Lewisham Station - Junction Approach, Lewisham, London, UK
N 51° 27.934 W 000° 00.828
30U E 707415 N 5705829
Lewisham station handles trains on the North Kent Line and the South Eastern Main Line and is a major commuter station for central London.
Waymark Code: WMF63W
Location: London, United Kingdom
Date Posted: 08/29/2012
Views: 1
The Ideal Homes website [visit link] gives a brief history of how
Lewisham came to have a station:
"Like other villages at this radius from London,
Lewisham became a popular place of residence for rich City men from the
seventeenth century, and increasingly in the eighteenth.
The first railway through Lewisham, the North Kent line
to Dartford, opened in 1849. The present station opened in 1857, when the Mid
Kent line was added. These railways encouraged the building of new houses for
commuters. Although there were a few working-class areas, Lewisham consisted
mainly of large houses with extensive gardens until the 1870s. From this time
the wealthier inhabitants moved out, and streets of houses for lower-middle
class and artisan commuters had largely replaced the big houses by the end of
the century."
Wikipedia [visit
link] tells us about the station's
layout:
"There are four platforms for main-line trains: 1 and 2
on the North Kent Line, and 3 and 4 on the South Eastern Main Line. The former
opened on 30 July 1849, the latter on 1 January 1857.
In 1929 large-scale remodelling of the junction was
undertaken to enable cross-London freight traffic to be routed via Nunhead and
Loughborough Junction. The new route utilised part of the former Greenwich Park
branch and included a flyover. Some trains heading to/from London use the
flyover and then descend via Tanners Hill Junction to rejoin the main line,
using a reversible line which opened in 1976. Kent trains from London, having
passed through the station, curve round under the main line to Hither Green en
route to Ladywell.
Platforms 5 and 6 are served by Docklands Light Railway
trains to Bank and Stratford
From December 2009, Lewisham was fitted with electric
ticket gates, in line with the Government's new strategy to give all Greater
London National Rail stations Oyster card accessibility and closing access to
those who attempt to travel without tickets. The part-time exit from platform 4
is ungated and does not have an Oyster reader and the gates on the secondary
entrance to platform 1 are regularly left open."