Underground Station Names Pre Modernisation



Underground Station Names Post Modernisation














The Glasgow Underground was opened in 1896 and is the third oldest such system after the London Underground and the Budapest Metro. The system was originally powered by a cable running round the circular layout with the cable winding buildings housed in Scotland Street.

The original powering system explains why the Glasgow Underground stations are built on the brow of a hill to allow the cable grips to be released before entering the stations with the trains gliding to a halt. It also helped when the trains had to grip the cable to start again with the trains moving downhill.

The service first opened on December 14 1896, however by the end of that day both tunnels were out of action.

A cable fault on the inner circle caused a car to be derailed at Buchanan Street, after this happened only the Inner circle ran. All the cars were filled to capacity, however a collision between two cars near St Enoch Station caused all services to be halted. The system was closed until January 21 1897.

The system was electrified in two stages, the first being the Inner Circle, with the last cable hauled train running on March 28th 1935, being replaced with the first power hauled train on March 31. The outer circle continued to be cable hauled until November 30 1895. The system was shut on December 1 , which was a Sunday, and from Dec 2 to Dec 4 it ran on the Inner Circle only, until the Outer Circle went 'live' on December 5.

The pictures below show the car shed in 1955.



The network ran like this until 21st May 1977, when at 12.50pm the station master at Copland Road (now Ibrox) received a phone call to say that services were being suspended due to a crack appearing in the roof at Govan Cross Station (now Govan).This turned out to be the end of the old system as it never re-started, thus ending the era of the old underground.

Below is a copy of the picture of the station master calling 'service suspended', the people in the picture are leaving the system for the last time ever.



Below is a mock up of the old Merkland Street station, which is currently housed in the Transport Museum.