Wotton railway station
Encyclopedia
Wotton railway station was a small station in Buckinghamshire
, England, built by the Duke of Buckinghamshire in 1871. Part of a private horse-drawn
tramway designed to carry freight from and around his lands in Buckinghamshire, Wotton station was intended to serve the Duke's home at Wotton House
and the nearby village of Wotton Underwood
. In 1872 the line was extended to the nearby town of Brill
, converted to passenger use, equipped with steam locomotives, and renamed the Brill Tramway
. In the 1880s, it was proposed to extend the line to Oxford
, but the operation of the line was instead taken over by London's Metropolitan Railway
.
Although situated in an unpopulated area, Wotton station was relatively well used. It saw the highest passenger numbers of any station on the line other than the terminus at Brill railway station
and the junction with the main line to London at Quainton Road railway station
, and it also carried large quantities of milk from the area's dairy farms. In 1906 the Great Western and Great Central Joint Railway
(commonly known as the Alternative Route) was opened, crossing the Brill Tramway at Wotton. Although the lines were not connected, a station (also named Wotton
) was built on the new line very near the existing Wotton station; the two stations shared a stationmaster.
In 1933 the Metropolitan Railway, which leased the line, was taken into public ownership and became the Metropolitan Line
of London Transport
. As a consequence, despite being a small rural station 49 miles (78.9 km) by train from the City of London
, Wotton became a station on the London Underground
. Frank Pick
, the Chief Executive of the London Passenger Transport Board, aimed to abandon freight operations on the London Underground network, and saw no way in which the more distant parts of the former Metropolitan Railway could ever become viable passenger routes. As a result, all passenger services north of Aylesbury
were withdrawn between 1935 and 1936; the last trains on the Brill Tramway ran on 30 November 1935. The line then reverted to the descendants of the Duke of Buckingham, but having no funds and no rolling stock they were unable to operate it. On 2 April 1936, the line's entire infrastructure, including Wotton station, was sold for scrap at auction. Except for a small building which once housed the Brill Tramway's forge, all the station buildings at Wotton have been demolished.
On 23 September 1868, the small Aylesbury and Buckingham Railway
(A&BR) opened, linking the Great Western Railway
's station at Aylesbury
to the London and North Western Railway
's Oxford to Bletchley line
at Verney Junction
. On 1 September 1894, London's Metropolitan Railway
(MR) reached Aylesbury, and shortly afterwards connected to the A&BR line, with local MR services running to Verney Junction from 1 April 1894. Through trains from the MR's London terminus at Baker Street
began on 1 January 1897.
Richard Plantagenet Campbell Temple-Nugent-Brydges-Chandos-Grenville, 3rd Duke of Buckingham and Chandos, had long had an interest in railways, and had served as Chairman of the London and North Western Railway from 1852 until 1861. In the early 1870s, he decided to build a light railway
to transport freight from his estates in Buckinghamshire to the A&BR's line at Quainton Road
. As the proposed line was to run on land owned by the Duke and by the Winwood Charity Trust, who consented to its construction, the line did not need Parliamentary approval and construction could begin immediately.
The first stage of the route, known as the Wotton Tramway
, was a 4 miles (6.4 km) line from Quainton Road via Wotton to a coal siding at Kingswood
, opened on 1 April 1871. Intended for use by horse trams
only, the line was built with longitudinal sleepers
, to reduce the risk of horses tripping.
lobbied the Duke for the introduction of passenger services on the line. This led to an upgrading and extension of the line from Wotton, via the original terminus of the tramway system at Wood Siding
, to a new terminus at the foot of Brill Hill, north of the hilltop town of Brill itself. The new Brill railway station
opened in March 1872. In addition to freight trains which ran as and when required, two mixed train
s per day ran in each direction. The Duke bought two Aveling and Porter
traction engine
s modified to work as locomotives, each with a top speed of 8 miles per hour (3.6 m/s), although a speed limit of 5 miles per hour (2.2 m/s) was enforced. With the extension to Brill opened, the line began to be referred to as the Brill Tramway.
In 1889 the Duke of Buckingham died, and in 1894 the trustee
s of his estate
set up the Oxford & Aylesbury Tramroad Company (O&ATC) with the intention of extending the line from Brill to Oxford
, but the extension beyond Brill was never built. Rail services from London to Oxford were very poor at this time; despite being an extremely roundabout route, had the connection from Quainton Road to Oxford been built it would have been the shortest route between Oxford and the City of London.
