Amersham station

Amersham
Station entrance
Amersham Location of Amersham in Buckinghamshire
Location	Amersham
Local authority	Chiltern
Managed by	London Underground[1]
Station code	AMR
Number of platforms	3
Accessible	Yes (Southbound only)[2]
Fare zone	9
London Underground annual entry and exit
2010	2.11 million[3]
2011	2.10 million[3]
2012	2.10 million[3]
2013	2.04 million[3]
National Rail annual entry and exit
2008–09	1.060 million[4]
2009–10	1.219 million[4]
2010–11	1.714 million[4]
2011–12	1.784 million[4]
2012–13	2.035 million[4]
2013–14	2.164 million[4]
Key dates
1892	Opened
4 July 1966	Goods yard closed[5]
Other information
Lists of stations	DLR Underground National Rail Tramlink
External links	Departures Layout Facilities Buses
London Transport portal UK Railways portalCoordinates: 51°40′26″N 0°36′25″W / 51.674°N 0.607°W / 51.674; -0.607

Amersham is a London Underground and National Rail station in the town of Amersham of the Chiltern district in Buckinghamshire, England.

Amersham station is a terminus of the London Underground's Metropolitan line.^[6] It is situated 23.7 miles (38.1 km) north-west of Charing Cross, making it the second furthest Underground station from central London and the second most westerly station on the whole London Underground system, after Chesham.^[7] As a consequence, it is in Travelcard Zone 9^[6] (previously zone D).

Amersham station is also served by Chiltern Railways, which run trains between London Marylebone and Aylesbury. From Aylesbury a shuttle service to Princes Risborough provides access to through services between Marylebone and Birmingham Snow Hill. The journey times to Central London range between 33 and 60 minutes. The average time taken for a Metropolitan line train to travel between Amersham and Chalfont & Latimer is approximately three and a half minutes.^[8]

History

Marylebone - Woodford Halse stopping train in 1959

The station was opened on 1 September 1892 as part of the Metropolitan Railway (Met) extension from Chalfont Road (now Chalfont & Latimer) to Aylesbury.^[9] On 12 March 1922, its name was changed to "Amersham & Chesham Bois", but the original name was restored during 1937.

From 16 March 1899, the Great Central Railway served the station through its extension to Marylebone.^[10] Consequently, the station became joint Met/GCR owned. On 1 January 1923, the GCR became part of the London and North Eastern Railway (LNER)^[10] as part of the Railways Act 1921, and on 1 July 1933, the Met became part of the London Passenger Transport Board (LPTB), thus becoming the Metropolitan line of the London Underground. On 1 January 1948, the LNER was nationalised, its share of the station initially coming under the control of the Eastern Region of British Railways, before being transferred to the London Midland Region in 1958.^[10]

On 12 September 1960, the tracks from Rickmansworth to Amersham were electrified,^[9] partially fulfilling plans first proposed some thirty years earlier. The rolling stock ordered by London Underground as part of this project, the A60 stock, is named after Amersham.

Service Changes

When the sectorisation of British Rail took place in 1982, services to Aylesbury on what had by now become the London to Aylesbury Line came under the operation of Network SouthEast. Following the privatisation of British Rail in the mid-1990s, these services have been provided by Chiltern Railways.

From December 2010, off-peak Metropolitan line services to and from Amersham were reduced to two per hour,^[9] simultaneously with a corresponding increase in through services on the Chesham branch. This is a return to the historically normal frequency of two Metropolitan trains per hour from the four Metropolitan trains per hour service that had been operating for the previous five years. When the Chiltern Railways services are included, Amersham still has four trains an hour to London in total, with extra trains from both operators in the peak. The new timetable on the Metropolitan line means that services are divided 50:50 between Amersham and Chesham.^[9] This is expected to divide park-and-ride or kiss-and-ride motorist users more evenly between the two stations and help spread the load on local roads, though the original reason for making the change was dictated by purely operating considerations.^[11]

The station today

It is located on Station Approach, Amersham.^[12] Ticket barriers are in operation at this station.^[1]

In 2009, because of financial constraints, Transport for London (TfL) decided to stop work on a project to provide step-free access at Amersham and five other stations, on the grounds that these are relatively quiet stations and some are already one or two stops away from an existing step-free station.^{[13][note 1]}

Notes and references

Notes

References

Further reading

• Butt, R. V. J. (1995). The Directory of Railway Stations: details every public and private passenger station, halt, platform and stopping place, past and present (1st ed.). Sparkford: Patrick Stephens Ltd. ISBN 1-8526-0508-1. OCLC 60251199. 
• Jowett, Alan (2000). Jowett's Nationalised Railway Atlas (1st ed.). Penryn, Cornwall: Atlantic Transport Publishers. ISBN 0-9068-9999-0. OCLC 228266687. 

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Amersham station.

• Train times and station information for Amersham station from National Rail
• Official London Underground website
• Station on navigable O.S. map

Preceding station		London Underground		Following station
Terminus		Metropolitan line		Chalfont & Latimer towards Baker Street or Aldgate
	National Rail
Great Missenden		Chiltern Railways Aylesbury route		Chalfont & Latimer
	Disused railways
Preceding station		London Underground		Following station
Great Missenden towards Aylesbury		Metropolitan line		Chalfont & Latimer towards Baker Street or Aldgate