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(Redirected from South Merton)
National Rail station in London, England
South Merton
South MertonLocation of South Merton in Greater London
Parliamentary approval for a line from Wimbledon to Sutton was obtained by the Wimbledon and Sutton Railway (W&SR) in 1910 but work was delayed by the First World War. From the W&SR's inception, the District Railway (DR) was a shareholder of the company and had rights to run trains over the line when it was built. In the 1920s, the Underground Electric Railways Company of London (UERL, precursor of London Underground) planned, through its ownership of the DR and the City and South London Railway (C&SLR, now the Northern line), to use part of the W&SR's route for an extension of the C&SLR to Sutton. The Southern Railway (SR) objected, and an agreement was reached that enabled the C&SLR to extend as far as Morden in exchange for the UERL giving up its rights over the W&SR route. The SR subsequently built the line, one of the last to be built in the London area.
In the original 1910 permission, the station was named "Merton Park" (not to be confused with Merton Park on the Tooting, Merton and Wimbledon Railway to the north) due to its proximity to the Merton Park estate, then being laid out to the north, and Merton Park golf course to the south (which was subsequently developed for housing). The station opened as the temporary terminus of the line when the first section opened from Wimbledon on 7 July 1929. The remainder of the line to Sutton opened on 5 January 1930.