Mark Lane is a disused station on the

London Underground The London Underground (also known simply as the Underground or by its nickname the Tube) is a rapid transit system serving Greater London and some parts of the adjacent ceremonial counties of England, counties of Buckinghamshire, Essex and He ...

. It was served by the

Circle A circle is a shape consisting of all points in a plane that are at a given distance from a given point, the centre. Equivalently, it is the curve traced out by a point that moves in a plane so that its distance from a given point is const ...

and

District line The District line is a London Underground line running from in the east and Edgware Road in the west to in west London, where it splits into multiple branches. One branch runs to in south-west London and a short branch, with a limited servic ...

s. In 1946 it was renamed Tower Hill. It was named after Mark Lane, the street on which it is located, slightly west of the current Tower Hill station that replaced it in 1967.

History

Mark Lane station was opened on 6 October 1884 to replace the short-lived Tower of London station, which was closed when the

Metropolitan Railway The Metropolitan Railway (also known as the Met) was a passenger and goods railway that served London from 1863 to 1933, its main line heading north-west from the capital's financial heart in the City to what were to become the Middlesex su ...

and

District Railway The Metropolitan District Railway, also known as the District Railway, was a passenger railway that served London from 1868 to 1933. Established in 1864 to complete an " inner circle" of lines connecting railway termini in London, the first par ...

were connected to form the Circle line and a larger station was required. Mark Lane station 1908 map

The station was referred to in early plans as Trinity Square, and later named Seething Lane, but it was ultimately given the more recognisable name Mark Lane (the street on which London's Corn Exchanges were located). On 1 September 1946, the station was renamed Tower Hill. The station was earmarked for closure due to overwhelming passenger numbers and little space available for expansion. It was closed on 4 February 1967 and the present Tower Hill station was opened as its replacement, located on the same site as the Tower of London station that had closed in 1884. The underground section of Mark Lane station can still be seen between

Monument A monument is a type of structure that was explicitly created to commemorate a person or event, or which has become relevant to a social group as a part of their remembrance of historic times or cultural heritage, due to its artistic, his ...

and Tower Hill, though only one platform on the eastbound track now remains due to redevelopment of the track. The surface station, sited in

Seething Lane Seething Lane is a street in the City of London. It connects All Hallows-by-the-Tower, Byward Street Byward Street is a road in the City of London, the historic and financial centre of London. It forms part of the A3211 route and, if travell ...

, can be seen in the form of a pedestrian subway under the road converted from the old station overbridge, where large white grilles now cover the original stairways down to the platforms. The offices above the station were called Mark Lane Station Buildings, and this sign can still be read above an entrance on

Byward Street Byward Street is a road in the City of London, the historic and financial centre of London. It forms part of the A3211 route and, if travelling eastward, is a short continuation of Lower Thames Street from a junction with Great Tower Street, to ...

In fiction

The disused station features in the 2017 novel ''Who Sent Clement'' by Keith A. Pearson as the fictional hiding place for a gold bar from the 1971

Baker Street robbery The Baker Street robbery was the burglary of safety deposit boxes at the Baker Street branch of Lloyds Bank in London, on the night of 11 September 1971. A gang tunnelled from a rented shop two doors away to come up through the floor of the va ...

. The loot is made as a pay-off to a look-out from the robbery, a former ticket office manager of the then recently closed station.

References

Notes

Bibliography

* *

External links

London's Abandoned Tube Stations – Mark Lane
{{closed london underground stations Circle line (London Underground) stations District line stations Tube stations in the City of London Disused railway stations in the City of London Disused London Underground stations Former Metropolitan and Metropolitan District Joint Railway stations Railway stations in Great Britain opened in 1884 Railway stations in Great Britain closed in 1967