The London Underground, 1968-1985 : The Greater London Council Years

London's historic Underground railway system in the period from 1968 to 1985 was a vastly different place to today. Much of its rolling stock dated from before World War Two, most trains were two-person operated as the 1970s dawned. Jim Blake recorded most of the system before it would change forever, concentrating on the older rolling stock as well as other items of interest due for replacement or modernisation. The transfer of overall control of London's buses and Underground system to the city-wide Greater London Council at the beginning of 1970 was removed by the Thatcher regime in 1984, after which things rapidly went downhill. This book covers the years of GLC control, including the months prior to their taking. Many rare and unusual scenes are here, including the uncompleted Northern Line extension between Drayton Park and Highgate, which had been so close to completion when work was halted during the war, but then abandoned in the early 1950s.