Wembley Park tube station
Template:Short description Template:Use dmy dates Template:Use British English Template:Infobox London station
Wembley Park is a London Underground station in Wembley Park, north-west London. It is served by the Jubilee and Metropolitan lines, and is in London fare zone 4. On the Jubilee line the station is between Kingsbury and Neasden stations, and on the Metropolitan line it is between Preston Road and Finchley Road stations.
The station is located on Bridge Road (A4089) and is the nearest tube station to exit for both Wembley Stadium and Wembley Arena. This is where the Jubilee line to Stanmore diverges from the Metropolitan line, which was formerly a branch of the Metropolitan Railway and was taken over by the Bakerloo line and is now part of the Jubilee line.
History
Before the station
Until 1880 the Metropolitan Railway (MR) line out of London only ran as far as Template:Stl. In early 1879 work began to build an extension to Template:Stl, with one additional station at Kingsbury and Neasden. Services to Harrow started on 2 August 1880, extending the MR route (today's Metropolitan line) into Middlesex.<ref name="horne13">Template:Cite book</ref> At this time Wembley was a sparsely populated rural area which did not merit the construction of a railway station and MR trains passed through without stopping.
However the then chairman of the MR, Edward Watkin, was an ambitious businessman who sought new ways of attracting paying passengers out of London and onto his railway, and he regarded the barren lands of Wembley as a business opportunity.
Opening
In 1881, Watkin purchased large tracts of land close to the MR line and began a grand scheme to build an amusement park at Wembley, laid out with boating lakes, a waterfall, ornamental gardens and cricket and football pitches. The centrepiece of this park was to be a soaring metal tower, known as Watkin's Tower; at Template:Convert it was to be taller than the Eiffel Tower and would offer panoramic views of the surrounding countryside, just 12 minutes from Baker Street station.<ref name="watkin_path">Template:Cite book</ref> Wembley Park station was specially constructed to serve these pleasure grounds as a destination for excursion trips on the company's trains.<ref name="EHO-01">Template:Cite web</ref> The station opened for the first time on 14 October 1893 and initially operated to serve only Saturday football matches in the park. It opened fully on 12 May 1894.<ref name="CULG_01">Template:Cite web</ref>
Watkin confidently anticipated that large crowds would flock to the park and the railway station design incorporated additional platforms to handle large passenger numbers.<ref name="horne">Template:Cite book</ref> Watkin's Tower ran into structural and financial difficulty; it was never completed and the partially built structure was demolished in 1904. Despite this, Wembley Park itself remained a popular attraction and flourished.
Later in the 1890s, the Great Central Railway's (GCR's) London extension was constructed adjacent to the MR's tracks. The tracks pass under the entrance building but the station has never been served by main line operators. In 1905 the tracks were electrified and the first electric trains became operational. Between 1913 and 1915, the MR added additional tracks to double the line's capacity.<ref name="DRose">Template:Cite book</ref>
From 1915 the MR began a programme of selling off its surplus land holdings in Buckinghamshire, Hertfordshire and Middlesex for suburban housing development. Its Metropolitan Railway Country Estates Limited marketed areas such as Wembley Park under the "Metro-land" brand, promoting modern homes in beautiful countryside with a fast railway service to central London.<ref name="Jackson">Template:Cite book</ref> The MR sold the park land at Wembley when the site was selected to host the 1924 British Empire Exhibition and the grand British Empire Exhibition Stadium constructed for this event was later to become Wembley Stadium, the home ground of the England national football team.<ref name="delisle">Template:Cite news</ref>
Stanmore branch and Bakerloo line
On 10 December 1932, the MR opened a branch line north from Wembley Park to Stanmore.<ref name="CULG_01" /> Originally, the MR served all stations south from Wembley Park to Baker Street but the line suffered from congestion due to limited capacity on the tracks heading into Baker Street. Following the combination of the MR and London's other underground railways to form the London Passenger Transport Board (LPTB) in 1933, the LPTB took steps to alleviate the congestion by constructing new tunnels with two new Bakerloo line stations from Baker Street to connect to the Metropolitan line's tracks south of Finchley Road. From 20 November 1939,<ref name="CULG_02">Template:Cite web</ref> the Bakerloo line then took over the Stanmore branch between Baker Street and Stanmore, including the five Metropolitan stopping services between Wembley Park and Finchley Road.
1948 Olympic Games
Following World War II, London was chosen to host the 1948 Olympic Games. To handle the exceptional number of spectators visiting Wembley Stadium, the original station building was extended, with a new ticket hall, additional circulation routes and platform stairs. This was built in a red-brick modernist style. At the opening of the Jubilee line on 1 May 1979, the Bakerloo line service from Baker Street to Stanmore was transferred to the new line.
UEFA Euro 1996
When the UEFA European Football Championship was held at Wembley in 1996, a large temporary staircase was constructed leading down from the 1948 extension and under the newly built Bobby Moore Bridge, which had opened in 1993. Intended as a temporary structure, the staircase remained in its unfinished state until 2004 when station upgrade works commenced.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
Upgrade and expansion
As part of the Wembley Stadium redevelopment in the early 2000s, the station was comprehensively rebuilt and expanded, increasing capacity by 70%. Costing £80Template:Nbspmillion,<ref>Template:Cite magazine</ref> the work included a significantly larger ticket hall, additional footbridges, widened stairs to Olympic Way and five lifts to provide step-free access.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> To cater for event crowds, event day entrances and exits were also constructed.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Undertaken by Tube Lines, the expansion was completed in 2006, prior to the completion of the delayed stadium project.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref> The provision of additional platforms for Chiltern Railways services was considered, but was not proceeded with.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
In the early 2020s, Transport for London proposed a new residential development on land adjacent to the station currently used as car parking. This development of over 450 new homes with Barratt Homes was approved by Brent Council in December 2020.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
Connections
The station is served by day and nighttime London Buses routes.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
References
External links
Template:Jubilee line navbox Template:Metropolitan line navbox