Northern City Line

Northern City Line
A Class 717 at Moorgate
Overview
Status	Operational
Owner	Network Rail
Locale	Greater London
Termini	Finsbury Park London Moorgate
Stations	6
Service
Type	Commuter rail, Suburban rail
System	National Rail
Operator(s)	Great Northern
Depot(s)	Hornsey
Rolling stock	Class 717 "Desiro City"
History
Opened	1904
Technical
Number of tracks	Two
Track gauge	1,435 mm (4 ft 8+1⁄2 in) standard gauge
Loading gauge	W6[1]
Electrification	25 kV 50 Hz AC OHLE (north of Drayton Park) 750 V DC third rail (south of Drayton Park)
Route map

v t e Northern City Line
Legend
Alexandra Palace branch (conversion started but abandoned) Alexandra Palace Muswell Hill Northern line via Finchley Central Cranley Gardens Highgate depot Highgate Northern line via Kentish Town Crouch End Stroud Green East Coast Main Line to the North Finsbury Park Finsbury Park Junction Holloway Junction Canonbury curve Drayton Park East Coast Main Line to London King's Cross Thameslink via London St Pancras Victoria line to Walthamstow Central North London line via Willesden Junction Highbury & Islington North London and East London lines via Canonbury Victoria line to Brixton Essex Road Old Street Thameslink via Farringdon Moorgate Lothbury proposed but not built

The Northern City Line is a commuter railway line in England, which runs from Moorgate station to Finsbury Park in London with services running beyond. It is part of the Great Northern Route services, and operates as the south-eastern branch of the East Coast Main Line (ECML). It is underground from Moorgate to Drayton Park in Highbury, from which point it runs in a cutting until joining the ECML south of Finsbury Park. Its stations span northern inner districts of Greater London southwards to the City of London, the UK's main financial centre. Since December 2015, its service timetable has been extended to run into the late evenings and at weekends,^[2] meeting a new franchise commitment for a minimum of six trains per hour until 23:59 on weekdays and four trains per hour at weekends.^[3]

The official name for this line is the Moorgate Line,^[4][5] but it is rarely referred to as this due to confusion with the Widened Lines route from Kentish Town to Farringdon, which, until March 2009, also served Moorgate surface-level station on the London Midland Region.^[6][7] The Northern City Line's name is derived from the fact that it was originally a London Underground line, where it was described or managed as part of both the Metropolitan and Northern lines (sometimes as the "Highbury Branch"), although never connected to either. Built as an isolated route with a northern terminus at Finsbury Park, reconstruction connected it to the British Rail network in 1976 and began its modern service pattern. One of London's deep-level railways, the Northern City is unlike the others in being owned by Network Rail and served by commuter trains operated by Great Northern from Moorgate to Finsbury Park and onwards to Hertfordshire.