Richmond
To find free parking in London, text PARKING plus Richmond to 80039
Richmond station (London) is a London Underground, London Overground and National Rail station in Richmond in the London Borough of Richmond upon Thames in south west London.
The station is the south-western terminus of the London Underground District line and the western terminus of the London Overground North London Line and is on the National Rail Waterloo to Reading Line on which South West Trains services run between Waterloo and Windsor & Eton Riverside, Reading, Kingston, and Hounslow.
The next station to the northeast on the terminating lines is Kew Gardens. On the through line Richmond is between North Sheen and St. Margarets stations.
The Richmond & West End Railway (R&WER) opened the first station at Richmond on 27 July 1846[3] as the terminus of its line from Clapham Junction via Wandsworth and Mortlake[4]. The Windsor, Staines & South Western Railway (WS&SWR) extended the line westward resiting the station on the extended tracks slightly west of the present through platforms. Both the R&WER and WS&SWR were subsidiary companies of the London & South Western Railway (L&SWR).
On 1 January 1869[5] the L&SWR opened a branch line to Richmond from the West London Joint Railway which started north of Addison Road station (now Kensington (Olympia)). The line ran through Hammersmith (Grove Road) station, since closed, and Turnham Green and connected to the North & South Western Junction Railway (N&SWJR) near Gunnersbury. Most of this line is now part of the London Underground District line; the line south from Gunnersbury was also served by the North London Railway (NLR).
From 1 June to 31 October of 1870[6] the Great Western Railway (GWR) ran a service from Paddington to Richmond via the Hammersmith & City Railway (now the Hammersmith & City Line) tracks to Grove Road then over the L&SWR tracks through Turnham Green.
On 1 June 1877 the Metropolitan District Railway (MDR, now the District Line) linked its terminus at Hammersmith to the nearby L&SWR tracks east of the present Ravenscourt Park station. The MDR then began running trains over the L&SWR tracks to Richmond[5]. On 1 October 1877[6], the Metropolitan Railway (MR, now the Metropolitan line) restarted the former GWR service to Richmond via Grove Road station.
The MDR route between Richmond, Hammersmith and central London was more direct than those of the NLR via Willesden Junction, of the L&SWR and the MR via Grove Road station and of the L&SWR via Clapham Junction to Waterloo. From 1 January 1894[6], the GWR began sharing the MR Richmond service, resulting in Gunnersbury havibg the services of five operators.
After electrifying its tracks north of Acton Town in 1903, the MDR funded the electrification, completed on 1 August 1905, from Gunnersbury to Richmond.[5]. The MDR ran electric trains on the branch while the L&SWR, NLR, GWR and MR services continued to be steam hauled.
MR services ceased on 31 December 1906 and those of the GWR on 31 December 1910[6] leaving operations northwards through Kew Gardens and Gunnersbury to the MDR (by then known as the District Railway), the NLR and L&SWR. On 3 June 1916 the L&SWR withdrew its service between Richmond and Addison Road through Hammersmith due to competition from the District line[6], leaving the District as the sole operator over that route and the NLR providing mainline services via Willesden Junction.
A proposed extension of the central london railway would have terminated here, the previous stop being Heathfield Terrace tube station
Under the grouping of 1923 the L&SWR became part of the Southern Railway (SR) and the NLR became part of the London, Midland & Scottish Railway (LMS); both were subsequently nationalised into British Railways. On 1 August 1937 the SR opened its rebuilt station with the station building and the through platforms moved east to be next to the terminal platforms.
A former goods yard south of the through platforms was on the site of the first station, a multi-storey car park now stands there.
Crossrail
A Crossrail route from Paddington to Kingston upon Thames via Richmond was proposed in 2003, but was dropped in 2004 due to a combination of local opposition, uncertainty over the route, cost and an insufficient return on the envisaged investment. It would have run either overland or via a tunnel to Turnham Green and then on the existing track through Gunnersbury and Kew — which would then have no longer been a District Line route — and thence to Richmond and Kingston.