 1960s-era building is particularly notable, but still, after sixty years of service, it will finally go to the great builder’s yards in the sky. That means you have a short time to see it in its current state before all those memories are lost.

During the closure, the existing canopy and staircases will be removed, and new stairs will be installed. When the station reopens in December 2024, a temporary pedestrian passageway will allow customers to access the platforms at Colindale via the existing ticket hall and new staircases, before the station upgrade finishes in autumn 2025.

Although the existing ticket hall will reopen in December ahead of its demolishment later, because of the partial rebuilding works that will have already been undertaken, you have just a couple of weeks left to see it in its current state.

The station will close from Friday 7th June, which means that the last day that passengers can use the old ticket hall is Thursday 6th June.

However, thanks to a quirk of the timetable, there are a couple of last trains calling just after midnight. So, if you wanted to be one of the last passengers to use the old station, the last southbound train from Colidale leaves at 00:06 on Friday morning, and the last northbound service will leave at 00:40.

For really determined tube nerds, it might be possible to buy a paper ticket from Colindale station on Friday 7th June, a date that will appear in all the historical records as when the station was closed. And won’t that confuse future historians.

For less nerdy types, during the station closure, a series of planned railway closures of the Northern line between Edgware and Golders Green will continue, with the next closure scheduled for the weekend of 8th and 9th June 2024.

During the temporary closure of the station, customers are advised to take local bus services to Burnt Oak or Hendon Central (Northern line) or Mill Hill Broadway (Thameslink) to continue their journeys. An additional bus route (NL6), free of charge, will run every 15 minutes on weekdays at peak times between Colindale and Hendon Central.

In addition, customers travelling on bus route 186 between Mill Hill Broadway and Hendon Central stations will have their bus fares refunded automatically when using Contactless or Oyster cards and after touching in or out at one of these two stations. Normal TfL and Thameslink fares will apply on all other journeys.

Stuart Harvey, TfL’s Chief Capital Officer, said: “Work is progressing well on the much-needed major upgrade of Colindale station and is set to transform the journeys of many thousands of our customers, making the station more accessible and welcoming, and ensuring it’s fit to serve this rapidly growing community for many decades to come. I apologise for the inevitable disruption that this upgrade will cause for our customers but we are committed to doing everything we can to ensure that, through our detailed travel advice, they can plan ahead and are able to complete their journeys using the public transport network.”