The Metropolitan Railway leased the Brill Tramway from 1 December 1899, and from then on the MR (the Metropolitan Line
of the London Underground
from July 1933) operated all services on the line, although the line continued to be owned by the O&ATC. Throughout the operation of the Brill Tramway the track and stations remained in the ownership of the Oxford & Aylesbury Tramroad Company; the MR had an option to purchase the line outright, but it was never taken up.
, which in 1871 had a population of around 220. Roughly halfway between the line's terminus at Brill
and the junction with the mainline at Quainton Road
, the station marked the official midpoint of the line for operating purposes. When more than one locomotive was in operation on the line, the Tramway operated a token signalling
system using colour coded staffs; drivers on the section between Quainton Road and Wotton were obliged to carry a blue staff; those between Wotton and Brill (and the Kingswood siding) a red staff. The station was situated on a sharp curve; had the extension to Oxford been built, the station would have needed to have been resited to accommodate longer and faster trains.
The original station was a crude earth bank 6 inches (15.2 cm) high, held in place by wooden planks, but it was later rebuilt. The station was equipped with a short level platform, and a small 25 feet (7.6 m) square goods shed. The main users of the goods facilities appear to have been the local dairy farms; in the 1880s, prior to the transfer to Metropolitan Railway operation, Wotton station was handling from 45,000 to 60,000 gallons (200,000 to 270,000 l; 54,000 to 72,000 US gal) of milk each year. The passenger station building itself was a wooden hut with an iron roof, 24 feet (7.3 m) long by 10 in 9 in (3.28 m) wide, including a waiting room, a booking office and male and female toilet facilities. Until the early 20th century the station porter was required to keep a three-gallon kettle on the boil for foot warmers, should the passengers require them. A pair of small cottages were built near the station to house Tramway employees.
A small siding immediately west of the station originally led to a stable, which housed the Tramway's horses. After the line's mechanisation in 1872 the stables were closed, and the siding served a small cattle pen.
. This spur line served two coal merchants, and never officially carried passengers; it was never upgraded to carry locomotives and remained worked by horses throughout its existence. (The siting of the coal bay at Kingswood was controversial, as it was inconveniently sited and built on low ground prone to flooding. The Duke and the line's surveyor had disagreed on the best location for the depot; to resolve the matter the Duke had thrown his hat in the air and the coal bay was built where the hat landed.) The spur to Kingswood was abandoned in about 1915, although a short stub, running between the Brill Tramway and the Duke of Buckingham's home at Wotton House
, remained open for occasional goods traffic until the line was closed.
, commonly known as the Alternative Route, opened to passengers. The new line linked Ashendon Junction
on the Chiltern Main Line
to the Great Central Railway
at Grendon Underwood
, a short distance northwest of Quainton Road. The Alternative Route crossed the Brill Tramway on a bridge at Wotton, and another station
, also named "Wotton", was built on the embankment immediately to the south of the existing Wotton station. Although the lines did not connect, a temporary siding was built from the Brill Tramway onto the new embankment, and used for the transport of construction materials and the removal of spoil from the works during the building of the new line. The two Wotton stations were very close together, and the same stationmaster was responsible for both stations.
From 1872 to 1894 the station was served by two passenger trains per day in each direction, and from 1895 to 1899 the number was increased to three per day. Following the 1899 transfer of services to the Metropolitan Railway, the station was served by four trains per day until closure in 1935. Limited by poor quality locomotives and ungraded
, cheaply laid track which followed the contours of the hills, and stopping at three intermediate stations between Wood Siding and Quainton Road to pick up and set down goods, passengers and livestock, trains ran very slowly; in 1887 trains took between 35 and 45 minutes to travel from Wotton to Brill, and around an hour from Wotton to the junction station
with the main line at Quainton Road.
Improvements to the line carried out at the time of the transfer to the Oxford & Aylesbury Tramroad, and the use of the MR's better quality rolling stock, reduced the journey time from Wotton to Brill and Quainton Road to around 10 minutes and 25 minutes respectively. Serving a lightly populated area, Wotton railway station saw little passenger use, although it was the most-used station on the line other than Brill itself and the junction station at Quainton Road; in 1932, the last year of private operation, the station saw 2,648 passenger journeys earning a total of £144 (about £ as of ) in passenger receipts.
