New North Main Line - History

History

It opened in 1903 as part of a joint project by the Great Central Railway (GCR) and the Great Western Railway (GWR) to improve their terminus's access from London to the Midlands and North of England, especially relative to the London and North Western Railway (LNWR). It begins at Old Oak Junction on the Great Western Main Line from Paddington and runs via Greenford to join what is now the Chiltern Main Line at Northolt Junction, south-east of South Ruislip.

The line joined the Great Western and Great Central Joint Railway between West Ruislip and Denham station in 1906. Its original name was "Denham - Junction for Uxbridge" as it was planned to be a stop on the shuttle service between Gerrards Cross and Uxbridge High Street. The latter was closed in 1964 and later demolished.

Since 1948 the West Ruislip branch of the London Underground Central line has run alongside it.

In the past it carried many trains to the north-west, and it was heavily used in the 1960s when electrification work restricted capacity on the West Coast Main Line (WCML); but when that project was completed, express services from London to Birmingham on the GWR/GCR route were discontinued as part of the Beeching Axe. All local trains on the route were diverted to Marylebone via Sudbury in 1963, and Greenford station on the New North Main Line was closed.

In the early 1990s the New North route was singled between Old Oak Common and Park Royal and between Greenford and South Ruislip. No improvement work has been carried out on the line since that date.

Plans at this date to do away with Greenford East signal box and its semaphore signals, with upgraded signalling controlled by Slough and Marylebone signalling centres, were postponed indefinitely as decline of rail traffic controlled by Greenford East did not justify the cost.