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Favourite tube stations can be a sensitive subject. Londoners are passionate about their local lines, and people get protective over heritage classics like Baker Street and tiled masterpieces like Gloucester Road.
But it isn’t just London’s oldest tube stations that deserve fanbases – and now a campaign group is calling for some of the capital’s newer hubs to get official protected status. Save Britain’s Heritage wants 11 Jubilee line stations to be listed on Historic England’s conservation register: Westminster, Waterloo, London Bridge, Southwark, Bermondsey, Canada Water, Canary Wharf, North Greenwich, Canning Town, West Ham and Stratford.
The campaign group asked Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy to grant special status to the stations. Historic England, which is in charge of protecting historic and noteworthy buildings, rejected a request to list Southwark Station in 2017 but is now reopening its assessment of it.
All 11 of the stations are part of the Jubilee line extension, which opened in 1999 to improve transport links to south and east London. At the time, it was the first direct connection between the West End and the Docklands.
Award-winning architect Roland Paoletti commissioned top architects to design the stations, and these days they’re beloved for their space age style. If you’ve used the escalators at Westminster or Canary Wharf (pictured above), you’ll know what we mean. The massive concrete pillars, the moody lighting, the steel framework – it’s all delightfully dystopian.
In 2001, Canary Wharf’s Jubilee line station won Best Transport/ Infrastructure building at the World Architecture Awards. Its cinematic looks even made it onto the big screen – Star Wars: Rogue One and Danny Boyle’s 28 Days Later both shot scenes there.
It’s a long way – literally and spiritually – from the original Jubilee line, which ran from Stanmore to Wembley Park and used to be part of the Metropolitan line. In the late ’70s, it was extended into the West End and renamed the Jubilee line, in honour of Queen Elizabeth’s Platinum Jubilee.
You can find out more about the campaign to get the Jubilee line extension listed on the Save Britain’s Heritage website here.
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