Geoff Marshall | |||||||
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![]() Marshall in 2017 | |||||||
Born | Geoff Marshall August 1972 (age 51–52) [1] [2] | ||||||
Nationality | British | ||||||
Occupation(s) | Presenter, editor, YouTuber | ||||||
Years active | 2002–present | ||||||
Notable work | All The Stations | ||||||
YouTube information | |||||||
Channel | |||||||
Years active | 2006–present | ||||||
Genre | Transport | ||||||
Subscribers | 312,000 [3] | ||||||
Total views | 80.8 million [3] | ||||||
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Last updated: 23 May 2023 | |||||||
Website | http://geofftech.co.uk/ |
Geoff Marshall (born August 1972) [1] [4] is an English video producer, performer, and author from London who runs a YouTube channel which is predominantly transport-themed. Born in London, he spent almost four years living in the United States between 2006 and 2009, and now resides in south London. [1]
Marshall was born in Lambeth, south London, to parents Roy and Christina. He went to school in Croydon and Sutton, and finished his studies at the age of 15. His interest in London Transport began as a child, when he and his cousins planned to go on all the bus routes. He started his own website in the 1990s. Marshall has worked in the IT industry. [5] [6]
Marshall has twice held the world record for the Tube Challenge: travelling to all London Underground stations in the fastest time possible. His first record time to visit the then 275 stations was achieved with Neil Blake in 18 hours 35 minutes and 43 seconds in May 2004, on his seventh attempt. [7] This beat the previous world record of 19 hours, 18 minutes and 45 seconds that was achieved by Jack Welsby in April 2002. [8]
His second record time of 16 hours, 20 minutes and 27 seconds, was set in August 2013. [9] [10] A previous attempt which came close was covered by BBC News as part of London Underground's 150 year celebrations. [11]
Marshall subsequently wrote the stage show TubeSpotting about his multiple attempts, which he performed at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in 2014, [12] and several times since at the London Transport Museum.
Between 2013 and 2019, Marshall was a contributor to Londonist. [13] One of the website's video series was Secrets of the Underground, in which Marshall presented little-known facts of the London Underground. The 17-episode series originally featured just the 11 [12] London Underground lines, but later episodes were produced for the DLR, Overground, and Tramlink networks, as well as bonus episodes. The series has over 17 million combined views.
All the Stations was a project organised by Marshall and Vicki Pipe to visit all 2,563 UK railway stations in the summer of 2017. [14] [15] The pair filmed much of the journey, with daily updates posted on YouTube and other social media. [16] A feature-length documentary about the journey was produced in 2018.
Funded through Kickstarter, the journey started on 7 May in Penzance and finished 105 days later on 19 August in Wick. The series consisted of 59 main videos and 12 bonus videos. Marshall and Pipe visited every station in Great Britain, including those that are served by only a small number of trains, [17] including Shippea Hill station on 3 June, where 19 people joined them, meaning more passengers used the station in a single day than had in the whole of the previous year. [18]
In 2019, Marshall and Pipe crowdfunded All the Stations Ireland, in which they spent three weeks visiting all 198 railway stations in Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland during March and April 2019. Subsequently, they spent three days in July 2019 visiting the Isle of Man to travel to every station on the island.
Marshall occasionally gives interviews on London TV and radio concerning transport stories, but first appeared on TV featuring in series 1 of ITV documentary The Tube . The second episode, titled "24 Hours", shows his failed attempt to beat Jack Welsby's Tube Challenge world record. [19] This was followed later in 2003 by "Race Around The Underground", part of Carlton Television's Metroland documentary series, [20] in which Marshall would have broken the record, had the Richmond Branch of the District Line not suffered a signal failure. [21]
He appeared on Sky 1's quiz show The Fanatics, answering questions about the London Underground. He appeared in an episode of More4's The World's Most Beautiful Railway in September 2019, highlighting the Caledonian Sleeper and Corrour railway station in the Scottish Highlands. [22]
Underground: USA was a 12-week documentary road trip which Marshall undertook between June and September 2009 in the US. He travelled to all 48 mainland states and, in each one, visited a town or a place that shared a name with a station on the London Underground map: for example, Epping, Maine, where the journey started. Despite having his filming equipment stolen during the trip, [23] Marshall turned the story into a one-hour YouTube documentary, as well as publishing an accompanying book.
