![]() ![]() PHOTO: GETTY IMAGESArt joined the huddled masses hiding from the chaos above, with priceless paintings and artefacts from the Tate Gallery and the London Museum stashed in the inner recesses under utmost secrecy. People shelter at Aldwych Station in 1940 when it was used as an air raid shelter. Soon the station was a well-organised mass air-raid shelter, with about 7000 people cramming in every night. The government initially pushed back against the sheltering hordes, before rapidly realising resistance was futile. Back then, Londoners instinctively made their way underground as Hitler’s Blitz bombs rained down on the capital. We stand in giant ventilation shafts, then edge along narrow tunnels and hear tales from World War 2. Curiously, the patterns and colours were originally intended to help passengers who couldn’t read identify their destination and navigate their way through the system. Yes, that’s up there in price, but when someone is unchaining a rusty gate and beckoning you into the dusty depths of Piccadilly Circus, it all suddenly seems worth it.Īs our guide leads us down into tunnels and lift shafts closed to the public since the 1920s, we pass through unused access tunnels between the platforms and the lifts, lined with distinctive green tiles designed by the original architect, Leslie Green. ![]() These typically run daily, take about 75 minutes and tickets cost £44 ($NZ90). PHOTO: GETTY IMAGESOn a recent flying visit to London, we jumped into one of these experiences, the "Piccadilly Circus: Heart of London" tour. Platform 1 at Aldwych, London, closed in 1994. Now, instead of just the odd maintenance worker getting into these places, you, too, can explore the abandoned Down Street station in Mayfair where Winston Churchill secretly sheltered during the Blitz or poke through the disused Aldwych station, once the last stop on the Piccadilly Line, now more frequently seen as a film and TV location or wander the old tunnels at Euston, where the walls are lined with vintage advertising posters, fragments that went unseen for decades. ![]() To meet that growing demand and crack open the deep mysteries of the Tube, Transport For London offer its novel "Hidden London" tours. And for transport nerds, history buffs and the just plain curious, the next level of fandom is exploring the hidden recesses of the system: the ghost stations, abandoned tunnels and mothballed recesses. PHOTO: GETTY IMAGES So the Tube symbolises London as much as Buckingham Palace or Big Ben. Down Street was opened in 1907 but closed in 1937. ![]() The disused Down Street station of the London Underground. We minded the gap at Embankment and once even traded a few vegetables for a fare with a bewildered ticket taker at Bethnal Green. We rode to the surface on the creaking timber escalators at King’s Cross, which, sadly, would later catch fire, causing a terrible tragedy. (Proper Tube superfans will know the rolling stock I’m talking about - I’m not that obsessive.) We bumped along on the old Bakerloo Line trains when they had dim incandescent lighting and kooky wool moquette seats. There's a large, framed route map of the London Underground on my office wall which betrays me as one of those weird, possibly slightly obsessive people who finds the Tube endlessly fascinating.īack in the day, I travelled the system when it still felt like a hangover from the 1940s. PHOTO: GETTY IMAGES Michael Lamb goes on the hidden London Tube tour, visiting disused Underground stations few tourists know about. A departing train disappears round the corner at Bank underground station on the Central Line in the heart of London’s financial district. ![]()
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