Mill Hill East tube station

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Mill Hill East
Location
Place	Mill Hill
Local authority	Barnet

Operations
Managed by	London Underground
Platforms in use	1

Transport for London
Zone	4
2005 annual usage	0.784 million †
2007 annual usage	0.958 million †
History
1867 1939 1941	Opened (GNR) Closed (LNER) Reopened (Northern Line)
Transport for London List of London stations: Underground \| National Rail
† Data from Transport for London [1]
London Transport Portal

Mill Hill East tube station is a London Underground station in Mill Hill in North London.

The station is on the High Barnet branch of the Northern Line, and is the terminus, and only station, of a branch from Finchley Central station. It is in Travelcard Zone 4 and is the least used station on the Northern Line with 0.784 million passengers per year. As of October 2006, service is provided by a dedicated shuttle between Finchley Central and Mill Hill East, with the exception of peak services. There were a few direct weekend trains, but that service was discontinued on 20 May 2007.

1 History
2 Onward Transport
3 External links
4 Gallery

[edit] History

Mill Hill East station was built by the Edgware, Highgate and London Railway (EH&LR) and was originally opened as Mill Hill on 22 August 1867 by the Great Northern Railway (GNR) (which had taken over the EH&LR) in what was then rural Middlesex. The station was on a line that ran from Finsbury Park to Edgware via Highgate.

The EH&LR was originally built as a single track line with the intention of doubling the track at a later date when business developed. However, when the GNR opened a branch from Finchley Central to High Barnet in April 1872 traffic on that section of the line was greater and the second track was never laid from Finchley Central to Edgware. For most of its history the service between those two stations was operated as a shuttle.

The station has been known by a number of names during its life including London Mill Hill and Mill Hill for Mill Hill Barracks. It was given its present name in 1928.

After the 1921 Railways Act created the Big Four railway companies, the line was, from 1923, part of the London & North Eastern Railway (LNER). The section of the High Barnet branch north of East Finchley was incorporated into the London Underground network through the "Northern Heights" project begun in the late 1930s.

In preparation for the transfer to London Underground operation, new track laying and electrification works had begun on the whole of the line from Finsbury Park when the start of the Second World War caused the postponement of the improvements. Passenger shuttle services on the Finchley Central to Edgware section were ended on 11 September 1939 but, to provide quick rail access to Mill Hill Barracks, the electrification of the short section of track between Finchley Central and Mill Hill East was completed although the track remained a single line. The station reopened on 18 May 1941. The work on the rest of the line from Mill Hill East to Edgware was left incomplete and after the war the proposal to electrify the line and to incorporate it into the Underground system was abandoned.

The buffer stops at Mill Hill East station as seen in October 2005. Note that part of the former trackbed has been built over.

Regular passenger services never used the line beyond Mill Hill East again although it was operated with steam haulage for freight purposes until 1964 when it was finally closed. The track and most of the infrastructure have been removed or destroyed but the original alignment can be followed in some locations.

Today, Mill Hill East station still retains much of its original Victorian architectural character and, as one of the two remaining original stations, on the Edgware, Highgate and London Railway (along with Finchley Central), it is one of the oldest parts of the Underground system, predating the first tunnelled section of the Northern Line (the City & South London Railway) by more than twenty years.

[edit] Onward Transport

The following London Buses services serve the area (times are off-peak Mon to Friday):

221 (Edgware Bus Station-Turnpike Lane station) every 12 minutes
240 (Edgware Bus Station-Golders Green station) every 12 minutes
382 (Southgate station-Mill Hill East station) every 15 minutes

[edit] External links

London's Transport Museum Photographic Archive Mill Hill station in 1944.

[edit] Gallery

Southbound train leaving the station. Note provision for second track which never came to fruition due to the cancellation of the electrification to Edgware.	View looking south	View looking north	Close up of the end of the line
Roundel on platform