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Sherlock Holmes' Tube Map - What would it look like?


Nearholmer

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I liked the Map showing the growth of the system. One thing puzzled me. I am sure the Bakerloo had trains to Stanmore before the Jubilee line was created. Or is it just my imagination. 

Don

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Yes and no. The graphics are the kind I was thinking of but, as Nearholmer has pointed out, I'd prefer it to cover all lines from the start, including all routes that have since closed (and stations too). Also, I wouldn't want it to be a video. I'd want it to be a user interaction map where the user can move the timeline as they want, and could click on and zoom in to see more stuff, also to get more details of the track, etc, ownership over time, maybe even see a set of photos related to that part of the system.

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As it only covers inner London and it only shows the Metropolitan & District Line, from the current tube lines, this may be of limited interest, but I have in my photo-sharing pages on the ipernity site, The New Railway Map of London & the suburbs, which my father dated to c1884, from his knowledge of railway history. 

It comes from a dilapidated gazetteer. I have scanned the pages and, as they are on double page spreads, I have presented them as six overlapping sections. On ipernity I have been able to use large files with a high degree of magnification. So I won't try uploading them here. They can be found at  http://www.ipernity.com/tag/philsutters/keyword/4630030 - If you want to see them at high magnification go to the ACTIONS button, at the upper right, and then look for 'See all sizes'.

The title panel can be seen below.

 

There are general maps of London and some other cities and counties, from the same 1884 gazetteer, in my 'Victorian Maps' album on ipernity.  http://www.ipernity.com/doc/philsutters/album/555379

 

There is also a WW2 tube map at http://www.ipernity.com/tag/philsutters/keyword/4630162

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Chris - well spotted, Sir! A wonderful little station, and at least one layout based on it has been built.

 

Phil - that 1884 map is brilliant! The nearest yet to what I'm after, so very many thanks indeed.

 

By putting "tube map" in the title of this thread, I've accidentally caused everyone to think about ...... Tube maps. When, in Sherlock's day there only was one Tube, the CSLR, and that only from 1890. It was this strange web of surface and subsurface routes that Holmes and Watson would have used.

 

Kevin

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I liked the Map showing the growth of the system. One thing puzzled me. I am sure the Bakerloo had trains to Stanmore before the Jubilee line was created. Or is it just my imagination. 

Don

 

Correct, the Bakerloo did run to Stanmore . The original name for the Jubilee Line was the Fleet Line as I remember dozens of station signs in the stores at Lillie Bridge depot that never saw the of day. 

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In the story referred to, Holmes and Watson board a cab in Baker St, instruct the cabbie to take them to Kings X and are then described as "rattling along the Grays Inn Road". If they have come from Baker St, they would presumably have passed along Marylebone Road to Kings X station. Go past Kings X and there is a three way junction, one of which is Grays Inn Road. So, a trip from Baker St to KX via Grays Inn Road is mistaken.

 

Not necessarily...

 

One of the stories has a client of Holmes running down Baker St from the direction of the station, so 221b couldn't have been opposite the station as it's depicted today. Originally Baker Street ran from Portman Square to Dorset Street, then it became York Place as far as Marylebone Road and Upper Baker Street from there to Allsop Place.

 

One of the old London surveys shows the door numbering & it's not 'odds & evens' but starts from 1 at Portman Square & runs up then across & back down, so 221b would have been at the Portman Square end of Baker Street.

 

So, if we assume that Holmes would have hailed a cab at Portman Square & instructed the driver to go to King's X, a logical route would be:

 

Wigmore St. > Cavendish Sq. > Cav. Pl > across Langham Pl > Mortimer St. > Charles St. > Goodge St. > across Tottenham Court Road > Chenies St. > Gower St. > Keppel St. > Russell Sq. > Guilford St. > Gray's Inn Road.

 

The only major pinch points are getting across Langham Place & Tottenham Court Road. That route misses the perpetual traffic jam that is the Marylebone/Euston Road. Of course that could be scuppered by Victorian one-way systems (if such existed). Co-incidentally it's near enough a route that I used to use regularly in a previous life as a cycle courier...

 

Pete.

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Roy - I'd like to see that, because I still suspect the group has got confused with LCDR, which ran an intense service from Victoria to the GNR.

 

More generally - I probably shouldn't have titled this "tube map", because what I'm really interested in is the pre-tube services.

 

Phil - yes, you are right about Bradshaw, and it might be that I end up investing a small fortune to buy,say, an 1895 one.

 

K

You may well be right about the LCDR. I'll try and find out from the KX group.

