I remember the old goods yard and Royal Mail loading platform, every year too Hornby would drag a special train in as a mobile exhibit which was nice. The first footbridge on the left hand side us kids built a kick arse camp. On the lefter most platform or the old London side platform at Sundridge Park, the little bijou 2 up 2 downs is where David Bowie grew up and the College Arms up on Plaistow Lane was where his first gigs happened. The park to the left on the London side is Kings Meadow, so many days and nites spent as a troubled teen there on the swings, in later years I used to run the whole oval and us old scooterboys used to ride round on our Vespa's and Lambretta's with a couple of Bromley police metro's chasing round unable to keep up then roar off with some cheeky hand gestures :P
One thing that could happen is that extra siding space has been kept at Bromley North, also the land was built up but never built upon for a chord heading south at Grove Park as when built it was envisaged that freight, mail and even passenger services could cross to the slow down but it was soon discovered that it meant slowing and stopping the coastal expresses on the fast up and down lines so they never put the chord in. The reason they stopped the through trains was the creaky old EPB's just held up the fast Hastings DEMU's and the 4CEPs which by time they came out of Elmstead Woods tunnel were running at full knots.
This is like a double track modern version of the Addiscombe line and I love it. I used to live in Grove Park but that was before I became interested in branch lines.
As one who commuted from Bromley North back in the 1950s (yes, the 1950s) I can fill you in on a few points:- 1) Grove Park's platform 1 did not, in my time, give cross platform interchange to the Up Fast line. 2) At the south end of Grove Park's layout there was a normal double junction between the Down and Up Fast Lines and the branch in addition to the connections to the Platform 1 line. 3) The normal service from Bromley North ran through to Charing Cross (also to Cannon Street in rush hours) on days in the week. As the crossovers from Fast to Slow lines immediately north of Grove Park station road bridge did not exist then, these trains ran all the way to and from London on the Fast lines. But in those days there were'nt the number of trains to and from places beyond Sevenoaks, which was where electrification ended. In more recent years the population of London commuters from areas beyond Sevenoaks has greatly increased. So the number of trains from these more distant places has increased. Of course these pass through Grove Park on the Fast Lines. Thus leaving no space for local trains to and from Bromley North. Had the branch been on the other, Slow lines side, of the main line there'd almost certainly be no problem in having through services to the London terminals. Finally - as a child I sometimes used to watch the shunting of goods wagons in Bromley North's goods yard (where Bus Station and car park now are) from the footbridge which still exists.
Hi. Thank you for this valuable information. I based my commentary on the former layout on an aerial photo from 1945 that is available on Google Earth but the resolution isn't that good. I used the branch daily from 2006 to 2011. Getting on at Grove Park in the morning was getting very difficult and the connection in the evening was so unreliable that I switched to using Shortlands to City Thameslink.
By the way, I have watched and enjoyed many of your videos. I have included the Palace Gates branch one in my North London playlist so that my viewers can contrast the current Stratford to North Woolwich route, as seen in my recent videos, with the old, as seen in yours. I intend to film Stratford to Tottenham Hale and beyond around April and May when Angel Road will be closing and Meridian Water will be opening. Not sure what the full scope and title of the resulting video will be.
Do you happen to know how goods trains reached the yard at Bromley North? I can't see any direct access from the down line into the yard on old track plans. Did goods trains have to run into the passenger platform and then reverse onto the up line before reversing again into the yard?
A nice portait of a relatively obscure branch line. Used to know someone who lived near Sundridge Park. He said the line was always under threat of closure in the 1970s and 1980s. Luckily it is still with us.
As part of my work I looked at closure in 1967/8 but couldn't justify the savings that might be made. It had nothing to do with the fact that it was my local station of course.
