London Victoria Statiion

London Victoria is a major London Underground, National Rail and Coach station in the City of Westminster. It is the second busiest railway terminus in London after Waterloo. It is in Travelcard Zone 1.

London Victoria is a major London Underground, National Rail and Coach station in the City of Westminster. It is the second busiest railway terminus in London after Waterloo. It is in Travelcard Zone 1.

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National Rail

The National Rail station is officially named London Victoria, a name that is commonly used outside London, but rarely by Londoners. Operationally, there are effectively two separate stations:

The eastern (Chatham) side, comprising platforms 1–8, is the terminus for services to Kent on the Chatham Main Line and its branches.

The western (Brighton) side, comprising platforms 9–19, is the terminus for services to Surrey and Sussex, including Gatwick Airport and Brighton on the Brighton Main Line and its branches.

This split is generally held to, as the track layout does not allow much swapping, with only a small number of connecting flyovers between the main lines in the Battersea area, plus a single track connection immediately outside the station. As the Brighton side is the busier of the two, disruption on that line sometimes results in some of its suburban services using the eastern side. This is particularly true of the Gatwick Express, which travels along the Brighton Main Line, as it will often divert over Chatham side tracks during engineering works in order to maintain service levels.

Victoria also serves as the London terminus for the Venice Simplon Orient Express, from Platform 2, the longest platform.

London Underground Station

The London Underground station lies to the north of the mainline station concourse.It is currently the busiest station on the system with around 76 million using the station as of 2007. There are two ticket halls: the newer hall, closer to the mainline station serves the Victoria Line; the other, further north serves the District and Circle Lines. The ticket halls are connected by a pedestrian passage beneath the Bus station.

History

The first part of the station was opened on 24 December 1868 by the Metropolitan District Railway (MDR, now the District Line) when the company opened the first section of its line between South Kensington and Westminster stations. The MDR connected to the Metropolitan Railway (MR, later the Metropolitan Line) at South Kensington and, although the two companies were rivals, each company operated its trains over the other's tracks in a joint service known as the "Inner Circle".

On 1 February 1872, the MDR opened a northbound branch from its station at Earl's Court to connect to the West London Extension Joint Railway (WLEJR, now the West London Line) which it connected to at Addison Road (now Kensington (Olympia)). From that date the "Outer Circle" service began running over the MDR's tracks. The service was run by the North London Railway (NLR) from its terminus at Broad Street (now demolished) in the City of London via the North London Line to Willesden Junction, then the West London Line to Addison Road and the MDR to Mansion House - the new eastern terminus of the MDR.

From 1 August 1872, the "Middle Circle" service also began operations through Victoria running from Moorgate along the MR's tracks on the north side of the Inner Circle to Paddington then over the Hammersmith & City Railway (H&CR) track to Latimer Road then, via a now demolished link, to the West London Line to Addison Road and the MDR to Mansion House. The service was operated jointly by the H&CR and the MDR.

On 30 June 1900, the Middle Circle service was withdrawn between Earl's Court and Mansion House. On 31 December 1908 the Outer Circle service was also withdrawn.

The original MDR station was rebuilt at the beginning of the 20th century initially as a single storey structure. An office building was constructed above it later.

In 1949, the Metropolitan Line operated Inner Circle route was given its own identity on the tube map as the Circle Line.

The new Victoria Line station was opened on 7 March 1969 when the third phase of the line began operating south of Warren Street. Initially, Victoria served as the temporary terminus of the line whilst the final phase was under construction to Brixton. Services to Brixton began operating on 23 July 1971.

Future

Victoria is a proposed stop on the Chelsea-Hackney Line also known as Crossrail 2. The route was safeguarded in 1991[9] and 2007 and any rebuilding of the station will have space for Crossrail 2 platforms. In the safegaurded route it was between Chelsea and Piccadilly Circus.

Current situation

The station is now the busiest on the London Underground system, serving nearly 80 million passengers per year. The station was not built for this number of passengers, which results in severe overcrowding. To prevent any dangerous situations like crowds pushing people off the platforms onto the track, crowd control measures are in place at the busiest times. This effectively means closing all the entrances to the Underground platforms and operating as an exit-only station until the overcrowding is relieved. These measures can last anywhere between a couple of minutes (when minor delays are occurring) up to several hours (during major incidents).

In order to provide a lasting solution to this problem, a major upgrade of the station is planned, including a new exit/entrance to both Victoria and Circle/District Line platforms at Bressenden Place. This upgrade is due by 2014.

Coach station

Victoria coach station is half a mile south-west of the railway stations. It is the main London coach terminal and serves all parts of the UK, and mainland Europe.