Just supposing

[Gwiwer]

Volks Electric Railway continues to this day having been in continuous operation (wartimes excepted) since construction.  It is not managed by a substantially volunteer labour force as a "heritage railway" but is under the wings of Brighton & Hove City council and has been since 1948, requiring three full-time salaried officers, as a fully-fledged electric tramway though operated under Heritage Railway legislation.  Day-to-day operations are in the hands of VERA (Volks Electric Railway Association) but not ownership.  The comparison is not entirely fair.

 

What if ..... the LNER had the benefit of foresight and had continued north from Epping instead of chancing their luck to the east.  Ongar might never have had a railway.  The intent was to wait for traffic to build up then extend to Chelmsford.  There is to this day no significant settlement along that line of route until Writtle is reached on the edge of Chelmsford some 12 miles farther on.  Even the one-time local bus along the direct route was withdrawn some years ago.  I lived briefly in Kelvedon Hatch in the 1980s; at that time the only traffic ever seen on the Chelmsford - Ongar main road bus was a few schoolchildren.  The less direct routes via Blackmore or Willingale survive (just!) however thanks to there being a couple of small villages to serve in each case.

 

So if the LNER had foreseen the development of Harlow and had taken the line north from Epping we might now have a Central Line serving Potter Street, Old Harlow and bored out beneath the new town to create loop via residential and industrial zones and the town centre.  If nothing else that would have brought rails a little closer to many people than do Harlow Town and Mill stations today.

[PhilJ W]

There was a plan to extend the line as a light railway from Ongar to Dunmow. The reason that there was no extension from Ongar was the need to move a cemetery. If such a line had been built there are several scenarios that could be modelled, for instance the Dunmow line was closed due to the colapse of a viaduct, goods traffic and some passenger services could have been transfered via the link at Stratford. Up until the early 60's freight services used the line and there was even an untimetabled DMU service.

[bike2steam]

There was a plan to extend the line as a light railway from Ongar to Dunmow. The reason that there was no extension from Ongar was the need to move a cemetery. If such a line had been built there are several scenarios that could be modelled, for instance the Dunmow line was closed due to the colapse of a viaduct, goods traffic and some passenger services could have been transfered via the link at Stratford. Up until the early 60's freight services used the line and there was even an untimetabled DMU service.

You must be thinking of the first issue of BRM, such a layout featured in that. But there were plans to carry on to Chelmsford. Yes you are right about the cemetery, but also there was the civil engineering involved with crossing the River Roding, and working it's way up to Norton Heath, and across to Writtle where flat Essex aint quite so flat. Right about the freight, but the DMU service was only first thing in the morning, and only because so many railway workers lived along the line between Ongar, and Stratford.

It was interesting to read 'Gwiwer's account of Eastern National service 32 ( Kelvedon Hatch is on the way (ish) to Brentwood ??), I travelled on that many times when I was a kid, some Saturdays it used to 'fly' past me at Writtle because it was full. I also used the other service, then the 46 Chelmsford to Harlow via Willingale to my village of Fyfield, where I grew up in my early/mid teens, and before that in Shelley just outside Ongar.

[Gwiwer]

 ..... Kelvedon Hatch is mid-way between Brentwood and Ongar and at the time I was there had just lost its long-standing London Transport / Country RT-worked route 339 (Harlow - Warley, cut back to Epping) in favour of Eastern National's 239 worked usually by Leyland Nationals (Ongar - Warley).  The Ongar - Epping section was covered by a new "red" bus route 201 which was introduced to be the tube replacement bus though the tube was still running.  A fair hike through the lanes brought me to Stanford Rivers where it  was possible on three days a week to catch one of the three remaining "red" bus trip on the 247B (Ongar - Romford and formerly part of the 175 Ongar - Poplar, Blackwall Tunnel!!!).  Those were worked by BL-type Bristol LHs - when they ran.  Even on that sparse timetable they were sometimes cancelled due to no vehicle being available.  A far cry from red RTs hammering out along that road to meet their green cousins in Ongar of a couple of years earlier.

 

Chelmsford - Ongar via the main road (EN route 32) served only the tiny hamlet of Norton Heath and was just a couple of trips each day.  When I used it fare-paying passengers cold have caught a taxi and left spare seats - it was only used by a handful of children going to school who boarded at isolated farm lanes.  The 32A via Blackmore and Edney Common served more people and the school trip on that warranted a Bristol FLF though the off-peak trips were still fairly quiet.  The route via Willingale (the 46) hasn't always reached through to Ongar; there have been times when its two or three trips only reached to Willingale or Fyfield.  With the 32 serving Chelmsford - Ongar passengers (few though there were) it was obviously thought that the luxury of a third route between those towns was a bus too far.  Other than the school runs noted everything else was either a Bristol RELL or a Leyland National at the time I was around the area, including the multiplicity of local routes around Brentwood and out to the villages.

