 Hello, thank you for joining me. I'm at Chorley Wood again, my favorite station on the Metropolitan Line. I was last here about a month ago where I made a video when we explored Chorley Wood Common and the Chorley Wood House and State. Now in that video we started down in the Village Centre. We walked up through the station because the down platform which we're on now is part of a through walking route. So it doesn't have any ticket barriers. And I noticed a poster about converting the old signal box, which is just here, into a railway museum with a working model railway. And I said I'd come back perhaps and do a video on that. Well, here we are, but unfortunately I haven't got the best news to bring to you on the project. Basically, it's all come to a bit of a halt due to funding and access agreements, I understand. So it's kind of, they were saying, well, they can't have the funding without the access agreement, but they can't get the access agreement about the funding. So it's a bit of a vicious circle. So I'm really sorry to bring you that news. That is rather disappointing. However, what I can show you is there was a planned book, a book has been made to sell in that museum. And I have a copy of it here and I've had a read through it. It's a very interesting book. It's called Rails to Chorley Wood and Beyond. So this book discusses Metroland, the Metropolitan Railway being built across the Chilton Hills. How you have Metroland basically grew up in what was Middlesex, Hartfordshire and Buckinghamshire. So it's it's worth getting. It's available. I'm going to put a link in the description to the video. It's also available in Chorley Wood Bookshop. I understand which I'll point out. We're going to go down to the town centre. So this explains about how the railway is built across Chilton Hills. Now, I know how obvious it is, but the railway is clearly going uphill at this point. Whenever they've done steam on the met in the past, this is probably one of the most popular stations to come and watch the steam train. They really have to work hard up this bank. So there's a few pages about the steam on the met. It also shows lots of archived pictures of the various other steam locos and electric locos. Not many diesel locos have come through here because it was electrified. You know, it wasn't really ever a through route for diesels. It was only really steam and electric. What is now the car park used to be the good yard? So there's some very interesting pictures of the good yard. Interestingly, the good yard looks like it never was electrified. Now, there had been access to the good yard down that end of the platform and this end. So in fact, a good train could pull in. So it's coming up the bank, pull into there, drop off coal, its goods, etc. Whether there would have been coal, expresso and various other commodities and then rejoin the track, the main line, continue north. Another thing the book shows is some quite interesting maps. And it also debunks the idea that there was possibly a halt at Berry Lane. That was another video I made where we went and investigated, was there ever a halt? Because when they built the Metropolitan Line, it was understood that for the Seed as a state, the owner wanted his own halt and it appears he never got it. He asked for it. He didn't get it. He didn't get Charlie Wood station though. So it also shows that. It also mentions about the George Cross Tunnel Saga, and how this line really became very useful then. You may or may not know at George Cross when they built a test goes over the railway. The tunnel collapsed because they were filling a cutting in. And unfortunately, it meant that the line was blocked but because you've got this second line across the Chilterns, OK, it did mean trains to Traversa, Ellsbury and Princess Rishborough. It meant that there was a second through route between here and London. So that's just a few of the things in there. Another thing which we're going to go and do, I thought, quite a fun thing to do, it shows some of the housing estates that they were going to build. So there are some of the housing estates in Metroland. I thought it would be fun to go and find those houses, or not all of them, but just some of them, just see what they look like today. We could perhaps compare them. And that's the one we're going to do is the Seed as a state, which is just beyond the station. So I thought what we'll do, we'll go down there now and we'll have a look. I'll also we'll have a look at Charlie Wood Village Centre because really before the railway, there wasn't a lot here. It also goes through all the name changes of the station, how it has at one point been Chorley Wood and Chain is, and it has also some, I think, until 1960, or from 1960, Chorley Wood has become one word. It was also at one point two different words. So it's had quite an interesting history on over there. That's the old station hotel, which is now flats and offices. So this is that way out I told you about, which, as I said, effectively means you can walk through the station without a ticket. We'll just see the S-Doc train arrive and then what we'll do, we'll go down to the town centre and we'll have a look, a couple of things down there. So again, that's looking towards Amisham up the hill. I really wish to do steam on the met again because I've got pictures, but I've never actually filmed a steam train thundering through here, working hard up Chorley Wood Bank. So as this train arrives, there's a lady taking a selfie. I'm not the only one holding a camera in my hand. The train arrives towards London. We're going to go. Train's going to go, I'll let you watch it come in. Train pulls in. That will go down the hill towards London. I'm going to go down the much steeper steps down to the village centre. So here we are at Chorley Wood Village Centre. It's effectively in two parts. You've got the other half down there and it's decepted by Sharlane, which goes off up that very steep hill. Down there is where the steps are. It's got up to the station, the railway line runs just along there. And then this is the other half. We've got a few more parades of shops. I can't say it's the most attractive village in for looking at the buildings. It's nice. It's got the trees and everything. It's quite spacious. It's got lots of nice shops and cafes. Just the buildings are a little bit bland. Anyway, I'm not actually here to review the architecture of the village. It is though a very nice place to live and it's got lots of nice countryside. The reason we're coming down here is we're on our way to look at those houses. But I just wanted to point out just there. That is the bookshop. Where you can get this book, cost 12 pounds. So we're going to walk on up here