(LPTB). Thus, despite it being 45 miles (72.4 km) and over two hours travel from the City of London
, Wotton formally became a London Underground
station, although in common with all other Metropolitan Line stations north of Aylesbury it was never shown on the tube map
. Frank Pick
, Managing Director of the Underground Group
from 1928 and the Chief Executive of the LPTB, aimed to move the network away from freight services and saw the lines beyond Aylesbury via Quainton Road to Brill and Verney Junction as having little future as financially viable passenger routes, concluding that over £2,000 (about £ as of ) would be saved by closing the Brill Tramway.
With Pick wanting to abandon freight services and seeing no future for the extremities of the former Metropolitan Railway as passenger routes, the LPTB decided to abandon all passenger services beyond Aylesbury. All services on the Brill Tramway were officially withdrawn on 1 December 1935, with the last trains running on 30 November. While services were withdrawn completely from the Brill Tramway, the LPTB considered the Verney Junction branch as having a use as a freight line and as a diversionary route
, and continued to maintain the line and to operate freight services until 6 September 1947.
Wotton station on the Alternative Route, which had passed from the ownership of the Great Central Railway to the London and North Eastern Railway
, remained open (albeit little used and served by only two trains per day in each direction) until 7 December 1953, when the line was abandoned. All buildings of the Brill Tramway station at Wotton were subsequently demolished, other than a small building which had once housed the Tramway's forge, which was left derelict. The bridge that had formerly carried the Alternative Route was demolished in 1970, and the former Great Central Railway station on the Alternative Route was converted to a private house.
Buckinghamshire
Buckinghamshire is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan home county in South East England. The county town is Aylesbury, the largest town in the ceremonial county is Milton Keynes and largest town in the non-metropolitan county is High Wycombe....
, England, built by the Duke of Buckinghamshire in 1871. Part of a private horse-drawn
Horsecar
A horsecar or horse-drawn tram is an animal-powered streetcar or tram.These early forms of public transport developed out of industrial haulage routes that had long been in existence, and from the omnibus routes that first ran on public streets in the 1820s, using the newly improved iron or steel...
tramway designed to carry freight from and around his lands in Buckinghamshire, Wotton station was intended to serve the Duke's home at Wotton House
Wotton House
Wotton House, or Wotton, the manor house in Wotton Underwood , was rebuilt from the ground up between 1704 and 1714, to a design very similar to that of the contemporary version of Buckingham House, as it is known from engravings...
and the nearby village of Wotton Underwood
Wotton Underwood
Wotton Underwood is a village and civil parish in the Aylesbury Vale District of Buckinghamshire, about north of Thame in neighbouring Oxfordshire....
. In 1872 the line was extended to the nearby town of Brill
Brill
Brill is a village and civil parish in Aylesbury Vale district in Buckinghamshire, England, close to the boundary with Oxfordshire. It is about north-west of Long Crendon and south-east of Bicester...
, converted to passenger use, equipped with steam locomotives, and renamed the Brill Tramway
Brill Tramway
The Brill Tramway, also known as the Quainton Tramway, Wotton Tramway, Oxford & Aylesbury Tramroad and Metropolitan Railway Brill Branch, was a six-mile rail line in the Aylesbury Vale, Buckinghamshire, England...
. In the 1880s, it was proposed to extend the line to Oxford
Oxford
The city of Oxford is the county town of Oxfordshire, England. The city, made prominent by its medieval university, has a population of just under 165,000, with 153,900 living within the district boundary. It lies about 50 miles north-west of London. The rivers Cherwell and Thames run through...
, but the operation of the line was instead taken over by London's Metropolitan Railway
Metropolitan railway
Metropolitan Railway can refer to:* Metropolitan line, part of the London Underground* Metropolitan Railway, the first underground railway to be built in London...
.
Although situated in an unpopulated area, Wotton station was relatively well used. It saw the highest passenger numbers of any station on the line other than the terminus at Brill railway station
Brill railway station
Brill railway station was the terminus of a small railway line in Buckinghamshire, England, known as the Brill Tramway. Built and owned by the Duke of Buckingham, it was later operated by London's Metropolitan Railway, and in 1933 briefly became one of the two north-western termini of the London...
and the junction with the main line to London at Quainton Road railway station
Quainton Road railway station
Quainton Road railway station was opened in 1868 in undeveloped countryside near Quainton, Buckinghamshire, from London. Built by the Aylesbury and Buckingham Railway, it was the result of pressure from the 3rd Duke of Buckingham to route the railway near his home at Wotton House and to open a...
