Pinner Underground station

Image: © Marathon Taken: 27 Apr 2016

Pinner station was opened on 25th May 1885, following a prior expansion to nearby Harrow-on-the-Hill station in 1880. It remained the terminus of the Metropolitan Railway until 1st September 1887 when the line was further extended to Rickmansworth. In 1915, the Metroland project was conceived in order to move people out of central London into rural Middlesex. Houses near the stations were built in haste and sold for as little as £400 each. However, in Pinner, houses built during this expansion were required to be worth at least £1,000. What is now the Chiltern Line began as the Great Central Railway on 15th March 1899. The Great Central Railway provided services from Marylebone to destinations such as Rugby, Leicester, Nottingham and Manchester before the Beeching Axe cut them back to Aylesbury. They used the same tracks as the Metropolitan until 1962 when a pair of fast lines was added from Harrow-on-the-Hill to north of Moor Park. These by-pass Pinner station to the south and are used by Chiltern Line trains and fast Metropolitan Line trains. In this photograph from the up platform, the fast lines are to the left beyond the down platform. The next station in this direction is Northwood Hills.

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