 

What if ..... there would have been issues extending beyond Ongar though at the time the line was built probably nothing insuperable as any extension could have skirted the cemetery to the north.  The DMU service ran from Stratford to Epping and back in the early morning (out about 04.00 and back around 04.45 IIRC, before the tube service got going) and used the now-vanished former LNER route from Leyton tube station through the old coal yard / ballast hole to join the Lea Valley route north of Stratford BR.  It was only available to BR staff and was not advertised.  One photo was published in a Railway Magazine at about the time it ceased illustrating a "Lea Valley" 3-car class 125 DHMU.

[RogerE]

Back in the 1890s the Metropolitan was petitioned by the townsfolk of High Wycombe to extend to that town, because, at the time, it was on an inefficient GWR branch line. They wanted an extension from the Uxbridge line. At the time the Met was extending towards Aylesbury, so proposed a branch from Great Missenden, and got as far as surveying the route via Great Hampden and Hughenden to terminate at Wycombe Temple End (where the current Morrisons store is located, just below the GWR viaduct). Unfortunately the cost of crossing the Hampden Estate and, especially, the Hughenden Estate (Disraeli's old estate) scuppered the scheme. Then the GCR extended south and improved the Wycombe railway so it all came to nothing.

 

Basic details are mentioned in Alec Jackson's Metropolitan Railway book, but managed to add a bit more talking to various landowners in the area.

 

Also found out that the Met proposed a special halt at Hughenden for the use of the Manor, and similar special carriage arrangements as those they had in place for the Rothschilds.

[Pacific231G]

Back in the 1890s the Metropolitan was petitioned by the townsfolk of High Wycombe to extend to that town, because, at the time, it was on an inefficient GWR branch line. They wanted an extension from the Uxbridge line. At the time the Met was extending towards Aylesbury, so proposed a branch from Great Missenden, and got as far as surveying the route via Great Hampden and Hughenden to terminate at Wycombe Temple End (where the current Morrisons store is located, just below the GWR viaduct). Unfortunately the cost of crossing the Hampden Estate and, especially, the Hughenden Estate (Disraeli's old estate) scuppered the scheme. Then the GCR extended south and improved the Wycombe railway so it all came to nothing.

 

I'm a bit confused by this. Surely the Wycombe Railway from Maidenhead to High Wycombe which was later extended to Oxford and Ayleesbury was taken over by the GWR (who had always operated its services) in 1867. The more direct 1899 line towards London via Ruislip and Northolt Junction and the doubling of the line to Princess Risborough etc. was always a joint GCR/GWR venture. It provided the GCR with an alternative main line into London, not involving the Met who they'd fallen out with, and the GWR a shorter route between High Wycombe and Paddington and later in 1910 its less Great Way Round route to Birmingham via Princess Risborough and Aynho Junction. 

[RogerE]

Yes you're correct, but at the time they wanted the Met to go to Wycombe (early 1890s) the Maidenhead-Wycombe-Aylesbury was still not a main line, and the GWR had several times refused to increase, or speed-up the service.

 

The Met was building the Aylesbury extension, which was opened 1892, when they started to look at the "branch" to Wycombe, so the idea was put on the back burner by 1892, and was finally dropped altogether when the GC/GW line was built,

[detheridge]

Hi again folks,

I've been reading on District Dave's forum about the Croxley link. Obviously a good thing for all, but it also seems to me that it offers the ultimate for  'Just supposing': just suppose that Watford Met and environs then became the happy hunting ground for preserved electric stock? After all, there's a thoroughgoing station with stock sidings and all mod cons just sitting there once the Croxley link is opened. Ideal for a preservation site, under the aegis of LUL itself, and could be the base for a series of railtours, shuttles to Rickmansworth and more. You could have the CO/CP stock back from Quainton Road, a rake of A stock, Dreadnoughts and the rest of the Heritage and Specials candidates all in one place and ready to roll. Now I would guess that envious eyes have already been cast in the direction of Watford Met for housing development, but apart from that, why might such an idea work, or indeed not?

 

Best wishes,

 

David.

[Lord of Narnia]

I think the plan is to use the site as stabling. If this is the case it is likely that the station buildings will be kept as a booking on point. It is possible that the station could be kept serviceable for heritage trips but that would mean LUL would need to spend money- not something they do loosely!

[suburbangorilla]

I am loving all these What Ifs.

[StephenB]

The 'might have been' line that I particularly like is the one to Oxford. The GCR might also have also been interested. If the SER had broken the stranglehold of the GWR at Reading, then Oxford would have been an obvious target. Just imagine, the big four plus the MET at Oxford - the modelling possibilities are immense.

 

Stephen

[Duchy Wheeler]

How about if.... the Northern City line and the ex GNR Northern Heights line had come under the auspicious of the Metropolitan line, all of which of course are/were built to main line clearances, then maybe you could now have 'S' stock trains running up to Alexandra Palace from Moorgate via Highgate (High Level)?