please empty your brain below |
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During WW2, telecoms cables were routed from Westminster, up to Trafalgar Square, through the Bakerloo Line down to Waterloo, and thence to the Waterloo and City line.
They ran through the tube tunnel until nearish Blackfriars where a small shaft took them up to the surface, and to the main international telecoms switch in Faraday House in the City. |
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it was the second deep-level railway and was built by the tunnelling engineer Dalrymple-Hay, who later became tunnelling consultant to the LPTB. another theory about the name "Drain" is that at that time most of the public associated underground structures with pipes, sewers etc.
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The W&C originally had its own power station, next to the depot. In 1948, a wagon with coal for the power station was being shunted onto the lift when the lift platform started to drop, dragging the shunting locomotive down with it. The locomotive, alhough still in working order, could only be extricated from the hole by cutting it up.
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The line has been electrified on three different systems: the original 1898 electrification system used a centrally-located live rail. In 1940 the live rail was moved to what had by then been adopted as the standard Southern railway position to one side of the running rails. In 1993 the line was converted to London Underground's four-rail system to allow trains built as an add-on order to the Central Line's new fleet to be used.
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The lift is now buried under the Eurostar terminal (itself now awaiting a decision on its future). Even if it was still there, the new trains would not be able to use it as the cars are longer than the old ones: although the trains are shorter as there are only four cars instead of five.
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Less than nine months after British Rail rebuilt the line and installed five new trains, it sold the whole trainset to London Transport for £1: less than the price of a single ticket.
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Beacuse it is closed on Sundays, the line is frequently used for filming. In "Sliding Doors", the principal characters meet on the train - strangely, he is already on the train when it arrives at Waterloo: they get talking, and by a romatic coincidence discover they are both going to the same destination!
(Outdoor scenes suggest the journey is supposed to be from Embankment to Fulham Broadway) |
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Presumably the Waterloo and City was sold to London Transport at the same time as the Southern half of the District branch to Wimbledon. Was anything else transferred at the same time? Was it £1 for each stretch of line or £1 in total?
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You can glimpse the depot and see the hole where rolling stock can be craned in and out from, on Spur Road, Waterloo.
On the final day of BR operation, a special headboard was used for the day. For a photo see: http://www.davekirwinphotography.co.uk/p528759703/hd7bd40c#hd7bd40c |
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