Maiden Lane And York Road Stations
These two disused stations are in the area of Kings Cross Central to the North of Kings Cross and St. Pancras stations.
- Maiden Lane station used to be on the North London Line and closed in 1916.
- York Road station used to be on the Piccadilly Line and closed in 1932.
This map from carto.metro.free.fr shows the layout of the lines and stations.
Note.
- The lines into Kings Cross station shown in black.
- The North London Line shown in orange.
- The Piccadilly Line shown in blue.
It would appear that York Road station has been designed to generous proportions.
Ian Visits
ThIs article on the Ian Visits web site, is entitled Reopening The Piccadilly line’s Disused York Road Tube Station.
Ian comes to the following conclusions.
A rebuilt Maiden Lane station on the Overground would be much cheaper to build, at around £8 million, and have much lower running costs. The site for the Overground station would be around 100 yards further to the north of York Road Station, roughly where a Camden Council maintains a bus garage.
Replacing that with the usual generic block of flats may generate the cash to fund a rebuilt Maiden Lane station.
However, York Road tube station is unlikely to ever reopen to the public again.
I very much agree.
However, there is a set of circumstances, where the building at York Road station may get reopened.
Look at this picture of York Road station.
The station building is a classic design by Leslie Green and just across the road from Central St. Martins, which is a constituent college of the University of the Arts London. So surely, if the college were to have, it’s own station, it should be to one of London’s iconic designs.
Ian gives a lot of reasons, why York Road would be an expensive station to add to the Piccadilly Line, despite the fact that it could have lifts like Caledonian Road descending to the platforms.
But suppose the Docklands Light Railway were to be extended from Bank station as has been proposed.
This map shows a possible route.
But why stop at S. Pancras.? It could be extended under Kings Cross station, stopping where required to finish at York Road station.
- Only the building would be used.
- There would be no connection to the Piccadilly Line.
- The Docklands Light Railway tunnels would be several metres down to travel under buildings and the stations.
- An underground passage could be built to a reopened Maiden Lane station.
A worthwhile use would have been found for an iconic building and Kings Cross Central would have much better public transport connections.
And what happens to the bus garage? Improving one transepts situation by worsening another doesn’t wash in my book.
Comment by Lawrence | February 23, 2018 |