So today I travelled on the High Barnet branch of the Northern Line
for the first time and was wondering...Why is East Finchley station so
LARGE when Finchley Central is relatively small?

Chris.

"Mmlabbd" wrote in message
om...
So today I travelled on the High Barnet branch of the Northern Line
for the first time and was wondering...Why is East Finchley station so
LARGE when Finchley Central is relatively small?


Because East Finchley was intended to be a junction station hence four
platforms and it is/was a train crew booking on point so needs offices and
messroom facilities.

It was built in the 1930s when the architectural fashion was for larger
structures with whereas Finchley Central dates from 1872 and was built as a
minor branch line station by the Great Northern Railway.

In article ,
(Mmlabbd) wrote:

So today I travelled on the High Barnet branch of the Northern Line
for the first time and was wondering...Why is East Finchley station so
LARGE when Finchley Central is relatively small?

Chris.

I assume that you mean the building itself?

When the Northern Line was extended from Highgate (now Archway) to join up
with the main line at East Finchley, two additional platforms were built -
the outer platforms (1 and 4). This meant demolishing the original station
building which was on the site of platform 4. East Finchley became a new
crew depot for the Barnet branch of the Northern Line and so accommodation
had to be built for them and this was built over all four platforms. Today
the building contains a mess room, canteen, booking-on office, managers
office and toilets.

Luckily Finchley Central survived any changes and the original building
still remains, although there were plans to incorporate an additional
track on the other side of platform 3, which would have meant demolishing
the existing station building. The demise of the Northern Heights
expansion stopped this.

Roger
(my reader sometimes loses mail/newsgroup messages
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please e-mail me again. Ta!)

Piccadilly Pilot wrote:
"Mmlabbd" wrote in message
om...

So today I travelled on the High Barnet branch of the Northern Line
for the first time and was wondering...Why is East Finchley station so
LARGE when Finchley Central is relatively small?



Because East Finchley was intended to be a junction station hence four
platforms and it is/was a train crew booking on point so needs offices and
messroom facilities.

It was built in the 1930s when the architectural fashion was for larger
structures with whereas Finchley Central dates from 1872 and was built as a
minor branch line station by the Great Northern Railway.


As Romix elucidated below, Finchley Central was also going to get a
partial axe as part of the Northern Heights expansion, with an
additional platform and major track rearrangements, to provide the same
layout at East Finchley for the Barnet and Mill Hill branches of the
Northern.

As it is, the current layout supports the conversion of the Mill Hill
branch into a two-station shuttle.

Brad

(Mmlabbd) wrote in message . com...

So today I travelled on the High Barnet branch of the Northern Line
for the first time and was wondering...Why is East Finchley station so
LARGE when Finchley Central is relatively small?

The (Barnet Branch) Northern Line wasn't always the way it is
now: it has been contorted over the past 70(?) years and
has had several mods/extensions to it proposed over time.

1. The Line to Mill Hill East was originally the "main" line,
with the line the HB being the Branch. The MHE line originally
went to Edgware (so there were two stations in Edgware, possibly
more).

2. The Station south of East Finchley wasn't the current
Highgate station but a different Highgate station atop the
existing one. It served a line to Alexandra Palace and Finsbury
Park.

There were proposals to bring all these under the banner of
The Northern Line, and to extend the line from Archway to the
current Highgate station (which wasn't yet there) and then on
to East Finchley

There was also a proposal to take the Northern Line from Edgware
on to Bushey Heath (partially built and the arches near Spur Road
were only removed 15 years ago)

As such, East Finchley was going to become a large junction, from
which you could get to:
a) Central London via Highgate Low Level and Archway
b) Alexandra Palace via Highgate High Level
c) Finsbury Park via Highgate Low Level
d) Bushey Heath, Edgware, Mill HE
e) High Barnet

Most of this happened but never all at the same time, I think.
I presume they'd already built/enlarged the station by then.

Richard [in PO7]

In article , Richard M
Willis writes
As such, East Finchley was going to become a large junction, from
which you could get to:
a) Central London via Highgate Low Level and Archway

Right. Then either Bank or Charing Cross branches.

b) Alexandra Palace via Highgate High Level

Only by changing trains at Highgate HL.

c) Finsbury Park via Highgate Low Level

High Level, not Low Level, and thence to Moorgate.

d) Bushey Heath, Edgware, Mill HE
e) High Barnet

Right.

Most of this happened but never all at the same time, I think.
I presume they'd already built/enlarged the station by then.

East Finchley was rebuilt in the late 1930s.

More details on http://www.davros.org/rail/culg/northern.html.

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"Clive D. W. Feather" wrote in message ...

East Finchley was rebuilt in the late 1930s.

More details on http://www.davros.org/rail/culg/northern.html.

If you look at the front of East Finchley station, there in an
'Underground' sign, but another plain glass panel of a sort of oval
shape with pointed ends. This used to be an LNER sign.

The Phoenix Cinema, on the other side of the road is worth a visit,
the auditorium dates from 1910, but was altered in 1938, it was
actually reversed, the screen used to be at the main road end. The
fiberous plaster bas reliefs on the side walls date from this
modernision. Further changes were made in the early '70s, and three
years ago it closed for several months for improvments to the foyer,
iincluding better disabled access, and new ladies toilets, but not the
gents, for some reason.

The projection equipment is relativly new, a single 1960s Kinoton
FP-20, installed there in the '80s, but the 1938 Strand Electric
dimmer board for the house lights is still there. Some 1910
decoration still exists in what is now the boiler house.