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The Northern City Line is a railway line from Moorgate to Finsbury Park in London, part of the Great Northern Route services. It is underground from Moorgate to Drayton Park, and runs in a cutting from there until meeting the East Coast Main Line south of Finsbury Park. It carries passengers from London's northern suburbs to and from the City of London, the UK's main financial centre. Services run on weekdays until around 10pm; at weekends, when many City offices are closed, all trains run to King's Cross instead.〔(【引用サイトリンク】url= http://www.nationalrail.co.uk/static/documents/content/Great_Northern_route_map.pdf )〕 The line was formerly part of London Underground, and during its history has been described or managed as part of both the Metropolitan and Northern lines (sometimes as the "Highbury Branch"), although it has never been connected to either. Built as an isolated route with a northern terminus at Finsbury Park, a reconstruction finished in 1976 connected it to the National Rail network and began its modern service pattern. It is now owned by Network Rail and served by commuter trains operated by Great Northern from Moorgate to Welwyn Garden City, Hertford North and Letchworth Garden City. == History == The Great Northern & City Railway was planned to allow electrified trains to run from the Great Northern Railway, now the East Coast main line, at Finsbury Park to the City of London at Moorgate. Despite being built using similar methods to the tube network then under construction, the tunnels were built large enough to take a main-line train, with an internal diameter of , compared with those of the Central London Railway with a diameter less than . However, the Great Northern eventually opposed the scheme and cancelled its electrification plans, and the line opened in 1904 with the northern terminus in tunnels underneath Finsbury Park GNR station. It was originally electrified with an unusual fourth-rail system with a conductor rail outside both running rails.〔 The GN&CR was bought in 1913 by the Metropolitan Railway, which operated what are today the Metropolitan and Hammersmith & City lines and the former East London line. They had plans to link it to the Circle line and to the Waterloo & City line, but these were never fulfilled. During this period, the line remained an isolated branch, without through services to any other part of the rail network. Carriages were brought to it through a connection into a freight yard near Drayton Park station, where a small depot was built to service trains. The GN&CR generating station closed when the Metropolitan Railway took over, and became the studio of Gainsborough Pictures. After lying derelict for many years, it was a temporary venue for the Almeida Theatre, and has since been redeveloped as apartments. After the Metropolitan amalgamated with the other Underground railways as part of the formation of the London Passenger Transport Board in 1933, the line was renamed the Northern City Line and became branded as part of the Edgware-Morden Line, which was renamed to the Northern line in 1937. As part of London Transport's New Works Programme, the Northern Heights plan would have connected the Northern City Line at Finsbury Park to existing main-line suburban branches to Alexandra Palace, High Barnet and Edgware, which would be taken over by London Transport and electrified. The Highgate branch of the Edgware-Morden Line would connect to this network north of Highgate. Only parts of this plan were completed: when the Second World War started, the Highgate link and electrification of the Barnet branch were well under way and ultimately completed, but the Northern City connection to Highgate was first postponed and finally cancelled after the war. After the war there were proposals to extend the Northern City Line north and south. The London Plan Working Party Report of 1949 proposed several new lines and suburban electrification schemes for London, lettered from A to M. The lower-priority routes J and K would have seen the Northern City extended to Woolwich (Route J) and Crystal Palace (Route K), retaining the "Northern Heights" extensions to Edgware and Alexandra Palace. The lines would have run in small-diameter tube tunnels south from Moorgate to Bank and London Bridge.〔J. Glover, "London's Underground", 7th edition, Shepperton, Ian Allan, 1991, p.61.〕 The "K" branch would have run under Peckham to Peckham Rye, joining the old Crystal Palace (High Level) branch (which was still open in 1949) near Lordship Lane. Nothing came of these proposals, and the Edgware, Alexandra Palace and Crystal Palace (High Level) branches were all closed to passengers in 1954. As a result, the Northern City Line remained isolated from the rest of the network. Services were cut back from Finsbury Park to Drayton Park in 1964 to make room for the Victoria line to use the low-level platforms at Finsbury Park. The former Piccadilly line platforms became the northbound Piccadilly/Victoria line platforms, and the former Northern City Line platforms the southbound Piccadilly and Victoria line ones. At the same time a change was made at Highbury and Islington, with the northbound Northern City line diverted to a new platform alongside the Northbound Victoria line, and the southbound Victoria using the former northbound Northern City platform, also providing cross platform interchange. Passengers from Moorgate to Finsbury Park took the Northern City line to Highbury and Islington and then changed onto the Victoria. In 1970 the line was renamed Northern line (Highbury Branch) and the following year an agreement was made to transfer it to British Rail and connect it (as intended by its original promoters) to the main line via surface platforms at Finsbury Park as part of a wider plan to electrify ECML suburban services. By running commuter trains to Moorgate instead of King's Cross, congestion at King's Cross was relieved. The last London Underground services ran in October 1975 and British Rail services commenced in August 1976, replacing services to Broad Street via the city branch of the North London Line. These BR services used the name "Great Northern Electrics". The track and tunnels are now owned by Network Rail. Services are provided by Great Northern to , and Hertford Loop Line services to (some extending to Stevenage or Hitchin or Letchworth). The name "Northern City Line" has been revived to refer to the underground part of the route. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Northern City Line」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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