Oxford Circus is an interchange of the London Underground's Bakerloo, Central and Victoria Lines in Central London. It is no surprise that Oxford Circus is one of the busiest stations in the UK with near 90 million entries and exits (and nearly 100 million in 2014). The station is named after the busy junction of Oxford Street and Regent Street above.
| Information |
| Type: |
Transport for London
(Bakerloo, Central &
Victoria Lines) |
| Station code: |
ZOC |
| Opened: |
1900 |
| Platforms: |
6 |
Oxford Circus was opened in 1900 as part of the original stretch of the Central London Railway (later the Central Line) from
Shepherd's Bush to
Cornhill (now
Bank station). The Bakerloo was next to Oxford Circus when the Baker Street & Waterloo Railway built its line from
Baker Street to
Elephant & Castle. The original station did not meet the requirements of the parent company UERL and had to be substantially rebuilt even before it was opened [1]. This finally happened in 1906.
Finally the Victoria Line reached Oxford Circus in the 1960s. A complete reconstruction of the station was required to accommodate the new line including a new ticket hall built underneath the road junction itself. This required a large steel structure, called the Oxford Circus Umbrella, to allow traffic to continue flowing overhead while the new ticket office was built underneath [2]. The Victoria line platforms were built parallel to the Bakerloo platforms to ease interchange.
The station was given a refurbishment and facelift in the 1980s which included murals on the Central and Bakerloo Line platforms [3] though these were mostly removed in 2007 during another refurbishment.
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| A Northbound Bakerloo Line train arrives at Oxford Circus |
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| A Northbound Victoria Line train pulls into the station |
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| Passageway at Oxford Circus |
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| Bakerloo Line platform |
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| Victoria Line platform |
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| You have just missed this Central Line train! |
[1] Mike Horne, The Bakerloo Line (Capital Transport, 2001) p. 11
[2] Mike Horne, The Victoria Line (Capital Transport, 2004) p. 35
[3] J. Grahem Bruce and Desmond F. Croome, The Twopenny Tube (Capital Transport, 1996) p. 70
