Yesterday I discussed why the Bakerloo line hasn't been extended south through Southwark. Today I've been to visit the communities who've missed out.
Poor old Camberwell. No Bakerloo line station, no tube station, indeed no station at all. And this is no insignificant location. Camberwell's been an important settlement since the Domesday Book, later home to extensive Georgian estates, now packed with people. They get around courtesy of a better-than-usual bus service, whereas what they'd really like is a station. Annoyingly, they used to have one. Just to the west of the central crossroads is Camberwell Station Road which, as all the clues suggest, used to contain a station. The northern edge of the road runs along the main railway viaduct, whose arches are filled with businesses that do things under the bonnets of cars. One of these used to be the way into Camberwell station, opened on the London, Chatham and Dover Railway in 1862. A most convenient way to travel to Blackfriars and Holborn, at least until wartime operations forced its closure in 1916. And since then there's been no way to catch a train from Camberwell, even though plenty of services speed through mockingly on the tracks above.
Could the station be reopened? Sure it could, if the will were there, and the money. The only real problem is that Loughborough Junction is less than a mile down the road, and that would probably have to close if Camberwell were reopened. There's no room to have two stations so close on this line, apparently, because the priority is not slowing down services to Sutton too much. Apologies to residents of SE5, but stopping to pick you up is on nobody's priority list. In the meantime Camberwell station remains somewhere to get your tyres changed and your panels beaten, and the road is king.
Had the Bakerloo ever come calling, the station would probably have been on Camberwell Green. That sounds like a terrible idea, concreting over a rare patch of grassland at the heart of the community. But Camberwell Green's no sylvan glade, more a cut-through with pigeons, and I dare say a corner could be lost without the world ending. Council cash means the image of this open space is improving, and there's now a Farmers Market to enjoy every Saturday. It's not a big Farmers Market, to be frank, but the fresh produce and bakery goods looked good to me and should draw out discerning consumers who like to shop local. Also present every Saturday are online community SE5 Forum, offering news and advice to take away, including a hard copy of this splendid 90-page guide to Camberwell's delights.
From here I walked north to Burgess Park - the other site hereabouts where a Bakerloo line station isn't going to be built. On my way up Camberwell Road I was stopped outside a parade of shops to be offered 'Enlightenment', in the form of a colour pamphlet promising salvation dispensed from the back of a supermarket trolley. The area is dominated by large housing blocks named after famous poets, as if somehow that might soften their visual impact. But there is one lovely Regency enclave at Addington Square, now surrounded on three sides by park. These are highlydesirableterraces, described by Pevsner as pleasantly irregular, gathered around a rectangular lawn already bursting with crocuses.
The Grand Surrey Canal once terminated at a wharf immediately to the north - another transport link the area has carelessly lost. The canal is now a footpath, and the surrounding land has become Burgess Park, the largest green lung round here. Unusually almost all of its 113 acres used to be housing, until this was wiped away post-war and made a recreation space for surrounding development. A limekiln, library and several former canal bridges survive, mixed in with far more modern services like a tennis club and American football pitches. It's not clear precisely where in the park a station might be located, but I'd guess somewhere near the boxing club and the butterfly mosaic, which is fairly central and already quite built up.
Immediately to the north is a dense residential zone, otherwise known as Walworth. To most Londoners Walworth doesn't exist because it doesn't have a station, although like Camberwell it once did, and the two closed on the same day. Previously when I've walked this way I've followed Thurlow Street, through the heart of the Aylesbury Estate, which is the epitome of 60s urban planning. Long residential blocks dominate the cityscape, laid out in parallel rows like a giant defensive structure. The poorest were moved in to give them a better life, but they just became poorer, perhaps because there wasn't a tube station at the bottom of the street. But on this visit I followed Portland Street, which started out just as bleak but then improved hugely.
The houses here are originals, highly characterful terraces of two or three storeys, some with variegated brick, others with Tudorbethan gables. No planner bulldozed these beauties, and they're now highly desirable in just the way that the Aylesbury's adjacent sky-boxes aren't. To add to the contrast, won't you look at Michael Faraday School? Outstanding both educationally and architecturally, its ribbed ring structure looks like an alien spacecraft has landed, in this case to bring hope. Head deeper into Walworth and you'll cross East Street Market, one of London's longest, and still thriving with bargain hunters. There's no brioche and croissants here, nor anything to cross the capital for, but many a blue plastic bag is carried home laden with fruit and veg or clothes and shoes.
As Elephant & Castle approaches the tone of the road changes until finally it ends at a locked gate beneath a concrete walkway. This is the edge of the Heygate Estate, almost as notorious as the Aylesbury, but considerably more dead. Southwark council have long had plans for regeneration, and a few years ago sold off the site to developers for what might have beentoo low a price. A thousand homes stand empty, their windows sealed with metal, a community dispersed. Until recently it was still possible to traipse the upper walkways and explore a maze of passages, but almost all of the stairways have now been closed off. Only ground level remains accessible, should you fancy a kickabout across an overgrown garden or a dystopian safari with your camera. Eventually something brighter will arise, but only 300 "affordable" rented homes are planned. Those relocated are unlikely to be able to return, with a more mixed crowd moving in as the Elephant heads upmarket. There's a tube station at the end of the road, you see, and that makes all the difference.
