Hackney Central railway station

Hackney Central railway station is a railway station on the North London Line in an area of the London Borough of Hackney known as Hackney Central in east London.

It is between Dalston Kingsland (to the west) and Homerton (to the east). It is in Travelcard Zone 2. The service is roughly every fifteen minutes westbound to, and every fifteen minutes eastbound to. Since November 2007 management has transferred to TfL's London Overground and service frequencies are set to double to 8 trains per hour by 2010 with 24 new tube style trains by 2008. Station deep cleaning and renovations are due in spring 2008.

The station is a short walk from Hackney Downs, on the National Express East Anglia route from. The former station building has been reused as a bar, now closed.

History
The North London Railway opened a station named Hackney on 26 September 1850, located east of Mare Street. It closed on 1 December 1870 and was replaced the same day by a station to the west of Mare Street, also named Hackney. This station passed in due course to the London and North Western Railway and later on to the London, Midland and Scottish Railway, which closed the entire North London Line east of Dalston Junction in 1944.

On 12 May 1980 the station was reopened, this time being named Hackney Central, albeit located a little to the west of the 1870 station. The 1870 station building is no longer in use by the railway, but is one of only two examples of North London Railway architecture still in situ, the other being Camden Road station, which is still open. Access to the modern Hackney Central station is from an alleyway adjacent to the 1870 building on Mare Street, as well as a more direct access from Amhurst Road.

Services
As part of the programme to introduce four-car trains on the London Overground network, the North London Line between Gospel Oak and closed in February 2010, and reopened on 1 June 2010. This was to enable the installation of a new signalling system and the extension of 30 platforms. Engineering work continued until May 2011, during which reduced services operated and Sunday services were suspended.

The typical service at the station is 4 trains per hour westbound to via, Camden Road and , 2 trains per hour westbound to Clapham Junction and 6 trains per hour eastbound to. The maintenance work on the North London Line was completed in May 2011 has enabled extra services to run all day which have replaced the additional shuttle trains running between Camden Road and Stratford stations in the morning and evening peaks.

Future
Hackney Central is a proposed stop on the Chelsea-Hackney Line, also known as Crossrail 2. It would be between Dalston Junction and Homerton. The platforms would be underground, with a connection to the existing surface station. It would connect the station and the borough to the London Underground for the first time ever, although the East London Line was supposed to bring the Underground to Hackney but now it is part of the London Overground network.

Transport links
London bus routes 30, 38, 48, 55, 106, 236, 242, 253, 254, 277, 394, D6, W15, night routes N38, N55 and N253.