London Underground questions

[Salif]

Which underground lines use the larger subsurface gauge and is it true it slightly exceeds normal UK heavy rail gauge?

[Trainman Dave]

Ask Tubeman at:
http://www.skyscrapercity.com/showth...445885&page=11

[Salif]

Thanks for pointing me down the right track

[sotonsi]

the District, East London, Metropolitan, Hammersmith and City and Circle lines use subsurface stock. The ELL and Met use A stock, the H&C, Circle and Wimbledon-Edgware Road use C stock and the rest of the District uses D stock.

the H&C, ELL and Met were set up to slightly wider gauge than mainline standard - this was due to the original Met's broad gauge (as used on the Great Western Railway, which it plugged into) and, later, the Great Central's continental gauge (and the overall plan to run Manchester-London-Paris trains via the Met and ELL).

IIRC the diesel GW local and Chiltern trains utilise the bigger gauge of their lines, just as A stock is wider than most UK passenger trains (I think it's the widest)

[Salif]

What is the difference between A, C & D stock?

And does that mean if things had gone to plan Continental gauge mainline trains could have been running along the GCR/GWR and then under Central London and then onto the Channel Tunnel?

[sarflonlad]

**deleted**

stupid post about gauges i easily answered on wiki

[Salif]

Originally Posted by sarflonlad

**deleted**

stupid post about gauges i easily answered on wiki

Eh?

[iampuking]

Originally Posted by Salif

What is the difference between A, C & D stock?

Quite a bit...

A Stock, built in 1960, lots of seats, 3 doors per train:

image hosted on flickr


C Stock, like cattle trucks, few seats, lots of doors:

image hosted on flickr


D Stock, single leaf doors, longer carriages, flat walls, built in 1978

image hosted on flickr

[zfreeman]

A C and D Stock refers to the subsurface lines (eg the District Line) and the sort of trains they have.
A stock runs on the metropolitan line and the east london line(four car formation-due to transfer back to the met line when the ELLX comes online by 2010)
C stock runs on district line (Edgeware Road to Wimbledon)
D stock runs on the rest of the district line

[Wild@Heart]

Right, I have a question that's been bugging me for a while... Why oh why is the Paddington Hammersmith and City line shown separately to the Circle/District and Bakerloo lines on the tube map? It makes no sense why they'd do it that way. They're both, for all intents and purposes, the same entity (see A-Z map below), so why confuse matters by putting two Paddington entries on the map?



I believe the H&C station is the one farthest to the north.

Now, compare the current map with one from 1997. Back then all the lines are joined by the circley interchange icons and things look a lot neater.



Anyway, just a bugbear of mine I'm seeking an explanation for. Maybe there's a perfectly good reason why it's shown that way, but I reckon it looks odd! Viva 1997!

[DarJoLe]

Overcrowding.

[sotonsi]

because you have to leave fare control and re-enter it to get between both bits. The distance is further than the two Hammersmiths, or Edgware Roads, and just about the same as the two Shepherd's Bushes.

Originally there was Paddington (Bishop's Road) and Paddington (Praed St) stations, with different names. Having these two as the same station would be like NR maps showing Kings Cross and St Pancras as one - they clearly aren't, though they are close.

[Wild@Heart]

Originally Posted by sotonsi

because you have to leave fare control and re-enter it to get between both bits.

Aha, wasn't aware of that. Thanks.

Interesting to find out that the reasons behind this are tactical. I still think it looks messy on the map, but hey, that's just me.

[sweek]

This is mostly done because the interchange there is more difficult than at Edgware Road; by doing it like that, they are trying to make people not make the interchange at the already very busy Paddington.

[Martin S]

I've always been surprised by those two Paddingtons. I worked on City Thameslink station back in the early 90s. Originally that was known as St Pauls Thameslink but was changed on the insistence of the emergency services who feared that it could be confused with the St Pauls underground station.