It's 100 years since an extension of the Bakerloo line south of Elephant & Castle was first proposed. So how come we still haven't got one? Is there a genuine reason, or is southeast London simply tube-jinxed.
Take a look a map of the northern half of Southwark, and there's a whopping railway-sized hole at its heart. Such gaps aren't unknown further out, but this is Zone 2 for heaven's sake, and no other part of inner London suffers this fate. The Northern line skirts down the western edge, although not especially close. Thameslink trains run two miles between Elephant & Castle and Loughborough Junction without stopping, which is heartless. And trains departing London Bridge run for three miles non-stop, apart from a branchline halt at South Bermondsey which merits a mere four trains an hour.
The least accessible spot in this transport desert is somewhere on the northern edge of Burgess Park, near that lake you can see on the map. From here it's more than 20 minutes walk to Kennington, more than 20 minutes walk to Denmark Hill and more than 20 minutes walk to South Bermondsey. Again, in the outer suburbs this might not sound too bad, but for a densely packed inner London suburb this is appalling connectivity, and TfL know it. They calculate public transport accessibility on a six point PTAL scale, with 1 being rubbish and 6 being ace. Here's a map ofPTAL contours, a little out of date, but you'll get the idea. Far flung Biggin Hill scores 1, while Trafalgar Square scores 6, even Bow where I live scores 6 too. But Burgess Park scores 2, maybe 1, depending on where precisely in the neighbourhood you are. You might fancy using TfL's Planning Information Database to calculate PTAL values in your neck of the woods.
It is perhaps no coincidence that the neighbourhoods in this transport black hole are among the poorest in London. The Aylesbury Estate, where Tony Blair launched his premiership, is closest to the epicentre, but no progress has been made here transport-wise in the last fifteen years. Plans were on the table for the Cross River Tram to run straight through the area on its way from Camden to Peckham, and that would have helped considerably, but Boris scrapped that for being too expensive. There had been musings that the Northern line could head this way from Kennington, but they've never been much more than a pipedream, and Boris extending the line to Battersea instead has killed that. So it's the Bakerloo or nothing. And alas, nothing looks most likely.
The Bakerloo line still has spare capacity, which is a rarity in rush hour London. To the south of Waterloo there's plenty of room northbound in the mornings and southbound in the evenings, and this could be put to much better use. Stand on the platforms at Elephant & Castle and the tunnels stretch off, brightly lit, in the direction where the extension ought to be. They're only a few hundred metres long, so an illusion, but it's easy to imagine trains rumbling onward to serve the Southwark hinterland.
A ridiculous number of Bakerloo line extensions have been proposed, without any of them actually coming to fruition... 1913: E&C → Camberwell Green → Dulwich → Sydenham Hill → Crystal Palace 1921: E&C → Camberwell Green → Dulwich → Sydenham Hill → Crystal Palace 1922: E&C → Loughborough Junction → Catford → Orpington 1928: E&C → Dulwich → Rushey Green 1931: E&C → Walworth → Camberwell 1947: E&C → Walworth → Camberwell
Those last two proposals were taken the most seriously of all. A third platform would have been added at Elephant & Castle, and the new route would have followed Walworth Road and Camberwell Road south. But no. A northern link from Baker Street to Finchley Road got the attention instead, then the war got in the way. Later it got so busy on the Watford and Stanmore branches that any southbound extension would have been impractical, and anyway cars were the future now so why bother. Later still the need for extra rolling stock bumped up the price too much, as did the cost of adding an extra subterranean platform. Always an excuse, never built.
It's only been in the last half a dozen or so years that a Bakerloo extension's again been taken slightly seriously again. In 2007 TfL's backroom team were asked to scope the possibilities, and came up with three possible options that might have proven workable.
a) E&C → Camberwell Green → Herne Hill → Tulse Hill → and all stations to Streatham Common and Beckenham Junction
That's a hurrah in Camberwell, where a Bakerloo link would be greeted as a revelation. But next stop Herne Hill isn't very adventurous - all this does is provide a second way to get from E&C to HH with very long gaps between the stations. Then we're onto existing National Rail lines, taking the indirect route round to Beckenham, including a last stretch doubling up with Tramlink. The Bakerloo would end up sharing tracks with other services at both its northern and southern ends, and journey times might get unreliable.
