- published: 28 May 2015
- views: 55408
Paddington railway station, also known as London Paddington, is a central London railway terminus and London Underground complex.
The site is a historic one, having served as the London terminus of the Great Western Railway and its successors since 1838. Much of the current mainline station dates from 1854, and was designed by Isambard Kingdom Brunel. The site was first served by Underground trains in 1863, and was the original western terminus of the Metropolitan Railway, the world's first underground railway.
The complex has recently been modernised, and now has an additional role as the London terminal for the dedicated Heathrow Express airport service. Paddington is in Travelcard Zone 1.
The station is the terminus for services from Bristol, Cheltenham Spa, Cardiff, Exeter via Reading, Penzance, Plymouth and Swansea.
The station complex is bounded at the front by Praed Street and at the rear by Bishop's Bridge Road, which crosses the throat of the mainline station on the recently replaced Bishop's Bridge. On the west side of the station is Eastbourne Terrace, while the east side is bounded by the Paddington arm of the Grand Union Canal. The mainline station stands in a shallow cutting, a fact obscured at the front by an hotel building, but which can be clearly seen from the other three sides.
Coordinates: 51°31′02″N 0°10′23″W / 51.5172°N 0.1730°W / 51.5172; -0.1730
Paddington is a district within the City of Westminster, in central London, England. Formerly a metropolitan borough, it was integrated with Westminster and Greater London in 1965. Three important landmarks of the district are Paddington station, designed by the celebrated engineer Isambard Kingdom Brunel and opened in 1847; St Mary's Hospital and Paddington Green Police Station (the most important high-security police station in the United Kingdom).
A major project called Paddington Waterside aims to regenerate former railway and canal land between 1998 and 2018, and the area is seeing many new developments.
The earliest extant reference to Padington, historically a part of Middlesex, was made in 1056.[citation needed]
In the later Elizabethan and early Stuart era, the rectory and associated estate houses were occupied by the Small (or Smale) family. Nicholas Small was a clothworker sufficiently well connected to have his new wife's (Jane Small) portrait painted by Holbein. Nicholas died in 1565 and his wife married again, to Nicholas Parkinson, who also resided in Paddington. Parkinson went on to be the Master of the Clothworker's company. Jane Small continued to live in Paddington after her second husband's death, and her manor house was big enough to have been let to Sir John Popham, the attorney general, in the 1580s. At this time there was an inn attached to the estate, named Blowers.
Inside Paddington Station
London Paddington Railway Station
Paddington Railway Station London
London Paddington Railway Station
Three Minutes at Paddington Station, London
Trains at London Paddington | 24/06/14
Paddington Station 1936
Paddington Station 1939
Paddington Meets The Brown Family - Clip - On DVD, Blu-ray and Download March 23rd.
Seconds From Disaster - S04E03 - Paddington Rail Disaster