page_title: Ongar railway station
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: Ongar railway station / History
caption_attribution_description: English: Ongar Station, with push-&amp;-pull train to Epping. View eastwards to the buffer-stops; terminus of the ex-Great Eastern branch from London Liverpool Street via Stratford and Epping. Latterly, the branch had been operate only with a push-&amp;-pull service from Epping. Since 24/9/49 it had come under the auspices of London Underground and and shortly after this photograph was taken the branch from Epping was finally electrified and operated by Tube trains. The locomotive in the scene is ex-GE F5 2-4-2T No. 67200.
context_page_description: Ongar railway station is a station on the Epping Ongar Railway heritage line, and a former London Underground station in the town of Chipping Ongar, Essex. It was opened in 1865 by the Great Eastern Railway, and became part of London Transport in 1949. Until its closure as such in 1994, it was the easternmost point of the Central line and the eastern buffers remain the point from which all distances on the London Underground are measured.
context_section_description: The station was opened by the Great Eastern Railway on 24 April 1865, serving principally as a goods station taking agricultural produce from the nearby farms into central London. On 29 September 1949, London Underground services took over the operation of the station from British Railways when services were extended from Loughton.
  Although the rest of the branch was electrified by London Underground before operations were taken over from British Railways, trains on the section north of Epping continued to be hauled by steam locomotives as a separate shuttle service. The service was operated by British Railways for the Underground until 18 November 1957, when the line was electrified and electric trains took over from steam. A shortage of power prevented the Epping to Ongar section being fully integrated into the line and it continued to operate as a shuttle service.
  The entire Epping to Ongar branch was a single track line with one passing place at North Weald station, although this loop was taken out of service between 1888 and 1949, and again from 1976. Between 1949 and 1976 two Tube trains could use the branch, although they were limited to four cars in length because of the restriction on the available traction current, as well as by the restricted platform lengths at North Weald and Blake Hall. The service was reduced to one train after the southbound track at North Weald was lifted. It was therefore never suitable for heavy use, and the line was reportedly never profitable. For much of its latter years, the service only operated during Monday to Friday peak hours, and London Transport closed Blake Hall station, the least used on the entire system, in 1981. The line itself continued in use and there was a brief re-introduction of all day services in 1990. However, a system wide cost-cutting exercise saw the service return to peak hours soon afterwards, with an even more skeletal service than before. The line was under threat of closure for many years, and it was finally closed on 30 September 1994.
caption: 9 March 1957, Ongar station still served with steam traction
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