The Infernal Tower

There have been some interesting proposals for London buildings over the years, from the Pyramid of Death to the scheme to rebuild the Crystal Palace so that it stood on its end. Perhaps the most significant landmark-that-never-was was the Wembley Tower.

It all started with the old Metropolitan Railway. Being a commercial enterprise, the directors of this company were naturally keen to make as much money as humanly possible. In the 1880s, though, they were already making quite a lot of money. What is a railway tycoon to do under such circumstances? If you were Edward Watkin, Chairman of the company, you simply create more traffic by making London bigger.

The idea was simple. Buy land out in the sticks where it’s cheap, miles away from London. Build a railway to it, build some houses on it and bam! You got yourself a suburb, mister. Sell the houses, there’s a goldmine for ya. You’d be amazed how much of London basically didn’t exist until people did this. Put it this way – until the 1860s, Kensington was considered to be a rural village.

Watkin was a man who liked to think big. For instance, his ultimate plan for the Metropolitan was to run trains up to Manchester and down to Paris (I forget how that one turned out). When he looked upon the route of his railway, he decided that what his grand plan needed was a selling point. Some sort of focus that would draw people to the area (and, let’s not forget, drive up the land values).

In 1889, the latest wonder of the world was the Eiffel Tower. Watkin came to the conclusion that what we needed in London was something similarly troubling to Freud, only more so. Possible sites included High Street Kensington and Gloucester Road, but eventually it was decided to purchase a 280-acre site at Wembley and develop that. Former Prime Minister William Ewart Gladstone asked questions in Parliament on behalf of Watkin and was told by the committee that “although the atmosphere of London may not be so favourable to extensive views as Paris, the view would be incomparably superior.” Suck-ups.

Having been given the go-ahead, the Metropolitan Tower Committee was formed in 1890 to decide on the form this tower would take. Many exciting designs were proposed. I think my favourite was one based on the Leaning Tower of Pisa. I’m no structural engineer, but I can’t help wondering how wise it would have been to build something like the Leaning Tower, only much taller. I also like the one about the “colony of aerial vegetarians.” Gustave Eiffel himself was even approached and did initially show some interest, only to decline later on patriotic grounds (he probably heard that dis about the views in Paris).

As it happened, the final design was very similar to the Eiffel Tower, only 320 metres taller. Work started in 189e and in 1896 the park around the tower’s base was opened to the public. The tower had only reached its first stage, but hopes were high even if the structure wasn’t.

Yet already problems were being encountered – the year before, the new Chairman of the Metropolitan, John Bell, had already been convinced the whole thing was a white elephant. It turned out that the foundations couldn’t quite support all that weight on just four legs (the original design called for eight). The biggest issue of all, though, was money. It turned out that not everyone was as enthusiastic as the Parliamentary committee, and very few were willing to invest. The park itself was not the major tourist attraction Watkin had hoped for, and work ground to a halt.

In fact, the tower ended up having a detrimental effect on the Metropolitan Railway. At this time, the Great Central Railway used the Met lines to get into London, a costly move. With the construction of the Tower, the Great Central was able to say (and I’m paraphrasing here y’understand), “Oh hey, that’s cool, with all that extra traffic you’ll be getting from the Tower you won’t be able to run our little trains so we’rebuildingourownlineintoLondonbyenow,” and promptly rushed off to Marylebone.

The Tower also had something of a domino effect on Watkin’s other schemes – it was very clear, as the mostly-incomplete tower rusted away, that Watkin had maybe lost his golden touch, and so investment in his grand scheme to run trains to Paris dried up as well. The ugly monument gained such unflattering nicknames as “the London Stump” and, the name by which it is perhaps best known today, “Watkin’s Folly.”

The enterprise went bust in 1899, in 1901 Watkin himself passed away and in 1902 the whole thing was declared a health and safety hazard and closed down. In 1907 the remains were blown up and sold for scrap. Yet Watkin’s scheme was not entirely in vain – in the 1920s, when the organisers of the British Empire Exhibition were looking for somewhere to build their stadium, they discovered there was a perfectly peachy-keen area of flat ground at Wembley…

… and the rest, they say, is history.

