80th year of Harry Beck's London Underground map design

[The Roofdog]

- Passing a train on the opposite track. Without warning, a series of carriages flicker by you in the darkness, their passengers illuminated like a ghostly sequence of pictures in a praxinoscope.

My ambition is to get on an empty carriage dressed as a seventeenth century plague doctor and just ride backwards and forwards scaring the shit out of tourists going the other way.

[Serge]

There are two excellent books on the London Underground that anyone interested should check out - Christian Wolmar's 'Subterranean Railway' and Andrew Martin's 'Underground, Overground', which also filled in lots of gaps in my knowledge about London in general.

- Occasionally seeing something old. Like some bit of map, or sign, or hardware that they haven't got round to updating yet. Do they still have the lightbulb-board platform indicator at Earls Court?

Ah, I used to love that indicator board when I lived over in that direction. I also love the fact that Baker Street station still seems quite Victorian in feel, as well.

[olliebean]

- Spiral staircases. It's like being in a big underground castle!

I love the way you can enter a crowded station like Tottenham Court Road during rush hour, slip off to the side at the top of the escalators, and have a lovely little bit of calm as you descend the spiral staircase, often not meeting a single other person all the way down.

[idunnosomename]

New favourite DLR station name: Pudding Mill Lane.

My favourite is Mudchute. Much more titter-worthy than Cockfosters.

I went on the DLR for the first time the other day. I forgot to tap in at Lewisham and was only reminded just before I got to Bank by one of the station announcements, so I had to go back two stops and check in so they didn't fine me at the other end.

But the great thing was I had to time to make sure I could sit at the front and it's like you're on a ROLLERCOASTER and you can pretend you're driving the train and spread the standard out on the desk and do the crossword and think about striking tommorrow. Also you remember why they call it the Tube when you reach Bank. All very exciting.

[Peter P. Parrot]

There is slight satisfaction when you sit at the front of the train and look through the front window though. Like the worlds most boring rollercoaster. I wish I could do that on other trains, just stare into dimly lit tunnels.

You need to take a ride on the Tyne and Wear Metro, the driver's cab is only half the width of the train so you can sit right at the front of the train, look out and pretend you're driving it, overground and underground.

I have done this. It was great.

[Serge]

Oh, by the way, the entire London Underground is 150 years old in less than half an hours time. The Metropolitan Railway officially opened on 9th January 1863, running between Paddington and Farringdon.

Blimus.

[Lazy Daisy]

Ten best thing about the London Underground

Some of these might be out of date. It's twelve years since we moved out of London, and ten since we moved away from Amersham, so bar the occasional weekend sojourn or sightseeing trip with the family, I haven't used the Tube in ages.

- The blast of hot, fetid air that hits you just before a train emerges from the tunnel.
- The barriers. Though the flimsy glass things they have nowadays are no match for the chunky rubber bumpers that had to be navigated with care when I was a kid.
- Passing a train on the opposite track. Without warning, a series of carriages flicker by you in the darkness, their passengers illuminated like a ghostly sequence of pictures in a praxinoscope.
- The 'hall of mirrors' effect caused by the curve in the window opposite the bench seats, which means you can amuse yourself by making your head float above your body.
- The escalators at Angel. They are so long that appropriately, it is like you are ascending into heaven.
- Mice. Aren't they adorable?
- Occasionally seeing something old. Like some bit of map, or sign, or hardware that they haven't got round to updating yet. Do they still have the lightbulb-board platform indicator at Earls Court?
- Spiral staircases. It's like being in a big underground castle!
- Just, the stations generally. The fact that they are portals to a nether dimension that exists beneath our own world, guarded by the mystical sigil of the roundel.
- Gawping at people in the carriages. Not in a lewd way, OK? I just like people-watching. I am a scrutinizer of the human condition.

definately agree with the whoosh as a train emerges, but you forgot the fragrant aroma of the Northern Line.

[DuncanC]

I'm dissatisfied that there's only one parody song about the London Underground in general circulation. What about one based on "Underwear" by Pulp? Come on, song parodists. Pull your socks up.

[Chutney]

http://www.etsy.com/listing/115098613/underground-lampshade

[mr-tony1000]

10 not so great things about the the London Undertube:

1- They used to have nice comfy seats on the district line trains, you know, them ones with the wooden floors an' that.
2- Other passengers.
3- Erm... pigeons in King's X
4- Not having enough brain capacity to work out exactly where to stand on every platform on the entire system, solely in order to alight/embark on the 'correct' carriage to enable the wearisome taveller to save vital seconds in being nearer the exit once one's destination has been attained, thus not being caught up in the fearful unwashed humanity of the feckless mongoids who dither about which way is 'to the exit.'
5- The cost. I mean, how much?!!?!?!?!?
6- Foreigners attempting to engage one in conversation. I mean, really, how can they not know? Dolts.
7- 10 Other stuff...

Re: Number 1. I meant the trains had wooden floors, not the seats were wooden and that THEY were the floors...

