West End of London and Crystal Palace Railway was the first line to create a corridor from the south and east towards Westminster and led to the development of London Victoria railway station. To coincide with the reopening of the Crystal Palace at Sydenham Hill on 10 June 1854, the LB&SCR opened a short spur line linking a new Crystal Palace station to Sydenham station on the Brighton main line from London Bridge. The WELCPR was an independent company that aimed to create an additional line from Wandsworth to the LB&SCR station at Crystal Palace and thence to Norwood Junction, whence it would have running powers over the
Crystal Palace, London pneumatic railway was briefly trialed in the area in 1864. Once the railways arrived, Crystal Palace was eventually served by two railway stations, the high level and low level stations, built to handle the large volume of passengers visiting the Crystal Palace. After the palace was destroyed by fire, and with railway travel declining, passenger numbers fell and the high level station was closed in 1954 and demolished 7 years later. Rail services gradually declined, and for a period in the 1960s and 1970s, there were plans to construct an urban motorway through the area as part of the London