, and it also carried large quantities of milk from the area's dairy farms. In 1906 the Great Western and Great Central Joint Railway
Great Western and Great Central Joint Railway
The Great Western and Great Central Joint Railway was a joint venture supported by the Great Western Railway and Great Central Railway and run by the Great Western and Great Central Joint Committee. The original arrangement was agreed between the two companies in September 1898...
(commonly known as the Alternative Route) was opened, crossing the Brill Tramway at Wotton. Although the lines were not connected, a station (also named Wotton
Wotton (GCR) railway station
Wotton was a railway station at Wotton Underwood, Buckinghamshire, on the Great Central Railway's link line between and Ashendon Junction.-History:...
) was built on the new line very near the existing Wotton station; the two stations shared a stationmaster.
In 1933 the Metropolitan Railway, which leased the line, was taken into public ownership and became the Metropolitan Line
Metropolitan Line
The Metropolitan line is part of the London Underground. It is coloured in Transport for London's Corporate Magenta on the Tube map and in other branding. It was the first underground railway in the world, opening as the Metropolitan Railway on 10 January 1863...
of London Transport
London Passenger Transport Board
The London Passenger Transport Board was the organisation responsible for public transport in London, UK, and its environs from 1933 to 1948...
. As a consequence, despite being a small rural station 49 miles (78.9 km) by train from the City of London
City of London
The City of London is a small area within Greater London, England. It is the historic core of London around which the modern conurbation grew and has held city status since time immemorial. The City’s boundaries have remained almost unchanged since the Middle Ages, and it is now only a tiny part of...
, Wotton became a station on the London Underground
London Underground
The London Underground is a rapid transit system serving a large part of Greater London and some parts of Buckinghamshire, Hertfordshire and Essex in England...
. Frank Pick
Frank Pick
Frank Pick LLB Hon. RIBA was a British transport administrator. After qualifying as a solicitor in 1902, he worked at the North Eastern Railway, before moving to the Underground Electric Railways Company of London in 1906...
, the Chief Executive of the London Passenger Transport Board, aimed to abandon freight operations on the London Underground network, and saw no way in which the more distant parts of the former Metropolitan Railway could ever become viable passenger routes. As a result, all passenger services north of Aylesbury
Aylesbury railway station
Aylesbury railway station is a railway station in Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire, England and is a major stop on the London to Aylesbury Line from Marylebone station via Amersham. It is 37.75 miles from Aylesbury Station to Marylebone Station...
were withdrawn between 1935 and 1936; the last trains on the Brill Tramway ran on 30 November 1935. The line then reverted to the descendants of the Duke of Buckingham, but having no funds and no rolling stock they were unable to operate it. On 2 April 1936, the line's entire infrastructure, including Wotton station, was sold for scrap at auction. Except for a small building which once housed the Brill Tramway's forge, all the station buildings at Wotton have been demolished.
Wotton Tramway
Aylesbury and Buckingham Railway
The Aylesbury and Buckingham Railway was an English railway located in Buckinghamshire, England operating between Aylesbury and Verney Junction.-History:...
(A&BR) opened, linking the Great Western Railway
Great Western Railway
The Great Western Railway was a British railway company that linked London with the south-west and west of England and most of Wales. It was founded in 1833, received its enabling Act of Parliament in 1835 and ran its first trains in 1838...
's station at Aylesbury
Aylesbury railway station
Aylesbury railway station is a railway station in Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire, England and is a major stop on the London to Aylesbury Line from Marylebone station via Amersham. It is 37.75 miles from Aylesbury Station to Marylebone Station...
to the London and North Western Railway
London and North Western Railway
The London and North Western Railway was a British railway company between 1846 and 1922. It was created by the merger of three companies – the Grand Junction Railway, the London and Birmingham Railway and the Manchester and Birmingham Railway...
's Oxford to Bletchley line
Varsity Line
The Varsity Line is an informal name for the railway route that formerly linked the English university cities of Oxford and Cambridge, operated successively by the London and North Western Railway, the London, Midland and Scottish Railway, and British Railways...
at Verney Junction
Verney Junction railway station
Verney Junction was a railway station at a junction serving four directions between 1868 and 1968 and from where excursions as far as Ramsgate could be booked...
. On 1 September 1894, London's Metropolitan Railway
Metropolitan railway
Metropolitan Railway can refer to:* Metropolitan line, part of the London Underground* Metropolitan Railway, the first underground railway to be built in London...