into a metro and understate. And what we're going to do, we're going to have a look at some of the houses. And it also tells you in here how much they cost when they were new. I'm not going to find out how much they cost now, but they're going to cost a lot more than they did. It'd be interesting to see, I can already see looking at them, but some of them have been extended over the years. See if we can find some in the most original condition. So if I have a look here, got these semi-detached houses. Now I understand from looking in the book as I walk along here, that was the E type. Now they cost 715 pounds when they were new. I think I don't think you'll get much for that, much money now in the way of bricks and water. And for me, they'd be quite nice because they got row at the India Garden. That said, not much more variety on this line anymore. So this is, as I said, this is the Cedars estate. This is Whitelands Avenue. You can see where a newer house has been infilled. That was possibly someone's garden. So that house there on the corner, that would not have been here. So not too sure about that one. That's been heavily altered. But these are all E type houses. So it's funny, I'm thinking of houses having a type. I think of E type, I think of E type as a jaguar for anyway. Let's have a look. So there's all these E type ones, but there is, there's a detached house coming up. Now that, as I look in, it's a bit awkward. I'm sort of trying to look in the book as I go along. I think that's an M type. So have a look at that house there. That's an M type house. So you can see above the door how it's got the keystones. It's rendered, but it's got the bricks as a bit of a feature and that shows that as new in the brochure. So it's quite nice. It's kept that. Oh yeah, there's another one. So this one's a bit easier to show you this one here. And it's looking pretty much as it would have done when it's original. It of course had new windows, but you can see that actually tiles around the arch of the front door. And that's possibly the original front door, which is nice to see. An old wooden door of a stained glass window. A lot of them had plastic doors. Interestingly, it seems with the E type, with their big roofs that come down. A lot of people have spilled in that space. Both these two here have with an extension. So you can see they were kind of right before development. Now it's quite interesting to see coming up on the corner. There's what looks to be an E type house, but a detached version. See how they're all semis. And then that one there is detached because you've got another road going up. Or does that have a different type? Because it was detached, it cost 825 pounds. So a fair bit more than these ones across the road, which cost 700 and 15 pounds. So you've got a road going off up there. Brushwood Avenue has a mixture of some older of these houses and some newer houses. So very pleasant place to live, the railway in your garden. And then you're not too far from the railway station. What I thought I'd do though, now I'm just going to go for a bit of a walk out into the countryside, just for fun really. And see if we can see any more of the railway lines. I'm going to continue up that way. Because I believe as a footpath takes me to some woods, I've not actually been in the tube before. So here we are. We've left the village and we're out in the woods. Well, we've nearly left. There's a few houses there. That's further down the road. We were just walking along, but they're newer. So they wouldn't have been built around the time of Metroland they built in the 60s. This wood is known as Carpenters wood. And up here it becomes Whiteland's wood. Now before the railway came to Chorleywood, these woods would have been used for chair making. Chilton Hills is fairly well known for chair making, High Wycombe and Princess Rishbara. That was their main source of business chair making. So they would have taken the wood from various woods in the Chilton Hills, this being one of them. I'm going to continue probably up and do a big circuit and then I'll eventually come back to Chorleywood Village. This is a very pleasant woodland. This is what you get if you live in Metroland. You get nice houses, easy access to London and countryside like this to walk in. I've had a rather pleasant afternoon walking around the woods and the housing estates in Chorleywood. I'm just climbing back up those steps. As I said, I did in that other video. We're back in the car park now. The old good yard as this book has quite a few pictures. So you'd be able to see what this view looked like when it was a good yard. So the trains are connected that way and that way with the main line. You go back up onto the platform. So as for this book, you can get it in the Chorleywood Bookshop. I'll also put details in the description on how else you can get hold of it. It is a real shame that as it seems at the moment, the project to convert the station or the single box rather into a museum isn't happening. But, you know, maybe one day things will change. As for what I think of this book, well, I think it is very good. There's not a lot I can really fault with it. It's got lots of interesting maps and pictures of, you know, workings I hadn't seen before, like there's an A3 passing through here. I don't know if I've ever seen a picture of an A3 on this line. A3 is the class of locomotives. Flying Scotsman has seen A3s, pictures of A3s in steam days, passing through George Cross on the other main line, the short main line. So some rather interesting pictures. Perhaps one thing I'd say I'd quite like if it had had would be a few past and present. So some of the pictures as they are and then a present view. So, you know, you can make comparisons. The only thing is to pass some presents is quite often they change, you know, as they go on. But then that also makes it quite fun. One other last thing on the whole signal box and signaling thing, you notice there's two signals there. There's the old color lights are about to be replaced with these new color lights. So even the old color lights, they've all once been semaphors pulled by leavers from that signal box. But now the color lights they're on their way out. And maybe one of those will be preserved somewhere. You never know. As I said, it's shame the museum products not going ahead, but it's really nice. This book has been produced. And this, as I say, is a set of beginning of video. I think it's my favorite station on the Met. It's a really pleasant station. I really like coming here to watch trains and talking of trains, there's one coming in now. So thank you very much for watching. Please do feel free to like, subscribe, and comment from Trawley Wood Station. Goodbye.