IMAGES TAKEN NEAR TO
Station Approach, LONDON, N12 8SE

Woodside Park underground station on the High Barnet branch of the Northern line. The station was opened in 1872 by the Great Northern Railway and became part of the Underground network in the late 1930s. It is the last station alphabetically in a list of Underground stations.

The early railways tended to avoid the high ground in the centre of the present Borough of Barnet. Finchley thus remained a largely agricultural community, providing hay for London's army of horses. To improve communications, the Edgware, Highgate & London Railway Company opened a line in 1867 from Finsbury Park through East Finchley, and Finchley Central, and to the east of Mill Hill. On 1st April 1872 the company opened a four mile double track northwards through stations, including Torrington Park (later Woodside Park), up the eastern side of the Dollis Brook to High Barnet. The line failed to climb the steep slope up to Chipping (High) Barnet and terminated at the foot of Barnet Hill. A new villa colony near Torrington Park, Woodside caused the station to be renamed ‘Woodside Park for North Finchley’ on 1st May 1882. From 1931 the Woodside Park Garden Suburb was laid out west of the Dollis Brook and its name was added to the boards at Woodside Park station. The new London Passenger Transport Board came into existence in 1933, and in 1935 a major railway development plan was drawn up. Under the plan, the Tube was to be extended from its then terminus at Archway to the surface at East Finchley. The lines north of East Finchley running out to High Barnet and Edgware would then be connected to the Underground at Archway, replacing the old steam routes. The Northern line was so named in 1937. Tube trains reached East Finchley in 1939 and High Barnet in 1940. Northern line Tube trains to High Barnet started on 14th April 1940 and at this time the name ‘Woodside Park and North Finchley for the Woodside Garden Suburb’ was replaced by Woodside Park. The Underground extension to Edgware from Finchley Central never got further than Mill Hill East and the rest of the project was cancelled after the War when Green Belt legislation came in. Referring to the stations on the High Barnet branch Alan A Jackson in London’s Local Railways says: “The perceptive travellers can still discern the origins of the line; for the seeing eye ... the atmosphere of a country branch has not entirely gone.” This view from the up platform of Woodside Park station looks towards the attractive footbridge and beyond to the unusual feature (for the Underground) of the signal box on the end of the down platform. The footbridge and signal box no doubt date from steam days, as do the station buildings. For a close up of the latter see http://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/4947251

The Image can be seen beyond the footbridge (right).

This is one of 270 artworks by Mark Wallinger (winner of the Turner prize in 2007) http://www.theguardian.com/uk/2013/feb/07/tube-150-birthday-labyrinth-art-project ; the labyrinths are numbered according to the route taken on the 2009 record breaking tube challenge: visiting every station on the London Underground network (270) in as short a time as possible http://www.thetubechallenge.com/ . My photos of Mark Wallinger’s labyrinths are at https://www.geograph.org.uk/search.php?i=79989769 .

Where I met a mother trying to get her pram up and down all this. We managed it without waking up the child. Result.

Opened in 1872 as" Torrington Park, Woodside" by the Great Northern Railway on its line from London Kings Cross to High Barnet, the name was changed to "Woodside Park" in 1882. It was connected to the Northern Line, electrified and, with the other stations on the High Barnet line, transferred to London Underground in 1940. 'Main line' trains ceased in 1941. View north towards Totteridge & Whetstone and High Barnet.