(MR) reached Aylesbury, and shortly afterwards connected to the A&BR line, with local MR services running to Verney Junction from 1 April 1894. Through trains from the MR's London terminus at Baker Street
Baker Street tube station
Baker Street tube station is a station on the London Underground at the junction of Baker Street and the Marylebone Road. The station lies in Travelcard Zone 1 and is served by five different lines...
began on 1 January 1897.
Richard Plantagenet Campbell Temple-Nugent-Brydges-Chandos-Grenville, 3rd Duke of Buckingham and Chandos, had long had an interest in railways, and had served as Chairman of the London and North Western Railway from 1852 until 1861. In the early 1870s, he decided to build a light railway
Light railway
Light railway refers to a railway built at lower costs and to lower standards than typical "heavy rail". This usually means the railway uses lighter weight track, and is more steeply graded and tightly curved to avoid civil engineering costs...
to transport freight from his estates in Buckinghamshire to the A&BR's line at Quainton Road
Quainton Road railway station
Quainton Road railway station was opened in 1868 in undeveloped countryside near Quainton, Buckinghamshire, from London. Built by the Aylesbury and Buckingham Railway, it was the result of pressure from the 3rd Duke of Buckingham to route the railway near his home at Wotton House and to open a...
. As the proposed line was to run on land owned by the Duke and by the Winwood Charity Trust, who consented to its construction, the line did not need Parliamentary approval and construction could begin immediately.
The first stage of the route, known as the Wotton Tramway
Brill Tramway
The Brill Tramway, also known as the Quainton Tramway, Wotton Tramway, Oxford & Aylesbury Tramroad and Metropolitan Railway Brill Branch, was a six-mile rail line in the Aylesbury Vale, Buckinghamshire, England...
, was a 4 miles (6.4 km) line from Quainton Road via Wotton to a coal siding at Kingswood
Kingswood, Buckinghamshire
Kingswood is a hamlet of 30 dwellings on the South side of the A41 from Waddesdon to Bicester and between the villages of Ludgershall and Grendon Underwood in Buckinghamshire, England. Kingswood is also a civil parish within Aylesbury Vale district. Parish matters are currently administered via a...
, opened on 1 April 1871. Intended for use by horse trams
Horsecar
A horsecar or horse-drawn tram is an animal-powered streetcar or tram.These early forms of public transport developed out of industrial haulage routes that had long been in existence, and from the omnibus routes that first ran on public streets in the 1820s, using the newly improved iron or steel...
only, the line was built with longitudinal sleepers
Baulk road
Baulk road is the name given to a type of railway track or 'rail road' that is formed using rails carried on continuous timber bearings, as opposed to the more familiar 'cross-sleeper' track that uses closely spaced sleepers or ties to give intermittent support to taller rails...
, to reduce the risk of horses tripping.
Extension to Brill and conversion to passenger use
Residents of the nearby town of BrillBrill
Brill is a village and civil parish in Aylesbury Vale district in Buckinghamshire, England, close to the boundary with Oxfordshire. It is about north-west of Long Crendon and south-east of Bicester...
lobbied the Duke for the introduction of passenger services on the line. This led to an upgrading and extension of the line from Wotton, via the original terminus of the tramway system at Wood Siding
Wood Siding railway station
Wood Siding railway station was a small halt in Bernwood Forest, Buckinghamshire, England. It was opened in 1871 as a terminus of a short horse-drawn tramway built to assist the transport of goods from and around the Duke of Buckingham's extensive estates in Buckinghamshire and to connect the...
, to a new terminus at the foot of Brill Hill, north of the hilltop town of Brill itself. The new Brill railway station
Brill railway station
Brill railway station was the terminus of a small railway line in Buckinghamshire, England, known as the Brill Tramway. Built and owned by the Duke of Buckingham, it was later operated by London's Metropolitan Railway, and in 1933 briefly became one of the two north-western termini of the London...
opened in March 1872. In addition to freight trains which ran as and when required, two mixed train
Mixed train
A mixed train is a train that hauls both passenger and freight cars or wagons. In the early days of railways they were quite common, but by the 20th century they were largely confined to branch lines with little traffic. As the trains provided passengers with very slow service, mixed trains have...
s per day ran in each direction. The Duke bought two Aveling and Porter
Aveling and Porter
Aveling and Porter was a British agricultural engine and steam roller manufacturer. Thomas Aveling and Richard Thomas Porter entered into partnership in 1862, developed a steam engine three years later in 1865 and produced more steam rollers than all the other British manufacturers combined.-The...
traction engine
Traction engine
A traction engine is a self-propelled steam engine used to move heavy loads on roads, plough ground or to provide power at a chosen location. The name derives from the Latin tractus, meaning 'drawn', since the prime function of any traction engine is to draw a load behind it...
s modified to work as locomotives, each with a top speed of 8 miles per hour (3.6 m/s), although a speed limit of 5 miles per hour (2.2 m/s) was enforced. With the extension to Brill opened, the line began to be referred to as the Brill Tramway.