Although we all know that the ideal mass transport solution would be to take out all the seats and and just cram folk in, but until we lose all film archive and the testimony of survivors, then Auschwitz-class will just have to remain in the design folder marked 'not just yet...'

[Doomy Dwyer]

3- Erm... pigeons in King's X

I once saw a pigeon get on at Westbourne Park and calmly alight at Ladbroke Grove. He was like a little pecky commuter. No one in the carriage batted an eyelid.

The Hammersmith & City line is mental.

[Jerzy Bondov]

I once saw a pigeon get on at Westbourne Park and calmly alight at Ladbroke Grove. He was like a little pecky commuter. No one in the carriage batted an eyelid.

The Hammersmith & City line is mental.

I had a pigeon get on at Wembley Park but I think he must have realised he'd wanted to go in the other direction because he went mental when the doors shut and flew at my girlfriend's head. I laughed a lot and we're not together any more.

She went 'AHHHHH!!!!! GET OFF!!!!!', ha ha ha, what a total bitch.

[Doomy Dwyer]

Birds, eh? What're they like?

[George Oscar Bluth II]

Anyone ever been on the mysterious Waterloo and City line?

[Replies From View]

Behold:

[Ginyard]

Ah, I used to love that indicator board when I lived over in that direction. I also love the fact that Baker Street station still seems quite Victorian in feel, as well.

I remember when the trains used to have these weird looking techno panels with large chunky buttons on them near the driver's carriage. A baffling and obscure technology betrayed only by the old Bakerloo train's beamed wooden floors, which screamed William Hartnell at you.

Grittier than the Moscow Metro but cosier than the Paris Metro, the old core of London's glorious tube network is the only place underground where I could happily take my last breath. It would be a pleasure to lie slumped in a Baker St alcove.

[Obel]

Man I remember the wooden floors! I used to love going into London when I was a wee tyke, mainly because I loved riding on the Underground. Happy birthday, trains and stuff!

I spend every day complaining about the tube because I hate rush hour Central line trains, but apart from that I love it.

[Replies From View]

Wooden escalators too.  There may be a couple of stations that still have these, actually.  Back in the days when people could still smoke on the underground (sounds insane and awful to think about) they did tend to catch on fire, those chaps.

[Buelligan]

4- Not having enough brain capacity to work out exactly where to stand on every platform on the entire system, solely in order to alight/embark on the 'correct' carriage to enable the wearisome taveller to save vital seconds in being nearer the exit once one's destination has been attained, thus not being caught up in the fearful unwashed humanity of the feckless mongoids who dither about which way is 'to the exit.'

Gosh, I'd forgotten about that.  The desperate, sad, little pleasure I took in knowing exactly where to stand on certain platforms so that I'd be right in front of the door of a usually less full carriage and ready to disembark at the correct spot on the next platform to speed myself towards the corridor and the next train. 

[Obel]

Wooden escalators too.  There may be a couple of stations that still have these, actually.  Back in the days when people could still smoke on the underground (sounds insane and awful to think about) they did tend to catch on fire, those chaps.

Pretty sure there isn't anymore - for safety reasons. As I recall there was a huge fire on the escalators ages ago at Kings X that killed a bunch of people.

[Angst in my Pants]

On a dull commute I often lose myself in the tube map, trying to find patterns or a station name I haven't heard of.

Searching for patterns probably started when I first saw this 'hard-to-unsee' advert:


Using google image search for the advert above uncovered these little beauties (more at fudgegraphics.com):


I once saw an advert showing a street map of the theatre district around Seven Dials which looked exactly like the two Greek theatre masks, but I can't find it nor recreate it - perhaps it had been dabbled with to make it fit.

[Serge]

Anyone ever been on the mysterious Waterloo and City line?

Yes. It's less exciting than you'd think.

[Obel]

It's the only underground line with no outdoor section. To repair trains they have a big crane at one side that pulls them out of the ground.

That's pretty much all there is to it.

[El Unicornio, mang]

But the great thing was I had to time to make sure I could sit at the front and it's like you're on a ROLLERCOASTER and you can pretend you're driving the train and spread the standard out on the desk and do the crossword and think about striking tommorrow.

You can do that on all the Metro trains (up here in the north east). They're usually already taken though (by riff-raff, 9 times out of 10)

[ziggy starbucks]

I've got no juice today

[Gurke and Hare]

Pretty sure there isn't anymore - for safety reasons. As I recall there was a huge fire on the escalators ages ago at Kings X that killed a bunch of people.

I think there's one left, at one of the District Line stations out in the East London sticks. Ah, no, it's at Greenford on the Central Line in the West London sticks.

[Peter P. Parrot]

It's the only underground line with no outdoor section. To repair trains they have a big crane at one side that pulls them out of the ground.

That's pretty much all there is to it.

The entire Victoria Line is underground, from Walthamstow Central in the north to Brixton in the south, although off-duty trains do go above ground to reach the depot at Northumberland Park.