Ongar railway station is a station on the
Epping Ongar Railway
The Epping Ongar Railway is a heritage railway in south-west Essex, England, run by a small number of paid staff and a team of volunteers. It was the final section of the Great Eastern Railway branch line, later the London Underground's Centr ...
heritage line, and a former
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 counties of Buckinghamshire, Essex and Hertfordshire in England.
The ...
station in the town of
Chipping Ongar
Chipping Ongar () is a market town and former civil parish, now in the parish of Ongar, in the Epping Forest District of the county of Essex, England. It is located east of Epping, southeast of Harlow and northwest of Brentwood. In 2020 th ...
,
Essex
Essex () is a county in the East of England. One of the home counties, it borders Suffolk and Cambridgeshire to the north, the North Sea to the east, Hertfordshire to the west, Kent across the estuary of the River Thames to the south, and Grea ...
. It was opened in 1865 by the Great Eastern Railway, and became part of
London Transport in 1949. Until its closure as such in 1994, it was the easternmost point of the
Central line and the eastern buffers remain the point from which all distances on the London Underground are measured.
History
![Ongar Tube Station](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/11/Ongar_Tube_Station.jpg)
The station was opened by the
Great Eastern Railway on 24 April 1865,
serving principally as a goods station taking agricultural produce from the nearby farms into central London. On 29 September 1949, London Underground services took over the operation of the station from
British Railways when services were extended from
Loughton
Loughton () is a town and civil parish in the Epping Forest District of Essex. Part of the metropolitan and urban area of London, the town borders Chingford, Waltham Abbey, Theydon Bois, Chigwell and Buckhurst Hill, and is northeast of Chari ...
.
[
Although the rest of the branch was ]electrified
Electrification is the process of powering by electricity and, in many contexts, the introduction of such power by changing over from an earlier power source.
The broad meaning of the term, such as in the history of technology, economic history ...
by London Underground before operations were taken over from British Railways, trains on the section north of Epping Epping may refer to:
Places
Australia
* Epping, New South Wales, a suburb of Sydney
** Epping railway station, Sydney
* Electoral district of Epping, the corresponding seat in the New South Wales Legislative Assembly
* Epping Forest, Kearns, a he ...
continued to be hauled by steam locomotives as a separate shuttle service. The service was operated by British Railways for the Underground until 18 November 1957, when the line was electrified and electric trains took over from steam. The low power supply prevented the Epping to Ongar section being fully integrated into the line and it continued to operate as a shuttle service.
The entire Epping to Ongar branch was a single track
Single may refer to:
Arts, entertainment, and media
* Single (music), a song release
Songs
* "Single" (Natasha Bedingfield song), 2004
* "Single" (New Kids on the Block and Ne-Yo song), 2008
* "Single" (William Wei song), 2016
* "Single", by ...
line with one passing place
A single-track road or one-lane road is a road that permits two-way travel but is not wide enough in most places to allow vehicles to pass one another (although sometimes two compact cars can pass). This kind of road is common in rural areas ...
at North Weald station, although this loop was taken out of service between 1888 and 1949, and again from 1976. Between 1949 and 1976 two Tube trains could use the branch, although they were limited to four cars in length because of the restriction on the available traction current, as well as by the restricted platform lengths at North Weald and Blake Hall. The service was reduced to one train after the southbound track at North Weald was lifted. It was therefore never suitable for heavy use, and the line was reportedly never profitable. For much of its latter years, the service only operated during Monday to Friday peak hours, and London Transport closed Blake Hall station
Blake is a surname which originated from Old English. Its derivation is uncertain; it could come from "blac", a nickname for someone who had dark hair or skin, or from "blaac", a nickname for someone with pale hair or skin. Another theory, presuma ...
, the least used on the entire system, in 1981. The line itself continued in use and there was a brief re-introduction of all day services in 1990. However, a system wide cost-cutting exercise saw the service return to peak hours soon afterwards, with an even more skeletal service than before. The line was under threat of closure for many years, and it was finally closed on 30 September 1994.
Epping Ongar Railway
The station and the line are now in the ownership of a private company, Epping Ongar Railway Ltd who, at time of purchase, publicly stated their intention to run commuter services again, but the claimed lack of platform availability at London Underground's Epping station at the west end of the line has to date proven an insuperable obstacle to this. The Epping Ongar Railway Volunteer Rail Society ran heritage trains on Sundays over the former Epping and Ongar line from 2004 until 2007, when the line was closed following a change in ownership.
The line was reopened to the public on 25 May 2012.
Ongar Station, as with the rest of the 6.05-mile branch reaching to the outskirts of Epping station, is currently undergoing significant improvement and infrastructure works. These are designed with the long-term future of the branch and to enable the use of locomotive-hauled trains (hauled by steam and diesel locomotives), all in keeping with its use as a heritage railway.
The station itself has been extensively restored by the teams of volunteers, with all the rooms being restored to their original layouts, opening up bricked up doorways and windows, and restoring the station to Great Eastern Railway colours (believed to be the only original operational GER station in its original colours). Within the station the former Parcels Office will be a museum and educational display.
In addition a GER signalbox, originally located at Spellbrook
Spellbrook is a hamlet in Hertfordshire, situated between Bishop's Stortford and Sawbridgeworth.
Location
Spellbrook is one mile south of Bishop's Stortford, thirteen miles east of Hertford and ten miles north of Epping. It lies on the A118 ...
, has been rescued and rebuilt to replace the Ongar signalbox demolished by LU in the 1980s, and the platform is being improved to facilitate access.
Connections
Local bus routes 7, 7A, 7B, 7C, 20, 21, 32, 46, 46A, 47, 146, 380, 381, 501 (Sundays only), 846, SB05 and Epping Ongar Railway
The Epping Ongar Railway is a heritage railway in south-west Essex, England, run by a small number of paid staff and a team of volunteers. It was the final section of the Great Eastern Railway branch line, later the London Underground's Centr ...
Vintage Route 339 serve the station (and town).
Other information
The sand drag at the very end of the rails — intended to help slow trains that overshot the stopping mark — was said to be home to a breed of harmless scorpion
Scorpions are predatory arachnids of the order Scorpiones. They have eight legs, and are easily recognized by a pair of grasping pincers and a narrow, segmented tail, often carried in a characteristic forward curve over the back and always en ...
and featured in a 1979 episode of the BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC
Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board exam. ...
...
''. They had been released there by a station foreman who was a keeper of exotic pets. The sand drag has since been removed. A scorpion has since been sighted in the wild, ten miles north of Ongar, in April 2010, although this is thought to be unrelated.
In 1971–72 the London underground network was remeasured in kilometres using Ongar as its zero point.
was known as Project ONGAR during development.
It was named after the station as the engineers hoped their new weapon would be "... the end of the line for torpedo development".
Ongar Tube was mentioned in the
''.
'You could be a "Complete Bastard" by telling tourists that all of London's tourist attractions were within walking distance of Ongar Tube.'
The station and surrounding engine sheds were used as one of the locations in the 2017 music video for
.