In 1889 the Duke of Buckingham died, and in 1894 the trustee
Trustee
Trustee is a legal term which, in its broadest sense, can refer to any person who holds property, authority, or a position of trust or responsibility for the benefit of another...
s of his estate
Estate (law)
An estate is the net worth of a person at any point in time. It is the sum of a person's assets - legal rights, interests and entitlements to property of any kind - less all liabilities at that time. The issue is of special legal significance on a question of bankruptcy and death of the person...
set up the Oxford & Aylesbury Tramroad Company (O&ATC) with the intention of extending the line from Brill to Oxford
Oxford
The city of Oxford is the county town of Oxfordshire, England. The city, made prominent by its medieval university, has a population of just under 165,000, with 153,900 living within the district boundary. It lies about 50 miles north-west of London. The rivers Cherwell and Thames run through...
, but the extension beyond Brill was never built. Rail services from London to Oxford were very poor at this time; despite being an extremely roundabout route, had the connection from Quainton Road to Oxford been built it would have been the shortest route between Oxford and the City of London.
The Metropolitan Railway leased the Brill Tramway from 1 December 1899, and from then on the MR (the Metropolitan Line
Metropolitan Line
The Metropolitan line is part of the London Underground. It is coloured in Transport for London's Corporate Magenta on the Tube map and in other branding. It was the first underground railway in the world, opening as the Metropolitan Railway on 10 January 1863...
of the London Underground
London Underground
The London Underground is a rapid transit system serving a large part of Greater London and some parts of Buckinghamshire, Hertfordshire and Essex in England...
from July 1933) operated all services on the line, although the line continued to be owned by the O&ATC. Throughout the operation of the Brill Tramway the track and stations remained in the ownership of the Oxford & Aylesbury Tramroad Company; the MR had an option to purchase the line outright, but it was never taken up.
Structures and sidings
Wotton station was situated in open countryside, about one mile (1.6 km) from the nearest settlement of Wotton UnderwoodWotton Underwood
Wotton Underwood is a village and civil parish in the Aylesbury Vale District of Buckinghamshire, about north of Thame in neighbouring Oxfordshire....
, which in 1871 had a population of around 220. Roughly halfway between the line's terminus at Brill
Brill railway station
Brill railway station was the terminus of a small railway line in Buckinghamshire, England, known as the Brill Tramway. Built and owned by the Duke of Buckingham, it was later operated by London's Metropolitan Railway, and in 1933 briefly became one of the two north-western termini of the London...
and the junction with the mainline at Quainton Road
Quainton Road railway station
Quainton Road railway station was opened in 1868 in undeveloped countryside near Quainton, Buckinghamshire, from London. Built by the Aylesbury and Buckingham Railway, it was the result of pressure from the 3rd Duke of Buckingham to route the railway near his home at Wotton House and to open a...
, the station marked the official midpoint of the line for operating purposes. When more than one locomotive was in operation on the line, the Tramway operated a token signalling
Token (railway signalling)
In railway signalling, a token is a physical object which a locomotive driver is required to have or see before entering onto a particular section of single track. The token is clearly endorsed with the name of the section it belongs to...
system using colour coded staffs; drivers on the section between Quainton Road and Wotton were obliged to carry a blue staff; those between Wotton and Brill (and the Kingswood siding) a red staff. The station was situated on a sharp curve; had the extension to Oxford been built, the station would have needed to have been resited to accommodate longer and faster trains.
The original station was a crude earth bank 6 inches (15.2 cm) high, held in place by wooden planks, but it was later rebuilt. The station was equipped with a short level platform, and a small 25 feet (7.6 m) square goods shed. The main users of the goods facilities appear to have been the local dairy farms; in the 1880s, prior to the transfer to Metropolitan Railway operation, Wotton station was handling from 45,000 to 60,000 gallons (200,000 to 270,000 l; 54,000 to 72,000 US gal) of milk each year. The passenger station building itself was a wooden hut with an iron roof, 24 feet (7.3 m) long by 10 in 9 in (3.28 m) wide, including a waiting room, a booking office and male and female toilet facilities. Until the early 20th century the station porter was required to keep a three-gallon kettle on the boil for foot warmers, should the passengers require them. A pair of small cottages were built near the station to house Tramway employees.