b) E&C → Burgess Park → Peckham Rye → Peckham Rye Common → Honor Oak Park → Catford Bridge → and all stations to Beckenham Junction and Hayes
No joy this time in Camberwell, but instead a direct hit on the transport black hole in Burgess Park. Just one station would be built in the big gap, however, before giving Peckham its first non-roundabout route to the West End. There'd follow another new station near the common, then an interchange with the Overground at Honor Oak Park. From Catford onwards the Bakerloo would emerge from underground and entirely take over the Hayes branch line - no sharing of tracks, an efficient solution.
c) E&C → Burgess Park → Old Kent Road → New Cross → Lewisham → and all stations to Beckenham Junction and Hayes
Another vote for Burgess Park, but then continuing east rather than south to bring a new station to the Old Kent Road. Rejoicing would ensue, and no mistake. Thence to New Cross, on the Cinderella branch of the Overground, and a non-stop link to Lewisham. All ten stations on the Hayes branch line would then be taken over, and the Bakerloo would become a proper cross-London line. [more, plus map, from London Reconnections]
The last of these three options got the closest to getting the nod, which alas wasn't very close at all. No proper plans have been made, and no funding is anywhere near being on the table. All three of these potential extensions are expensive combinations of tunnelling and repurposing, far beyond even the wildest dreams of Coalition austerity kickstart funding. It'd take Westfield opening a supermall in Walworth to see any action, because we don't fund rail for aspirational reasons any more, only hard economics. Sorry Southwark, your miserable connectivity looks set to endure for decades.
Poor old Camberwell. No Bakerloo line station, no tube station, indeed no station at all. And this is no insignificant location. Camberwell's been an important settlement since the Domesday Book, later home to extensive Georgian estates, now packed with people. They get around courtesy of a better-than-usual bus service, whereas what they'd really like is a station. Annoyingly, they used to have one. Just to the west of the central crossroads is Camberwell Station Road which, as all the clues suggest, used to contain a station. The northern edge of the road runs along the main railway viaduct, whose arches are filled with businesses that do things under the bonnets of cars. One of these used to be the way into Camberwell station, opened on the London, Chatham and Dover Railway in 1862. A most convenient way to travel to Blackfriars and Holborn, at least until wartime operations forced its closure in 1916. And since then there's been no way to catch a train from Camberwell, even though plenty of services speed through mockingly on the tracks above.
Had the Bakerloo ever come calling, the station would probably have been on Camberwell Green. That sounds like a terrible idea, concreting over a rare patch of grassland at the heart of the community. But Camberwell Green's no sylvan glade, more a cut-through with pigeons, and I dare say a corner could be lost without the world ending. Council cash means the image of this open space is improving, and there's now a Farmers Market to enjoy every Saturday. It's not a big Farmers Market, to be frank, but the fresh produce and bakery goods looked good to me and should draw out discerning consumers who like to shop local. Also present every Saturday are online community SE5 Forum, offering news and advice to take away, including a hard copy of this splendid 90-page guide to Camberwell's delights.
The Grand Surrey Canal once terminated at a wharf immediately to the north - another transport link the area has carelessly lost. The canal is now a footpath, and the surrounding land has become Burgess Park, the largest green lung round here. Unusually almost all of its 113 acres used to be housing, until this was wiped away post-war and made a recreation space for surrounding development. A limekiln, library and several former canal bridges survive, mixed in with far more modern services like a tennis club and American football pitches. It's not clear precisely where in the park a station might be located, but I'd guess somewhere near the boxing club and the butterfly mosaic, which is fairly central and already quite built up.
The houses here are originals, highly characterful terraces of two or three storeys, some with variegated brick, others with Tudorbethan gables. No planner bulldozed these beauties, and they're now highly desirable in just the way that the Aylesbury's adjacent sky-boxes aren't. To add to the contrast, won't you look at Michael Faraday School? Outstanding both educationally and architecturally, its ribbed ring structure looks like an alien spacecraft has landed, in this case to bring hope. Head deeper into Walworth and you'll cross East Street Market, one of London's longest, and still thriving with bargain hunters. There's no brioche and croissants here, nor anything to cross the capital for, but many a blue plastic bag is carried home laden with fruit and veg or clothes and shoes.
Take a look a map of the northern half of Southwark, and there's a whopping railway-sized hole at its heart. Such gaps aren't unknown further out, but this is Zone 2 for heaven's sake, and no other part of inner London suffers this fate. The Northern line skirts down the western edge, although not especially close. Thameslink trains run two miles between Elephant & Castle and Loughborough Junction without stopping, which is heartless. And trains departing London Bridge run for three miles non-stop, apart from a branchline halt at South Bermondsey which merits a mere four trains an hour.
The Bakerloo line still has spare capacity, which is a rarity in rush hour London. To the south of Waterloo there's plenty of room northbound in the mornings and southbound in the evenings, and this could be put to much better use. Stand on the platforms at Elephant & Castle and the tunnels stretch off, brightly lit, in the direction where the extension ought to be. They're only a few hundred metres long, so an illusion, but it's easy to imagine trains rumbling onward to serve the Southwark hinterland.
