London inaugurates the world’s first subway service. Approximately forty thousand Londoners ride the trains the first day.
The original line ran from Paddington Station to Farringdon Street via Edgware Road, Baker Street, Portland Road (now Great Portland Street), Gower Street (now Euston Square), and King’s Cross. It took the train eighteen minutes to make the three-and-three-quarter-mile journey. By 1880, the line was carrying forty million passengers a year. Despite the subway’s success, it was not widely copied for more than three decades. The next metro subways to open were in Budapest and in Glasgow, in 1896. Boston’s opened in 1897, Paris’s in 1900, and New York’s in 1904.
The London system relied on steam-driven trains, which made proper ventilation critical. There were several independent companies operating the trains, making logistics a nightmare. By the twentieth century, however, trains had been electrified and tunneling methods improved. The London system, which became known as the Underground, was largely consolidated by 1902 under the ownership of American tycoon Charles Yerkes. But it was 1933 before all the lines came under the control of a public corporation, the London Passenger Transport Board.
Governance of the system has successively passed to the London Transport Executive (1948), London Transport Board (1963), London Transport Executive (again; 1970), London Regional Transport (1984), and Transport for London (2000). During the Blitz in World War II, Underground stations were used as ad hoc air-raid shelters. Today the Underground comprises eleven lines (not counting the Dockland Lights Railway or the converted suburban rail lines of the London Overground) serving 270 stations in metropolitan London. The system carries roughly a billion passengers per year, making it one of the largest in the world. By comparison, New York City’s subway system carries 1.6 billion passengers annually, and Tokyo’s 3.1 billion.—TL