NORTHERN HEIGHTS: Crouch End - Highgate

 


 

For a scan of a 1930s A-Z showing the route of the Finsbury Park to Alexandra Palace section of this line, click here.

London Transport had planned to take over the entire line (hence it being shown as 'under construction' on contemporary tube maps) and incorporate it into its Northern Line. The conversion works were disrupted by the second world war however: the works that were suitably advanced were completed but the remainder were shelved and never resumed.

The map above shows everything except the plan to divert the section south of Finsbury Park onto the short underground line to Moorgate.


For some interesting comparisons between these photos and how the line was in 1970,
have a look at Peter Wright's Northern Heights website.

 


 


The platforms at Crouch End looking north.

Top level photo taken by Peter Wright in 1970 (©2003), the bottom level photo (move your cursor over the above image to view it) taken around 1979.
Apart from the missing track, the obvious difference is the replacement of the weak bridge carrying
Crouch End Hill over the line. The top half of the station building (i.e. most of it) was
demolished along with the old bridge.

Click here for Peter Wright's excellent site of the line as it was in 1970.

 

 

 

 

 


Looking south.

 

 

 

 

 


The platforms at Crouch End looking south from where the station building used to be.

 

 

 

 

 


At the northern end of Crouch End's southbound platform are the bricked up remains of the base of the old station building.

 

 

 

 

 


Closer, more recent view of the bricked up windows of the lower level of the station building.

 

(photo: 2003)

 

 

 

 

 


The station building for Crouch End stood on this bridge over the line where the strange upright brick mini-towers are. The two premises to the left of it have survived from operational days - the rear of them can be seen in the photo two above this one.

The location of Crouch End station is not ideal; it is a third of a mile (uphill) from Crouch End Broadway. The ideal position for a station would be in Crouch End Broadway itself: the area in front of the town hall would suffice.

The author, in fantasy money-is-no-object mode, would like to see the line dive into a new tunnel immediately north of Stroud Green station, serve Crouch End Broadway, then head back toward the surface, rejoining the original alignment before it reached Highgate. Of course if money was no object, the line could always continue in tunnel directly to Muswell Hill and Alexandra Palace (and continue to Wood Green?). The problem with that though would be the loss of the remarkable views from the Muswell Hill viaduct.

 

 

 


This sign was situated just to the left of the two buildings in the photo above. It went 'missing' sometime in the 1980s.

 

 

 

 

 


Grotesque tree root formation.

(photo: 2003)

 

 

 

 

 


The bridge over Stanhope Road - the line nestling in the valley between Shepherd's Hill and Hornsey Lane.

The bridge was demolished (presumably due to deterioration) and replaced by a one-track width footpath.

 

 

 

 

 


Very narrow bridge (for cars) over Northwood Road.

(photo: 2003)

 

 

 

 

 


Looking north at the southern portal of the southern tunnels, in the late 1970s or so.

The forestation of the line is indicated by the 2009 photo taken from approximately the same position. Move your cursor over the image to view it.

 

 

 

 

 


The tunnel mouths south of Highgate station.

These have been used for filming episodes of Eastenders and Waking The Dead amongst others.

(photo: 2006)

 

 

 

 

 


Screenshot of the BBC drama Waking The Dead - Trevor Eve with his back to the camera. This was filmed circa Mar 2003.

 

 

 

 

 


Waking The Dead (the episode was entitled Thin Air).

 

 

 

 

 


Southern end of the northbound tunnel. Open for many years, these gates here were welded shut in 2009.

(photo: 2003)

 

 

 

 

 


Looking south from Highgate station at the southbound tunnel.

(photo: 2005)

 

 

Photos taken between 1977 and 1981, except where stated.

 


 

Northern Heights: Highgate station