Last one, whenever I missed or they cancelled the slow to London at Grove Park, I used to walk up to the signal fone there by the ramp and pick up and the signalman at other end would answer and I would say "This is Keith's son, any chance of stopping a fast at platform 2 as late for duty" and immediately the red light would go up on platform 2 and I would hop on and get into work on time, no one batted an eyelid as BR was run for BR first and the drivers docket would show the red light so he never got grief from his traction manager. My father worked London Bridge platform 1-6 aka the widowmaker signalling panel as during rush hour it was horrendous with trains literally running block to block limping from one yellow to the next made worse with the Thameslinks.
I used the shuttle from 2006 to 2012 but swapped to Shortlands. That was slower but more reliable and I always got a seat. Bromley South is my station of choice since I got my Freedom Pass.
Some comments: unusual that all the trains you photographed at Bromley went to P1, as the vast majority use P2. At 5:25 the station building is original (with minor additions); at 6:30 you see the planned location for Sundridge Park but the local landowner objected (although he was happy for the Prince of Wales to use it in 1882); at 9:45 you are passing the old head shunt for the sidings.
Thank you for your comments. I am always very pleased to receive comments that add to the story. You are right about platform 1. I commuted from Bromley North for six years and the train was always at platform 2 but it seems that the daytime off peak service alternates between the platforms. Presumably this is to keep the track circuits functioning. The train indicator is positioned on platform 2 so it is very confusing for everybody when the train is in platform 1.
I start with a rough idea of the story I want to tell,based on what I already know. I then do a lot of research about the history of the location and look at maps and Google Earth for suitable filming locations. Then when I am filming my choice of viewpoints is influenced by the story I want to tell. After filming I edit all the clips so that I can see what I have got that is useable. I then arrange the clips in the order that they need to be seen. I add the subtitles as I go along but I read them as a story after I have finished and insert any parts of the story that I have missed. That's about it. I think I am getting better at it as I get more experienced.
Bromley branch is being re-locked as part of the Hither Green Signalling Renewals which commissions April 2020. This will be the last area re-controlled from London Bridge ASC to Three Bridges ROC (extending Grove Park workstation installed @ Easter 2018). Signal heads will be replaced and axle counters added to the branch. Signal Auto plates will be removed, and signal IDs replaced from 'Lnnn' to 'TLnnn'.
I can only say that whoever authorised this expenditure needs to take another look. Single line working on a 'one engine in steam' basis beyond platform 1 at Grove Park is all that is required to meet the available traffic. The constraints of the connection to the main line mean that nothing more than that is practical in any case. Can the axle counters cope with counting to 8 three times an hour or will they die of boredom.
@@BoogiesTrains The Bromley North relay interlocking will be life expired so subsuming the relock as part of the Higher Green relock is the most timely and cost effective solution.
I recognise that renewal and re-control are necessary but the scope of the work could be reduced considerably with just a little thought as to the real ongoing requirement. Whilst I acknowledge that much of the 80s work in removing unnecessary track went too far and we can see some of it being reversed, such as Filton Bank, there is no prospect of a surge in demand on the Bromley North branch that would even merit 4 car trains, never mind the existing double track. Lock all the points out of use. Put in a ground frame at Bromley North if it is absolutely necessary to retain two working platforms for some imagined future emergency use. Signal engineering skills are in short supply. Don't waste them on the Bromley North branch.
It is interesting that in the current capital v labour struggles in the railway industry that nobody is thinking about the customer or the long term future of the product.
It seems to me that this is a classic example of "closure by stealth". Just as BR tried with the Settle and Carlisle, there is purposely no attempt made to run the service with any connecting trains, and as for staff threatened with disciplinary action for actually helping those who pay their salaries is laughable. In a couple of years the TOC will publish lack of passenger loadings, cost of running etc as a case for closure. But why on earth is such a short branch line still double track?, that tells me that they don't want to spend any money in the run up to closure.
This video implies low usage but using entry/exit figures for Bromley North and Sundridge Park implies 720k+ trips per year, averaging 20+ per train. If the majority of these passengers are travelling to London implies are gross revenue of £3 million per annum. Perhaps justifying it's existence.