Marylebone (Great Central)

Poor Marylebone. It’s a terminus you have to feel sorry for. It’s one of the smallest main line termini as well as the youngest. It only has six platforms, meaning it’s outdone by the likes of Richmond and Wimbledon out in the suburbs. Even the Underground virtually snubs it, only serving it with the Bakerloo Line.

The fact is, Marylebone never really had a chance. It was built by the Great Central Railway, opening in 1899 – long after the other main line companies had already got their foot in the door. The Great Central Railway, by the way, should not be confused with the Great Northern, Great Eastern, Great Western or Great North of Scotland Railways.

The Great Central Railway was a somewhat pointless enterprise. By the time it was built, several of the places it ran to already had a railway. Oddly enough, one of the railways it was in competition with was the Metropolitan Railway, now of course the Metropolitan Line of the London Underground. I say oddly because a gentleman by the name of Edward Watkin was on the board of directors for both and had the ultimate ambition of a train service all the way from Manchester to Paris, using railways in which he had a controlling interest and an ambitious 19th century Channel Tunnel project.

Sadly, as we know, it was not to be, and the Great Central remained the line that no one asked for. Chronically short of money, the company could barely afford to get into London, squeezing in between Euston and Paddington. Even their station hotel, normally a grand statement by the railway to say “We Are Here,” had to be contracted out. Nevertheless, the company remained optimistic. Although they could only afford four platforms, they planned for ten. All this despite the fact that they couldn’t even afford their own trains.

Making things worse for them was the fact that much of their route into London was already developed. The biggest obstacle was, in fact, cricket fans – the proposed route would have threatened Lord’s, and so the plans had to be hastily rewritten accordingly.

Architecturally, it has to be said that a very nice job  was done on the station. While it’s not as grand as either Euston (as it was before redevelopment) or Paddington, it provides a pleasant aesthetic contrast with both, being constructed in a baroque style. It looks more like a country house than a railway station, but that’s no bad thing when it harmonises so well with its surroundings.

The station suffered when Britain’s railways were nationalised. More important services were diverted to the larger stations, turning little Marylebone into little more than a commuter station. Maintenance was cut down. Under the notorious head of British Railways, Dr Richard Beeching, any line seen as a loss-maker was to be culled, and Beeching was ruthless. The former Great Central was the only main line to be closed, and with only a few commuter services to justify it, it looked like curtains for Marylebone. I refer once again to Alan A. Jackson’s London Termini, written during this turbulent period (in 1969 to be precise), in which he notes that:

Marylebone seems unlikely to last much longer. Already much of the goods yard has been sold for building. The temptation to dispose of the rest, which is on higher-value land, must be very strong… The killing could be done without too much pain, but when it comes, there will be a certain sadness.

Indeed, plans were made to divert all services to other termini and turn Marylebone into a coach station – Jackson’s prophecy looked worryingly close to becoming a reality.

In retrospect, we know now that a lot of the cuts were over-hasty, leaving many communities with inadequate public transport and forcing them on to the roads, with obvious environmental consequences. Indeed, railway historian Christian Wolmar has argued that even the Great Central shouldn’t have been closed, precisely because it served a lot of places that already had a rail link – it could have been used to increase the number of services to those destinations.

Is it worth noting that Ernest Marples, the Minister for Transport under whom Beeching worked, owned a road building company? I think it is. To be fair, when it was pointed out that there was a conflict of interest, he sold his shares in the company. By a million-to-one chance, they were bought up by his wife. Eventually he was forced to flee to Monaco due to legal difficulties and a heinous amount of tax fraud, living the remainder of his life in his French chateau. What a bastard.

The tube station was originally known by the railway name.

But anyway. Marylebone. Marylebone is a shining example of why it’s a good idea not to close stations. In the 1980s, Paddington was becoming overcrowded. And fortunately for British Rail, it happened that there was a badly underused terminus just down the road. Marylebone, the little terminus that no one wanted, found itself in demand. It was revamped – unused land was sold to finance repairs and rebuilding. In the 1990s, it gained two new platforms. About a hundred years later than planned, but still. Plans are afoot to reopen lines (including part of the old Great Central) and provide new train services to Wales, and suddenly Marylebone is, metaphorically speaking, the prettiest girl at the dance.

By the way, do you pronounce it “Marlibun” or “Marri-le-bone?” I was always taught the former was correct, but I seem to be the only person who pronounces it that way. Hmm.