A small siding immediately west of the station originally led to a stable, which housed the Tramway's horses. After the line's mechanisation in 1872 the stables were closed, and the siding served a small cattle pen.
Church Siding
Slightly to the west of the station was a junction with a 1 mile 57 chain (1 mile 1,300 yards; 1.8 km) spur line known as Church Siding, which ran through Wotton Underwood to the hamlet of KingswoodKingswood, Buckinghamshire
Kingswood is a hamlet of 30 dwellings on the South side of the A41 from Waddesdon to Bicester and between the villages of Ludgershall and Grendon Underwood in Buckinghamshire, England. Kingswood is also a civil parish within Aylesbury Vale district. Parish matters are currently administered via a...
. This spur line served two coal merchants, and never officially carried passengers; it was never upgraded to carry locomotives and remained worked by horses throughout its existence. (The siting of the coal bay at Kingswood was controversial, as it was inconveniently sited and built on low ground prone to flooding. The Duke and the line's surveyor had disagreed on the best location for the depot; to resolve the matter the Duke had thrown his hat in the air and the coal bay was built where the hat landed.) The spur to Kingswood was abandoned in about 1915, although a short stub, running between the Brill Tramway and the Duke of Buckingham's home at Wotton House
Wotton House
Wotton House, or Wotton, the manor house in Wotton Underwood , was rebuilt from the ground up between 1704 and 1714, to a design very similar to that of the contemporary version of Buckingham House, as it is known from engravings...
, remained open for occasional goods traffic until the line was closed.
Great Western and Great Central Joint Railway
On 2 April 1906, the Great Western and Great Central Joint RailwayGreat Western and Great Central Joint Railway
The Great Western and Great Central Joint Railway was a joint venture supported by the Great Western Railway and Great Central Railway and run by the Great Western and Great Central Joint Committee. The original arrangement was agreed between the two companies in September 1898...
, commonly known as the Alternative Route, opened to passengers. The new line linked Ashendon Junction
Ashendon Junction
Ashendon Junction in Buckinghamshire, England, was a major mainline railway junction where, from July 1910, the Great Western Railway's London-Birmingham direct route diverged from the Great Central Railway's main London-Sheffield route....
on the Chiltern Main Line
Chiltern Main Line
The Chiltern Main Line is an inter-urban, regional and commuter railway, part of the British railway system. It links London and Birmingham on a 112-mile route via the towns of High Wycombe, Banbury, and Leamington Spa...
to the Great Central Railway
Great Central Railway
The Great Central Railway was a railway company in England which came into being when the Manchester, Sheffield and Lincolnshire Railway changed its name in 1897 in anticipation of the opening in 1899 of its London Extension . On 1 January 1923, it was grouped into the London and North Eastern...
at Grendon Underwood
Grendon Underwood
Grendon Underwood is a village and civil parish in Aylesbury Vale district in Buckinghamshire, England. It is in the west of the county, close to the boundary with Oxfordshire and near the Roman road Akeman Street....
, a short distance northwest of Quainton Road. The Alternative Route crossed the Brill Tramway on a bridge at Wotton, and another station
Wotton (GCR) railway station
Wotton was a railway station at Wotton Underwood, Buckinghamshire, on the Great Central Railway's link line between and Ashendon Junction.-History:...
, also named "Wotton", was built on the embankment immediately to the south of the existing Wotton station. Although the lines did not connect, a temporary siding was built from the Brill Tramway onto the new embankment, and used for the transport of construction materials and the removal of spoil from the works during the building of the new line. The two Wotton stations were very close together, and the same stationmaster was responsible for both stations.
Passenger services
Land grading
Grading in civil engineering and construction is the work of ensuring a level base, or one with a specified slope, for a construction work such as a foundation, the base course for a road or a railway, or landscape and garden improvements, or surface drainage...
, cheaply laid track which followed the contours of the hills, and stopping at three intermediate stations between Wood Siding and Quainton Road to pick up and set down goods, passengers and livestock, trains ran very slowly; in 1887 trains took between 35 and 45 minutes to travel from Wotton to Brill, and around an hour from Wotton to the junction station
Junction station
Junction station usually refers to a railway station situated or close to a junction where lines to several destinations diverge. The usual minimum is three incoming lines...
with the main line at Quainton Road.
