DISCOVER LONDON³with the GWR, which opened in 1864
despite the breakdown of the agreement
on train provision. Today, this is part of the
Underground’s Hammersmith & City line.
Another feeder line running north-west
from Baker Street to Finchley Road began
life in 1868 as the Metropolitan and
St John’s Wood Railway, later to develop
into the Metropolitan’s main Extension
line to the country.
A plan was developed to create a full
“Inner Circle” railway for London to link
up the Metropolitan at both ends, with
another underground line connecting the
termini of the main-line extensions that
crossed the river from the south to Charing
Cross, Ludgate Hill and Cannon Street.
This was a complicated scheme that
involved several separate railway
companies, new links and an ambitious
plan to create a new embankment for the
Thames that would enclose both the railway
and a new sewage system for London, to be
created by the Metropolitan Board of Works
under the direction of Sir Joseph Bazalgette.
The whole interconnected development,
which began in the 1860s, would take
twenty years to complete.
A new company, the Metropolitan
District Railway (usually shortened to
“District”), was formed to build the
southern part of the underground railway
circuit, while the Metropolitan undertook to
extend its line south-west from Paddington
to South Kensington and eastwards from
Farringdon through the City to Tower Hill,
where the two railways would eventually
meet. From the start, the two companies
were intended to work very closely
together, leading to eventual amalgamation.
Fowler was appointed engineer for the new
railway works and the Metropolitan agreed
to operate all train services on the “Inner
Circle” when it opened.
The District was also built by “cut-
and-cover” construction throughout,
but unlike the original section of the
Metropolitan, the route did not lie below a
wide existing street. The section between
South Kensington and Westminster, where
construction began, was heavily built up.
A great deal of expensive property
purchase and demolition was necessary,
which delayed progress on the line.
There were also unexpected engineering
challenges, including the need to channel
the underground Westbourne River through
a substantial iron pipe and box girder over
the tracks at Sloane Square station. This
survived a direct hit on the station duringcompleted to a new terminus at Victoria in- Other railways got permission to cross
the Thames into the City itself. Another
Parliamentary Select Committee decided
that the best way to minimise further
incursions was to follow the Metropolitan’s
example and go underground. Backed
by the Metropolitan’s board of directors,
Fowler was already planning extensions
to the original line east to Moorgate and
west to Hammersmith. The latter was an
overground branch to be run in partnership
Left: In 1876 Mansion
House was the nal
station yet to be
connected to the
Inner Circle line
Below: A Metropolitan
train timetable