page_title: Marylebone station
section_title: GCR and LNER
hierarchical_section_title: Marylebone station / National Rail / History / GCR and LNER
caption_attribution_description: English: Marylebone station, City of Westminster. Français&#160;: La Gare de Marylebone, dans la Cité de Westminster, en Angleterre.
context_page_description: Marylebone station is a Central London railway terminus and connected London Underground station in the Marylebone area of the City of Westminster. On the National Rail network it is also known as London Marylebone and is the southern terminus of the Chiltern Main Line to Birmingham. An accompanying Underground station is on the Bakerloo line between Edgware Road and Baker Street in Transport for London's fare zone 1.
  The station opened on 15 March 1899 as the London terminus of the Great Central Main Line, the last major railway to open in Britain for 100 years, linking the capital to the cities of Leicester, Sheffield and Manchester. Marylebone was the last of London's main line termini to be built and is one of the smallest, opening with half of the platforms originally planned. There has been an interchange with the Bakerloo line since 1907, but not with any other lines.
  Traffic declined at Marylebone station from the mid-20th century, particularly after the GCML closed. By the 1980s, it was threatened with closure, but was reprieved because of commuter traffic on the London to Aylesbury Line and from High Wycombe.
context_section_description: The early history of Marylebone is tied into the Great Central Railway (GCR)'s Great Central Main Line (GCML) extension into London. When Sir Edward Watkin became chairman of the Manchester, Sheffield and Lincolnshire Railway (MS&LR) in 1864, the line was not particularly lucrative as it had no direct connection to London. Watkin was unhappy about transferring traffic to the Great Northern Railway, and when he became chairman of the Metropolitan Railway in 1872, he decided to build a dedicated line between the MS&LR and Central London.
  The approach to Marylebone was the last section of the Great Central Main Line to be built. Progress was delayed in the 1890s because of objections, particularly as the line would pass through Lord's, the principal cricket ground in London and home of Marylebone Cricket Club. Watkin promised that Lord's would not be disrupted by the railway construction, and an act of Parliament to complete the line was passed on 28 March 1893. The station was built on a 51-acre (21 ha) site around Blandford and Harewood Squares, west of Regent's Park. More than 4,000 working-class people were evicted from their homes to turn Harewood Avenue and Rossmore Road into approach roads; around 2,600 of them were rehomed in new apartments near St. John's Wood Road. Watkin resigned the chairmanship in 1894 following ill health, and was replaced by Lord Wharncliffe. The approach to the station through Lord's was achieved by a cut-and-cover tunnel constructed between September 1896 and May 1897, avoiding the cancellation of any cricket.
  The station opened to coal traffic on 27 July 1898 and to passengers on 15 March 1899. It was the terminus of the GCR's London extension main line – the last major railway line to be built into London until High Speed 1. The Great Central Railway linked London to stations in High Wycombe, Aylesbury, Rugby, Leicester, Nottingham, Sheffield and Manchester. Local services from northwest Middlesex, High Wycombe and Aylesbury also terminated at Marylebone. The GCR moved its headquarters to Marylebone from Manchester in 1905.
  The station was designed by Henry William Braddock, a civil engineer for the GCR. It has a modest design owing to the GCR's lack of money. The main booking hall is 63 feet (19.2 m) by 40 feet 6 inches (12.3 m). It is a domestic version of the "Wrenaissance" revival style that fits in with the residential surroundings with Dutch gables, employing warm brick and cream-coloured stone. The GCR crest was worked into the wrought iron railings in numerous places.
  The original plan was for eight platforms, but half were designated as a "possible future extension" and the cost of building the GCML was greater than expected. The line leading to the station cut through 70 acres (28 ha) of middle-class housing, including the Eyre Estate in St John's Wood and the area around Lord's, drawing protests and requiring a relocation of the track and station facilities. There was never enough money for the extra platforms, and only four were built, three inside the train shed and one to its west (platform 4). As a result, the concourse is unusually long and had three walls for most of the 20th century. The northern wall was missing, as the GCR anticipated that the other four platforms, under an extended train shed, would be built later on. An office block was later built on the vacant site. The cost of the London Extension meant that the adjoining Great Central Hotel, designed by Sir Robert William Ellis, was built by a different company. The hotel operated for a relatively short time and was converted to offices in 1945, becoming the headquarters of British Rail from 1948 to 1986. The offices were restored as a hotel in 1993.
  The GCR constructed an engine shed at the site in 1897, but it was short lived. A locomotive servicing area, consisting of a turntable and coaling stage remained in use until the end of steam traction at the station in 1966.
  Passenger traffic on the GCR was never heavy because it was the last main line to be built and had difficulty competing against longer-establish
caption: The facade of Marylebone Station, designed by Henry William Braddock
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