| Location | |
|---|---|
| Place | The Angel, Islington |
| Local authority | Islington |
| Operations | |
| Managed by | London Underground |
| Platforms in use | 2 |
| Transport for London | |
| Zone | 1 |
| Annual entry/exit | 14.03 million † |
| History | |
| Key dates | Opened 1901 |
| Transport for London List of London stations: Underground | National Rail |
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| † Data from Transport for London [1] | |
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Angel tube station is a London Underground station in The Angel, Islington. It is on the Bank branch of the Northern Line, between Old Street and King's Cross St. Pancras stations. It is in Travelcard Zone 1. Angel station was originally built by the City & South London Railway, and opened in 1901 as the northern terminus of a new extension from Moorgate. It is one of five stations on the London Underground named after a public house - in this case the once-famous Angel inn, which dates back to at least 1638. As with many other stations on the line, it was originally built with a single central island platform serving two tracks – an arrangement still seen at Clapham North and Clapham Common – and access from street level was via lifts. The most recent lifts were of the Otis "drum hoist" design used throughout the rest of the tube system, but were of about half the size. For years, the station regularly suffered from congestion and overcrowding which, especially with the island platform, constituted a major safety issue. Consequently, the station was comprehensively rebuilt, re-opening in 1992.
A new section of tunnel was excavated for a new northbound platform and the southbound platform was rebuilt to completely occupy the original 30-foot tunnel, explaining why it is larger than most deep-level platforms. The lifts and the ground level building originally on the corner of Torrens Street and City Road were closed and a new station entrance was opened around the corner in Islington High Street. Because of the distance of the new entrance from the platforms, and their depth, two flights of escalators were required aligned approximately at a right-angle. These include the longest escalators in Western Europe, with a vertical rise of 27.4 m (90 ft) and a length of 60 m (197 ft). Between Angel and Old Street stations is the disused tube station City Road.
Trivia
- Angel station is the subject of 40 minutes: Heart of The Angel, an award-winning 1989 BBC "40 minutes" documentary, by Molly Dineen. It shows the troubled life of the station a few years before the 1992 rebuilding, including the platform overcrowding and the lifts regularly breaking down.
- Angel station is one of the most popular stations in terms of merchandising.
- In March 2007, an unidentified man posted a video on YouTube of himself skiing down the escalator (reportedly sometime in 2006), an action condemned by the Police and London Underground officials [1] [2].
- The goth/industrial club Slimelight is located directly behind the Tube station, approximately a 5 minute walk from the Tube entrance. The closing times for the club are correspondent with the opening times for the Tube stop.
References
External links
| Preceding station | Following station | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Northern line |
toward Morden
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