An abandoned London Underground station near Harrods has just sold for £53 million
Key Points
- The Ministry of Defence has sold a disused London Underground station at 206 Brompton Road, Knightsbridge, for £53 million.
- The station opened in 1906, closed in 1934, and was used by the War Office as a WWII anti-aircraft operations room.
- The 28,000-square-foot site sits metres from Harrods and is expected to become a residential development.
- Money raised from the sale will be returned to the defence budget, according to the MoD.
- The tube platform and line remain owned by Transport for London, with no access for the new owner.
A former London Underground station in Knightsbridge, used during the Second World War as a military command centre, has been sold for £53 million by the Ministry of Defence (MoD).
The property at 206 Brompton Road was put on the market in September 2013 by the Defence Infrastructure Organisation, the body responsible for managing the MoD’s land and property.
The department said the money raised would be returned to the defence budget, and that the site is expected to be used for a predominantly residential development.
The station opened in 1906 and was designed by English architect Leslie Green. It closed in 1934 after London Underground decided it was no longer financially viable. The War Office later took over the building and used it as an anti-aircraft operations room during the Second World War.
The 28,000-square-foot property sits next to the Grade II-listed Brompton Oratory and Brompton Square, and is metres away from the Harrods department store.
Above ground, it contains a drill hall, garages, offices and a mess. Below ground, several subterranean areas that formed part of the former Underground station have been left largely unused since the end of the war.
Defence Minister Andrew Murrison said the MoD was committed to selling surplus land and property to provide the best possible value for money to the taxpayer. He added that the department took its role as a custodian of the nation’s history seriously and had been working to record the building’s historic significance.
In recent years the site has been occupied by the University of London Air Squadron, the London Universities Royal Naval Unit, and air cadets of 46F Squadron Air Training Corps.
Few relics of the station’s wartime past remain. One of the last is a large anti-aircraft operations map of central London, located in a lift well deep underground.
The MoD said it was working with the National Archives to ensure the map is recorded, and that it had worked with both the National Archives and English Heritage on the preservation of artefacts at the site.
The tube platform and the line itself remain the property of Transport for London, and the new owner will have no access to either.