Hi Martin. I commuted on the line from 2006 to 2011 and now use it only occasionally in the off peak. When I commuted there were perhaps 3 or 4 trains in the morning peak that could be described as busy, but please remember we are only talking two coaches here. The evening peak was spread out a bit more. When the branch train left without us in the evening and we decanted to the 126 or 261 bus outside the station we all got on one bus easily. Commuting patterns seem to be changing across the board so I can't comment on current peak usage. Off peak it is very quiet in the middle of the day. I have been the only person on the train. I stopped commuting on the branch because getting on the main line train at Grove Park became very difficult and the unreliability of the homeward journey became unacceptable. I started using Shortlands to City Thameslink instead. Nominally slower but reliable and often actually quicker with the added bonus of always getting a seat.
What a stupidly inflexible way to run a service: "apparently late running on the branch can cause severe disruption at London Bridge" indeed! How on earth can they justify such an inane claim? The line plainly serves a purpose, or it would been closed years ago; if Southeastern weren't so obsessed with pettifogging rules it might well attract even more passengers.
I think he was being ironic. The fact is it needs 2 train operation so that reasonable connections can be achieved and, in the event of delay, you don't have too long to wait. Everything possible has been done to make the service as inconvenient as possible but 1000 passengers still traipse across the footbridge during the rush hour. The only slight amelioration has been the implementation of 2 driver working during the rush hours which allows 2 minute turn rounds and a slightly increased (if erratic) frequency.
I remember the old goods yard and Royal Mail loading platform, every year too Hornby would drag a special train in as a mobile exhibit which was nice. The first footbridge on the left hand side us kids built a kick arse camp. On the lefter most platform or the old London side platform at Sundridge Park, the little bijou 2 up 2 downs is where David Bowie grew up and the College Arms up on Plaistow Lane was where his first gigs happened. The park to the left on the London side is Kings Meadow, so many days and nites spent as a troubled teen there on the swings, in later years I used to run the whole oval and us old scooterboys used to ride round on our Vespa's and Lambretta's with a couple of Bromley police metro's chasing round unable to keep up then roar off with some cheeky hand gestures :P
One thing that could happen is that extra siding space has been kept at Bromley North, also the land was built up but never built upon for a chord heading south at Grove Park as when built it was envisaged that freight, mail and even passenger services could cross to the slow down but it was soon discovered that it meant slowing and stopping the coastal expresses on the fast up and down lines so they never put the chord in. The reason they stopped the through trains was the creaky old EPB's just held up the fast Hastings DEMU's and the 4CEPs which by time they came out of Elmstead Woods tunnel were running at full knots.
This is like a double track modern version of the Addiscombe line and I love it. I used to live in Grove Park but that was before I became interested in branch lines.
As one who commuted from Bromley North back in the 1950s (yes, the 1950s) I can fill you in on a few points:-
1) Grove Park's platform 1 did not, in my time, give cross platform interchange to the Up Fast line.
2) At the south end of Grove Park's layout there was a normal double junction between the Down and Up Fast Lines and the branch in addition to the connections to the Platform 1 line.
3) The normal service from Bromley North ran through to Charing Cross (also to Cannon Street in rush hours) on days in the week. As the crossovers from Fast to Slow lines immediately north of Grove Park station road bridge did not exist then, these trains ran all the way to and from London on the Fast lines. But in those days there were'nt the number of trains to and from places beyond Sevenoaks, which was where electrification ended.
In more recent years the population of London commuters from areas beyond Sevenoaks has greatly increased. So the number of trains from these more distant places has increased. Of course these pass through Grove Park on the Fast Lines. Thus leaving no space for local trains to and from Bromley North.
Had the branch been on the other, Slow lines side, of the main line there'd almost certainly be no problem in having through services to the London terminals.
Finally - as a child I sometimes used to watch the shunting of goods wagons in Bromley North's goods yard (where Bus Station and car park now are) from the footbridge which still exists.
