London Underground Design
There was a time, in the 1930s, when design on
London Underground was held as one of the world-beating quality features of the
system. Many of these designs survive to the present day and still show the quality
which can be achieved when it is held as important by a company's management. There
are signs that, given the will and the money, such design excellence can be achieved
today. Just look at the Jubilee Line Extension for further examples of good design
on London Underground. However, all is not well. Some comments on London
Underground designs are offered below.
Contents
The Roundel - Typeface
- Posters - Jubilee Line
Extension - 1938 Tube Stock - 1983 Tube Stock
The best known symbol of the Underground is the bar and
circle, also known as the roundel.
The roundel was originally developed from the
spoked wheel used by the London General Omnibus Company which had the word GENERAL
displayed across it. The LGOC was purchased by the Underground group in 1912 and in
the following year an early version of the now familiar bar and circle device, which had a
solid blue disc, appeared on station platforms as a means of displaying the station name.
A book about the logo has recently been
published by Capital Transport Publishing called A Logo for London, ISBN 185414 232 1.
There is an on-line history of the roundel here:
http://www.ltmuseum.co.uk/exhibitions/online_exhibitions/logo/index.html
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Shortly after the bar and disc device was introduced, a new
corporate typeface was introduced on the Underground. It was designed by Edward
Johnston and was introduced on new signs and publicity from 1916. It has
remained in use to this day, although now modified and known as New Johnston.
Johnston also redesigned the bar and disc symbol so that it became the bar and circle
device similar to that used today. The typeface is available in PC software form. A
version of it is available at www.p22.com where people
can buy it.
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The London Underground became renowned throughout the world
as a leader in the use of high quality art in its publicity. Posters
displayed on stations have been prominent in the use of works by artists specially
commissioned by the Underground. This tradition started in 1908 with the appearance
of posters such as Hassell's "No need to ask a P'liceman", which depicted a
policeman showing a lady the Underground map which had recently been introduced at
stations. The tradition continued throughout the 1920s and 1930s with work by such
artists as Graham Sutherland, E McKnight Kauffer and many others. The posters became
so popular that they have been reproduced for sale to the public as well as revived for
publicity purposes.
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The Jubilee Line extension (the JLE) was the most expensive
railway ever built. It cost USD 330 million per kilometre. This is
twice what Singapore is spending on their new underground metro line called the North East
Line. The costs are mostly in the infrastructure - the civil engineering and
stations. The JLE has the most impressive stations to be seen anywhere. The
architecture is superb, the finishes of high quality, the spaces large enough to cater for
the heaviest traffic - except on the platforms.
Therein lies the rub. The money was spent on the
architecture but not on the railway. The trains, control systems and station
platform areas all show that they were neglected in favour of the architecture.
The platforms at many of the new stations are too narrow and the trains are
too small.
 Narrow platform at Bermondsey, Jubilee Line with
platform edge doors.
Click on the image for the full size view
It would have been better to have widened the
existing Jubilee tunnels to take larger trains and to have built longer and wider
stations. The London tube train is too small to carry a reasonable amount of people
in rush hour conditions. Remember, when the tube lines were first built in
1890-1907, people were smaller than they are today and they didn't require so much
personal space as they do today. That's why, building more tube lines is a mistake.
More full-size underground railways is what London needs now.
For more images on the JLE go to Jubilee Line Photos.
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This represents the biggest step in engineering design which
London Underground ever took. The equipment was all new and much smaller than ever
used before. The visual appearance was pleasing and the interiors were reasonably
comfortable. The transverse seats and the end door handles were perhaps the only
interior errors which crept into the design. The equipment did give a lot of trouble
and there were over 1000 modification during the first few years of the stock's
existence. The compressors were the biggest headache, being of a rotary vane design
originally intended for trolleybuses known as the Bernard Holland type KLL4.
They were too delicate for the rough service on London Underground and, in the late 1960s,
they began to be replaced by reciprocating compressors. The stock last ran in
passenger service on LU in 1988.
 7-car train of 1938 Tube Stock on the Bakerloo Line at West Hampstead.
Click on the image for the full size view
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In a curious reversal, in opposition to the 1938 Tube Stock,
its replacement, the 1983 Tube Stock, represented the nadir of London Underground's design
ability. The trains were poorly designed, looked terrible, were badly built, had
inferior equipment and were unreliable. The original batch were too big for the
tunnels and had to be rebuilt. The bogies were soon falling apart and the motor
alternators were very unreliable. In the end, the Jubilee Line extension gave LU the
excuse to get rid of them and they were withdrawn about 10 years after the last of them
was delivered.
 A 1983 Tube Stock train in store at Uxbridge sidings. Others were
stored elsewhere on the system - Cockfosters and South Harrow - but most have been
scrapped. Photo D. McGarr.
Click on the image for the full size view
Ten trains were being kept for a possible rebuild to make
them useable on the Piccadilly Line. In Tubeprune's view, this would have been a
mistake. They would never have been right and would have required additional spares
and different maintenance procedures from the Piccadilly Line's own fleet of 1973 Stock
trains. It seems as if this idea was dropped by the Tubelines PPP contractor of the
JNP group and sanity finally prevailed.
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