Last Day of the Chesham Shuttle on the Metropolitan Line

[Xerces Fobe2]

On Sunday, 12th December 2010 the new working timetable was introduced on the Metropolitan Line.

 

The Chesham - Chalfont & Latimer shuttle is withdrawn as of midnight on 11 December 201o

 

The following new working timetable has been introduced 2 of the former 4 Amersham - Baker Street fast trains per hour will provide the Chesham service, Amersham services are reduced to 2 trains per hour.

 

During early morning and late evening periods when fast Amersham services operate at 2 trains per hour, the 2 trains per hour Chesham service will be provided by the diversion of 2 of the 6 Watford - Baker Street slow services per hour. In consequence services between Moor Park and Watford are reduced to 10/20 minute intervals and Chesham services will call at all stations.

 

On Sundays the last train to Chesham will depart from Baker Street 13 minutes later at 23.24.

 

To celebrate the passing of the old order LU organised a low key event at Chesham station on Saturday 11 December. That been said a lot of effort was put in with Metropolitan line's General Manager is Angela Back in attendances. What a superb manager she appears to be very friendly, customer focused and very enthusiast about the new service but also wanted to make sure the old order went out in style. Headboards were fitted to the 4-cat A^ stock for the whole of the days service with a raffle held for the headboard - (proceeds went to the Railway Children's Charity). The other Headboard Angela is keeping ..... to mount in a safe location on Chesham station which I thought was a nice touch. There was an official farewell train at @ 12:15 from Chesham with Clive Foxall author of the book " History of the Metropolitan Line†giving a short speech over the trains PA on the journey to Chalfont & Latimer.

 

A Last Day or the Chesham Shuttle ticket was given to all the passengers that travelled on the train (shown below and reproduced with permission). A crowd of us from an Underground focused forum made this event our Christmas meet and headed into London for drinks and food after. A really enjoyable day and thanks to Angela and her staff for all been helpful and friendly.

 

Check out the photos of this event in the Galleries section of RMweb - "Last Day Of the Cheshan Shuttle"

 

Xerces Fobe

[roythebus]

Further info on the District Dave website.

[edcayton]

It's taken a while for the penny to drop, but I have now realised that the photo is of the TICKET and not the train!!!

 

Ed

[Gwiwer]

Very good, Ed!!! Chesham station hasn't looked like that in many a long year.

 

Times move on and travel patterns and demands change but this really does mark the end of one of the great survivors from the days of "Metroland". The Chesham shuttle has operated thus since early MR days and was even one of the earlier electrified operations before reverting to steam haulage. It was re-electrified in the 1960s and the A-stock introduced at that time has worked the branch ever since.

 

With the advent of S-stock which can only operate as full-length trains (afaik) there would be a need to look at the operation as a full set tied to a 30-minute lightly-used shuttle would be wasteful. Making those into through City trains takes better advantage of the new rolling stock and also offers an improved service; passengers no longer need to sweat on a connection being made or enduring a lengthy (and often cold) wait at Chalfont.

 

But with Amersham clearly remaining the "main line" we shall still refer to the "Chesham branch" just as we do to the Watford and Uxbridge "branches".

 

Now does anyone fancy repainting one of the new cars into "Mayflower" or "Galatea" livery for a Chesham Pullman????

[Trevellan]

The last time I travelled on the Chesham shuttle it was aboard the preserved 1960 stock unit. Well, okay, it was one of the last Steam on the Met days. It's nice to see current management actively supporting the celebration of historic milestones. LU can still turn on the style when they want to.

[PhilJ W]

The bay at Chalfont and Latimer can only take 4 car trains. Adapting it to take 8 car trains would be horrendously expensive.

[Gwiwer]

Over the years Chesham has seen a few unusual operations. As there are no spare paths available on the single line (and no second platform at Chesham since 19-a long time ago) on the occasions when a railtour has been permitted to go there it has doubled as the service train. Thus at least one LU "service" train has been formed of a Hastings demu and on at least one occasion a leaf-clearing working was operated using "Hastings" motor coaches as tractor units and carrying passengers.

[John M Upton]

Does the London Transport Museum have any plans to preserve a four car example of the A60/62 stock? I always did like them even with the sometimes rather firm ride at high(ish) speed!!

[robertcwp]

The LT museum will almost certainly preserve a car of A stock, probably at the Acton museum depot. They have already claimed a 1967 stock driving motor - the one The Queen rode in when she opened the Victoria Line.

 

I think the bay platform at Chesham went in 1970 or thereabouts.

 

The withdrawal of the A stock will mark the disappearance of the last significant fleet of Cravens-built vehicles on Britain's railways (or does anyone know otherwise?). Having travelled on an A stock train yesterday, they do look very dated even in their facelifted form.

[Gwiwer]

they do look very dated even in their facelifted form.

Given that the design of A-stock is derived from prototype car 17000 which entered service as long ago as 26th January 1946 that would hardly be surprising!

[Chris116]

Further info on the District Dave website.

I have looked at the District Dave site but the last update is quoted as 2005 and looking through the site that appears to be true! I suspect he may have updated the site name and I am getting the old version, can you let us know the correct point of entry please?

 

Chris

[Burkitt]

The site is inactive but the forum is very well used http://districtdave.proboards.com/

 

Paul

[Gwiwer]

Just had a browse of the new timetable.

 

Apart from the regular-headway 10-minute service now provided to Ricky, Chorleywood and Chalfont there are a few goodies. The positioning trips around North Curve are still in the timetable between Ricky and Watford (plus the very occasional one back) meaning it is possible to travel on an advertised service in both directions over a curve not shown on the tube map. But the best one must be for early birds out at Chesham where the first departure of the morning at 05.19 is not a City train at all but a direct Watford!

[andyman7]

I grew up near Pinner and we often used the Met line in my childhood. The passing of the A60/62 stock means the withdrawal of the last public transport stock that I travelled on as a child - class 501s went in '85, heritage DMUs by the end of 2003, the last Mk1 EMU earlier this year (Lymington Btanch) whilst we have seen the back of LT Swift, Fleetline, RT and Routemaster buses. Must be getting old! BTW I remember from childhood noticing that A60/62 stock had spoked wheels - although this isn't the case now. Anyone know when they lost these?

[Engineer_London]

Working without the safety net of records and hard information...

 

As a lifetime rider and observer of A stock [even drafting this while on one, homeward bound], and also having been an Engineer trainee at Neasden in the late 1970s, I'd estimate the transition from spoked wheelsets really took hold in the early to mid-1980s. When I started, there were plenty of spoked wheels [and the occasional disc] around in the lifting shed at Neasden and making the lorry trip to and fro to Acton, where tyres were turned, fitted and removed from centres. During the 1980s, the shift to monobloc wheels took place for plenty of technical, maintenance and commercial procurement reasons. I'd guess there weren't many spoked wheels around on A Stock from the late 1980s.