Canary Wharf tube station

This article is about the London Underground station. For the Docklands Light Railway station, see Canary Wharf DLR station. For the Crossrail station, see Canary Wharf railway station.

Canary Wharf
Station entrance
Canary Wharf Location of Canary Wharf in Greater London
Location	Canary Wharf
Local authority	London Borough of Tower Hamlets
Managed by	London Underground
Number of platforms	2
Accessible	Yes
Fare zone	2
OSI	Canary Wharf Heron Quays
London Underground annual entry and exit
2011	46.59 million
2012	48.04 million
2013	50.05 million
2014	51.81 million
Railway companies
Original company	London Regional Transport
Key dates
1999	Opened
Other information
Lists of stations	DLR Underground National Rail Tramlink
London Transport portal

Canary Wharf is a London Underground station on the Jubilee line, between Canada Water and North Greenwich. The station, serving Canary Wharf, is in Travelcard Zone 2 and was opened by Ken Livingstone setting an escalator in motion on 17 September 1999 as part of the Jubilee Line Extension. It is maintained by Tube Lines. Over 40 million people pass through the station each year, making it second busiest on the London Underground outside Central London after Stratford, and also the busiest that serves only a single line. (The DLR station is completely separate.)

History

Before the arrival of the Jubilee line, London's Docklands had suffered from relatively poor public transport. Although the Docklands Light Railway station at Canary Wharf had been operating since 1987, by 1990 it was obvious that the DLR's capacity would soon be reached. The Jubilee line's routing through Canary Wharf was intended to relieve some of this pressure.

The tube station was intended from the start to be the showpiece of the Jubilee Line Extension, and the contract for its design was awarded in 1990 to the renowned architect Sir Norman Foster. It was constructed, by a Tarmac Construction / Bachy UK Joint Venture, in a drained arm of the former dock, using a simple "cut and cover" method to excavate an enormous pit 24 metres (78 ft) deep and 265 metres (869 ft) long. The size of the interior has led to it being compared to a cathedral, and it has even been used to celebrate a wedding. However, the main reason for the station's enormous dimensions was the great number of passengers predicted; as many as 50,000 daily. These predictions have been outgrown, with as many as 69,759 on weekdays recorded in 2006.

In a 2013 poll conducted by YouGov, it was voted as the "Most Loved" tube station in London.

The station today

Above ground there is little sign of the vast interior: two curved glass canopies at the east and west ends of the station cover the entrances and allow daylight into the ticket hall below. The Jubilee Park, a public park is situated between the two canopies, above the station concourse. It had originally been intended that the infilled section of the dock would be reinstated above the station, but this proved impractical because of technical difficulties and the park was created instead.

As with the other below-ground stations on the Jubilee Line extension, both station platforms are equipped with platform screen doors.

Canary Wharf station has become one of the busiest stations on the network, serving the ever-expanding Canary Wharf business district. Although it shares its name with the Docklands Light Railway station at Canary Wharf, the two are not directly integrated (in fact, Heron Quays DLR station is nearer at street level). All three stations are connected underground via shopping malls. Out-of-station interchange within twenty minutes between any two of the stations entails no additional charge.

Canary Wharf can be used to reverse trains from both the east and the west. A scissors crossover west of the station allows trains from Stanmore to enter either the east- or west-bound platform at the station, and trains from Stratford enter the normal westbound platform and can use this scissors crossover to reverse back towards Stratford.

The station was used as a location for some scenes of Danny Boyle's 2002 film 28 Days Later.

On 9 January 2013, the station appeared on a £1.28 British postage stamp as part of a set commemorating the 150th anniversary of the first London underground train journey. The stamp's captions read "Jubilee Line at Canary Wharf" and "1999". The Canary Wharf stamp represented the most modern phase of the Underground in the set of six stamps.

Connections

London Buses routes 135, 277, D3, D7, D8 and night route N550 and Coach routes 761, 762 763, 764, 769, 770, 781, 784 serve the station.

Future proposals

Canary Wharf station and the Jubilee line Extension itself were partly funded by the owners of the Canary Wharf complex, with the intention of making it more accessible to commuters. Only five years after the construction of the extension, capacity issues started becoming apparent and upgrades were required. The first step was the lengthening of the trains from 6 to 7 cars. This was done at the end of 2005. The second step was to replace the conventional Jubilee line signalling with the Thales S40 moving-block system. This was eventually introduced into service during 2011 after many delays and teething problems and allows a more intensive timetable to operate with 30 trains per hour running in the peaks.

Gallery

• 

  Concourse and concourse roof of Canary Wharf station

• 

  View from the down escalator at the west end of the station on the day of the London Marathon 2009

• 

  Interior of Canary Wharf

• 

  Canary Wharf platforms

See also

• Canary Wharf DLR station

External links

• Construction of the Station's Entrance Canopies
• More photographs of Canary Wharf station

Preceding station		London Underground		Following station
Canada Water towards Stanmore		Jubilee line		North Greenwich towards Stratford
	Out of system interchange
Preceding station		DLR		Following station
West India Quay towards Bank, Tower Gateway or Stratford		Docklands Light Railway Transfer at: Canary Wharf		Heron Quays towards Lewisham
Canary Wharf towards Bank, Tower Gateway or Stratford		Docklands Light Railway Transfer at: Heron Quays		South Quay towards Lewisham
	Future interchange
Preceding station		Crossrail		Following station
Whitechapel towards Reading or Heathrow Airport		Crossrail Elizabeth Line		Custom House towards Abbey Wood