Northwood station

Image: © Marathon Taken: 21 Mar 2018

Northwood station was opened on 1st September 1887 on the Metropolitan Railway's extension to Rickmansworth from the previous terminus at Pinner – see https://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/4926906 Northwood had been the first suburb in the 19th century on the extension (Northwood Hills dates from the 1930s see https://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/5667907) 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. At Northwood, the Gatehill Estate was built between the two world wars but much of the area remained wooded or covered by golf courses – Northwood Golf Course dates from 1891 and Haste Hill Golf Course from 1926. 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 Northwood station to the south and are used by Chiltern Line trains and fast Metropolitan Line trains. At the same time the station was rebuilt to include platforms on the newly quadrupled Watford slow lines rather than the Amersham fast lines. This is the up Metropolitan line platform looking up the line. The next station in this direction is Northwood Hills. The fast lines are out of sight to the right.

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