Improvements to the line carried out at the time of the transfer to the Oxford & Aylesbury Tramroad, and the use of the MR's better quality rolling stock, reduced the journey time from Wotton to Brill and Quainton Road to around 10 minutes and 25 minutes respectively. Serving a lightly populated area, Wotton railway station saw little passenger use, although it was the most-used station on the line other than Brill itself and the junction station at Quainton Road; in 1932, the last year of private operation, the station saw 2,648 passenger journeys earning a total of £144 (about £ as of ) in passenger receipts.
Withdrawal of services
On 1 July 1933 the Metropolitan Railway, along with London's other underground railways aside from the short Waterloo & City Railway, was taken into public ownership as part of the newly formed London Passenger Transport BoardLondon Passenger Transport Board
The London Passenger Transport Board was the organisation responsible for public transport in London, UK, and its environs from 1933 to 1948...
(LPTB). Thus, despite it being 45 miles (72.4 km) and over two hours travel from the City of London
City of London
The City of London is a small area within Greater London, England. It is the historic core of London around which the modern conurbation grew and has held city status since time immemorial. The City’s boundaries have remained almost unchanged since the Middle Ages, and it is now only a tiny part of...
, Wotton formally became a London Underground
London Underground
The London Underground is a rapid transit system serving a large part of Greater London and some parts of Buckinghamshire, Hertfordshire and Essex in England...
station, although in common with all other Metropolitan Line stations north of Aylesbury it was never shown on the tube map
Tube map
The Tube map is a schematic transit map representing the lines and stations of London's rapid transit railway systems, namely the London Underground , the Docklands Light Railway and London Overground....
. Frank Pick
Frank Pick
Frank Pick LLB Hon. RIBA was a British transport administrator. After qualifying as a solicitor in 1902, he worked at the North Eastern Railway, before moving to the Underground Electric Railways Company of London in 1906...
, Managing Director of the Underground Group
Underground Electric Railways Company of London
The Underground Electric Railways Company of London Limited , known operationally as The Underground for much of its existence, was established in 1902. It was the holding company for the three deep-level "tube"A "tube" railway is an underground railway constructed in a circular tunnel by the use...
from 1928 and the Chief Executive of the LPTB, aimed to move the network away from freight services and saw the lines beyond Aylesbury via Quainton Road to Brill and Verney Junction as having little future as financially viable passenger routes, concluding that over £2,000 (about £ as of ) would be saved by closing the Brill Tramway.
With Pick wanting to abandon freight services and seeing no future for the extremities of the former Metropolitan Railway as passenger routes, the LPTB decided to abandon all passenger services beyond Aylesbury. All services on the Brill Tramway were officially withdrawn on 1 December 1935, with the last trains running on 30 November. While services were withdrawn completely from the Brill Tramway, the LPTB considered the Verney Junction branch as having a use as a freight line and as a diversionary route
Detour
Detour may refer to:* Detour, a temporary routing to avoid an obstruction-Entertainment:Literature* Detour , a 1939 novel* Detour , an entertainment and fashion magazine published by the Detour Media GroupFilm and television...
, and continued to maintain the line and to operate freight services until 6 September 1947.
Closure
Following the withdrawal of London Transport services the Metropolitan Railway's lease was voided and the railway and stations reverted to the control of the Oxford & Aylesbury Tramroad Company. With no funds and no rolling stock of its own the O&ATC was unable to operate the line, and on 2 April 1936 the entire infrastructure of the line was sold at auction. Wotton station building sold for £5 10s (about £ as of ), the platform for £2 5s (about £ as of ), and the cattle pen for 11s (about £ as of ).Wotton station on the Alternative Route, which had passed from the ownership of the Great Central Railway to the London and North Eastern Railway
London and North Eastern Railway
The London and North Eastern Railway was the second-largest of the "Big Four" railway companies created by the Railways Act 1921 in Britain...
, remained open (albeit little used and served by only two trains per day in each direction) until 7 December 1953, when the line was abandoned. All buildings of the Brill Tramway station at Wotton were subsequently demolished, other than a small building which had once housed the Tramway's forge, which was left derelict. The bridge that had formerly carried the Alternative Route was demolished in 1970, and the former Great Central Railway station on the Alternative Route was converted to a private house.