Hi. Thank you for this valuable information. I based my commentary on the former layout on an aerial photo from 1945 that is available on Google Earth but the resolution isn't that good. I used the branch daily from 2006 to 2011. Getting on at Grove Park in the morning was getting very difficult and the connection in the evening was so unreliable that I switched to using Shortlands to City Thameslink.
By the way, I have watched and enjoyed many of your videos. I have included the Palace Gates branch one in my North London playlist so that my viewers can contrast the current Stratford to North Woolwich route, as seen in my recent videos, with the old, as seen in yours. I intend to film Stratford to Tottenham Hale and beyond around April and May when Angel Road will be closing and Meridian Water will be opening. Not sure what the full scope and title of the resulting video will be.
@@BoogiesTrains Thanks, I'll look forward to enjoying that.
Do you happen to know how goods trains reached the yard at Bromley North? I can't see any direct access from the down line into the yard on old track plans. Did goods trains have to run into the passenger platform and then reverse onto the up line before reversing again into the yard?
I'm sorry, I have no idea. I only moved to London in the 1970s.
A nice portait of a relatively obscure branch line. Used to know someone who lived near Sundridge Park. He said the line was always under threat of closure in the 1970s and 1980s. Luckily it is still with us.
As part of my work I looked at closure in 1967/8 but couldn't justify the savings that might be made. It had nothing to do with the fact that it was my local station of course.
💓Love this little branch line.
Last one, whenever I missed or they cancelled the slow to London at Grove Park, I used to walk up to the signal fone there by the ramp and pick up and the signalman at other end would answer and I would say "This is Keith's son, any chance of stopping a fast at platform 2 as late for duty" and immediately the red light would go up on platform 2 and I would hop on and get into work on time, no one batted an eyelid as BR was run for BR first and the drivers docket would show the red light so he never got grief from his traction manager. My father worked London Bridge platform 1-6 aka the widowmaker signalling panel as during rush hour it was horrendous with trains literally running block to block limping from one yellow to the next made worse with the Thameslinks.
I used the shuttle from 2006 to 2012 but swapped to Shortlands. That was slower but more reliable and I always got a seat. Bromley South is my station of choice since I got my Freedom Pass.
Great video.
Some comments: unusual that all the trains you photographed at Bromley went to P1, as the vast majority use P2. At 5:25 the station building is original (with minor additions); at 6:30 you see the planned location for Sundridge Park but the local landowner objected (although he was happy for the Prince of Wales to use it in 1882); at 9:45 you are passing the old head shunt for the sidings.
Thank you for your comments. I am always very pleased to receive comments that add to the story. You are right about platform 1. I commuted from Bromley North for six years and the train was always at platform 2 but it seems that the daytime off peak service alternates between the platforms. Presumably this is to keep the track circuits functioning. The train indicator is positioned on platform 2 so it is very confusing for everybody when the train is in platform 1.
11:12 my old mate Phil Martin walking along Milk St :)
This is superb. Super informing. I really enjoyed
Thank you.
@@BoogiesTrains Can you give me any tips for if i want to make a documentary on this line like yours?
I start with a rough idea of the story I want to tell,based on what I already know. I then do a lot of research about the history of the location and look at maps and Google Earth for suitable filming locations. Then when I am filming my choice of viewpoints is influenced by the story I want to tell. After filming I edit all the clips so that I can see what I have got that is useable. I then arrange the clips in the order that they need to be seen. I add the subtitles as I go along but I read them as a story after I have finished and insert any parts of the story that I have missed. That's about it. I think I am getting better at it as I get more experienced.
@@BoogiesTrains Thanks so much! I hopefully can do one soon! Maybe you could check it out when its released and tell me your thoughts!
Bromley branch is being re-locked as part of the Hither Green Signalling Renewals which commissions April 2020. This will be the last area re-controlled from London Bridge ASC to Three Bridges ROC (extending Grove Park workstation installed @ Easter 2018). Signal heads will be replaced and axle counters added to the branch. Signal Auto plates will be removed, and signal IDs replaced from 'Lnnn' to 'TLnnn'.
