Crystal Palace and South London Junction Railway

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The Crystal Palace and South London Junction Railway was built by the London, Chatham and Dover Railway to serve the Crystal Palace after it was moved to Crystal Palace from its original site in Hyde Park.

Stations:

Nunhead
Honor Oak (closed)
Lordship Lane (closed)
Upper Sydenham (closed)
Crystal Palace High Level (closed) -This station was in competition with Crystal Palace Low Level

The branch line had a chequered history, linked to the Crystal Palace's own precarious financial position, with two periods of closure. Wartime economies led to the line closing from 1917-1919. After this first closure, trains from the City (Holborn Viaduct), which had previously served the station, were not reinstated. However, the branch was electrified, as part of a Southern Railway scheme, on 12 July 1925. After elctrification all train services were operated to the London termini in the City (Blackfriars & Holborn Viaduct)

Following the destruction of the Crystal Palace by fire in 1936, the line lost most of original function of carrying visitors to events in the Palace. Manpower shortages led to a second closure from 1944-1946. When services were reintroduced they were very lightly used, and the line finally closed on 20 September 1954. The track was lifted in 1956.

Lordship Lane station has found posthumous fame, as the subject of one of Camille Pissarro's finest small scale pictures.

Although much of the route of the railway has now been lost to residential development, it can be traced in some places, and some architectural features remain such as the ornamental portal of the Paxton Tunnel just north of the former High Level terminus. Part of the route adjacent to the Horniman Museum and Gardens is now a 'Railway Nature Trail', maintained for the museum by the Trust for Urban Ecology(TRUE).

In the early 1990s, a local amenity group, Friends of the Great North Wood produced a walking leaflet titled From the Nun's Head to the Screaming Alice along a route that closely follows the former railway line. ('Screaming Alice' was Cockney rhyming slang for Crystal Palace.) The walk continues from the line's terminus at Crystal Palace High Level Station, past the Crystal Palace Museum, and on to the existing Crystal Palace railway station.