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Not necessarily...

 

One of the stories has a client of Holmes running down Baker St from the direction of the station, so 221b couldn't have been opposite the station as it's depicted today. Originally Baker Street ran from Portman Square to Dorset Street, then it became York Place as far as Marylebone Road and Upper Baker Street from there to Allsop Place.

 

One of the old London surveys shows the door numbering & it's not 'odds & evens' but starts from 1 at Portman Square & runs up then across & back down, so 221b would have been at the Portman Square end of Baker Street.

 

So, if we assume that Holmes would have hailed a cab at Portman Square & instructed the driver to go to King's X, a logical route would be:

 

Wigmore St. > Cavendish Sq. > Cav. Pl > across Langham Pl > Mortimer St. > Charles St. > Goodge St. > across Tottenham Court Road > Chenies St. > Gower St. > Keppel St. > Russell Sq. > Guilford St. > Gray's Inn Road.

 

The only major pinch points are getting across Langham Place & Tottenham Court Road. That route misses the perpetual traffic jam that is the Marylebone/Euston Road. Of course that could be scuppered by Victorian one-way systems (if such existed). Co-incidentally it's near enough a route that I used to use regularly in a previous life as a cycle courier...

 

Pete.

Hang on, you missed the "'ang a left at..." "chuck a right at...." :) Cor blimey guv and similar cab driver talk. on't get me going saarf o' the river, not this time of night.

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Not necessarily...

 

One of the stories has a client of Holmes running down Baker St from the direction of the station, so 221b couldn't have been opposite the station as it's depicted today. Originally Baker Street ran from Portman Square to Dorset Street, then it became York Place as far as Marylebone Road and Upper Baker Street from there to Allsop Place.

 

One of the old London surveys shows the door numbering & it's not 'odds & evens' but starts from 1 at Portman Square & runs up then across & back down, so 221b would have been at the Portman Square end of Baker Street.

 

So, if we assume that Holmes would have hailed a cab at Portman Square & instructed the driver to go to King's X, a logical route would be:

 

Wigmore St. > Cavendish Sq. > Cav. Pl > across Langham Pl > Mortimer St. > Charles St. > Goodge St. > across Tottenham Court Road > Chenies St. > Gower St. > Keppel St. > Russell Sq. > Guilford St. > Gray's Inn Road.

 

The only major pinch points are getting across Langham Place & Tottenham Court Road. That route misses the perpetual traffic jam that is the Marylebone/Euston Road. Of course that could be scuppered by Victorian one-way systems (if such existed). Co-incidentally it's near enough a route that I used to use regularly in a previous life as a cycle courier...

 

Pete.

 

Not far off the route I would use to walk from Holborn to Paddington Via the W&H Model shop avoiding traffic and crowds. Holborn was of course another model shop.

Don

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I love those bigs maps Phil It would be great to have that as one big map.

Don

If I had a scanner that will take 480mm x 310mm that would be easy. I suppose that I could try and splice the sections together, but you would either have a huge file or much reduced magnification and it wouldn't upload here. There is a download facility - look for the ACTIONS menu at upper right on the ipernity screen when you open an image. So you could try building it up from the sections if you have the software.

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Not far off the route I would use to walk from Holborn to Paddington Via the W&H Model shop avoiding traffic and crowds. Holborn was of course another model shop.

Don

Wouldn't you have gone via Hamblings in Cecil Court, off Charing Cross Road?

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Phil

 

Re: Post 44.

 

The Met? Or, was it the District?

 

In either case, do you know the origin and the route? My guess would be District, from Mansion House via Earl's Court and Acton.

 

Kevin

It was from Mansion House. It only ran from 1893-1895 apparently over GWR metals from Ealing Broadway. The GWR then took over the section from Ealing Broadway but the train still ran with the same (GWR) stock changing from MDR locomotion to GWR at EB. It was for this service that the MDR placed the 'box cab' electric locomotives in service c. 1905.

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Thanks, Phil.

 

The box cabs were used mainly for the "middle circle", Broad Street to Mansion House, taking over from NLR/LNWR steamers at Earl's Court. That was a four trains per hour service, IIRC, but it was cut back to EC within a few years, leaving the locos short of work.

 

They did have the Ealing Broadway to Tilbury services left though ......

 

Kevin

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OK, now we've wandered OT into antediluvian model shops, which do have their own thread: where, in relation to modern premises on Holborn was 112?

 

My office is very near there, and despite looking, I've never quite convinced myself of exactly where it was.

 

Kevin

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