I can only say that whoever authorised this expenditure needs to take another look. Single line working on a 'one engine in steam' basis beyond platform 1 at Grove Park is all that is required to meet the available traffic. The constraints of the connection to the main line mean that nothing more than that is practical in any case. Can the axle counters cope with counting to 8 three times an hour or will they die of boredom.
@@BoogiesTrains The Bromley North relay interlocking will be life expired so subsuming the relock as part of the Higher Green relock is the most timely and cost effective solution.
I recognise that renewal and re-control are necessary but the scope of the work could be reduced considerably with just a little thought as to the real ongoing requirement. Whilst I acknowledge that much of the 80s work in removing unnecessary track went too far and we can see some of it being reversed, such as Filton Bank, there is no prospect of a surge in demand on the Bromley North branch that would even merit 4 car trains, never mind the existing double track. Lock all the points out of use. Put in a ground frame at Bromley North if it is absolutely necessary to retain two working platforms for some imagined future emergency use. Signal engineering skills are in short supply. Don't waste them on the Bromley North branch.
Class 465 are operating on the shuttle service between Grove Park and Bromley North. Instead of having Class 466.
Thank you for this Andrew. I haven't been up that way for a while. Maybe time to visit Grove Park again.
@@BoogiesTrains Ok 👍
Great video 👏🏽
was riding this from when I was a little child. If they got rid of it I'd be so upset
I've got to go here oneday
At 14:11: Remember that the passengers are for the trains, not the trains for the passengers. See also Mark 2:27 to think the other way round.
It is interesting that in the current capital v labour struggles in the railway industry that nobody is thinking about the customer or the long term future of the product.
It seems to me that this is a classic example of "closure by stealth". Just as BR tried with the Settle and Carlisle, there is purposely no attempt made to run the service with any connecting trains, and as for staff threatened with disciplinary action for actually helping those who pay their salaries is laughable. In a couple of years the TOC will publish lack of passenger loadings, cost of running etc as a case for closure. But why on earth is such a short branch line still double track?, that tells me that they don't want to spend any money in the run up to closure.
This video implies low usage but using entry/exit figures for Bromley North and Sundridge Park implies 720k+ trips per year, averaging 20+ per train. If the majority of these passengers are travelling to London implies are gross revenue of £3 million per annum. Perhaps justifying it's existence.
Hi Martin. I commuted on the line from 2006 to 2011 and now use it only occasionally in the off peak. When I commuted there were perhaps 3 or 4 trains in the morning peak that could be described as busy, but please remember we are only talking two coaches here. The evening peak was spread out a bit more. When the branch train left without us in the evening and we decanted to the 126 or 261 bus outside the station we all got on one bus easily. Commuting patterns seem to be changing across the board so I can't comment on current peak usage. Off peak it is very quiet in the middle of the day. I have been the only person on the train. I stopped commuting on the branch because getting on the main line train at Grove Park became very difficult and the unreliability of the homeward journey became unacceptable. I started using Shortlands to City Thameslink instead. Nominally slower but reliable and often actually quicker with the added bonus of always getting a seat.
Difficult to read the text..
If you pause the video it'll help you read the text
What a stupidly inflexible way to run a service: "apparently late running on the branch can cause severe disruption at London Bridge" indeed! How on earth can they justify such an inane claim? The line plainly serves a purpose, or it would been closed years ago; if Southeastern weren't so obsessed with pettifogging rules it might well attract even more passengers.
I think he was being ironic. The fact is it needs 2 train operation so that reasonable connections can be achieved and, in the event of delay, you don't have too long to wait. Everything possible has been done to make the service as inconvenient as possible but 1000 passengers still traipse across the footbridge during the rush hour. The only slight amelioration has been the implementation of 2 driver working during the rush hours which allows 2 minute turn rounds and a slightly increased (if erratic) frequency.
ok