Marshall first organised a tube-based charity event in 2005 with Tube Relief, in response to the 7 July 2005 London bombings. Using the slogan "Not Afraid", around 50 people took part and raised over £11,000 for the London Bombings Relief Charitable Fund. [24]
Subsequently, Marshall organised a series of Walk the Tube events to raise money for charities, by getting a group of people to visit every tube station, though not as a record attempt. These events took place in 2014, 2015, and 2016. [25]
The London Underground is a rapid transit system serving Greater London and some parts of the adjacent home counties of Buckinghamshire, Essex and Hertfordshire in England.
The Metropolitan line, colloquially known as the Met, is a London Underground line between Aldgate in the City of London and Amersham and Chesham in Buckinghamshire, with branches to Watford in Hertfordshire and Uxbridge in Hillingdon. Printed in magenta on the tube map, the line is 41.4 miles (66.7 km) in length and serves 34 stations. Between Aldgate and Finchley Road, the track is mostly in shallow "cut and cover" tunnels, apart from short sections at Barbican and Farringdon stations. The rest of the line is above ground, with a loading gauge of a similar size to those on main lines. Just under 94 million passenger journeys were made on the line in 2019.
The Victoria line is a London Underground line that runs between Brixton in south London and Walthamstow Central in the north-east, via the West End. It is printed in light blue on the Tube map and is one of the only two lines on the network to run completely underground, the other being the Waterloo & City line.
Canary Wharf is a London Underground station at Canary Wharf and is on the Jubilee line, between Canada Water and North Greenwich stations. The station is located in Travelcard Zone 2 and was opened on 17 September 1999 as part of the Jubilee Line Extension. Over 40 million people pass through the station each year, making it second busiest on the London Underground outside Central London after Stratford, and also the busiest that serves only a single line.
Willesden Green is a London Underground station on Walm Lane in Willesden. It is served by the Jubilee line and is between Dollis Hill and Kilburn stations. Metropolitan line trains also pass through the station, but do not stop. The station is in both Travelcard Zone 2 and Zone 3.
Bond Street is an interchange station in Mayfair, in the West End of London for London Underground and Elizabeth line services. Entrances are on Oxford Street, near its junction with New Bond Street, and on Hanover Square.
Old Street is an interchange station at the junction of Old Street and City Road in Central London for London Underground and National Rail services.
Blackfriars, also known as London Blackfriars, is a central London railway station and connected London Underground station in the City of London. It provides Thameslink services: local, and regional and limited Southeastern commuter services to South East London and Kent. Its platforms span the River Thames, the only one in London to do so, along the length of Blackfriars Railway Bridge, a short distance downstream from Blackfriars Bridge. There are two station entrances either side of the Thames, along with a connection to the London Underground District and Circle lines.
Covent Garden is a London Underground station serving Covent Garden and the surrounding area in the West End of London. It is on the Piccadilly line between Leicester Square and Holborn stations and is in Travelcard Zone 1. The station is at the corner of Long Acre and James Street and the street-level concourse is a Grade II listed building.
Barbican is a London Underground station situated near the Barbican Estate, on the edge of the ward of Farringdon Within, in the City of London in Central London. It has been known by various names since its opening in 1865, mostly in reference to the neighbouring ward of Aldersgate.
Mile End is a London Underground station in Mile End, London. It is served by the Hammersmith & City, District and Central lines. This station features a cross-platform interchange in both directions; District and Hammersmith & City lines stop on the inside tracks, and the Central line stops on the outside tracks. It is in Travelcard Zone 2.
Gants Hill is a London Underground station in the largely residential Gants Hill district of Ilford in east London. It is served by the Central line and is between Redbridge and Newbury Park stations on the Hainault loop. It is in Travelcard Zone 4. It is the easternmost station to be below ground on the London Underground network and the busiest on the Hainault loop.
Hainault is a London Underground station in Hainault, northeast London, England. The station is on the Central line between Fairlop and Grange Hill stations. Since 2 January 2007, the station has been in Travelcard Zone 4. It is also home to one of the three Central line depots.
Wick railway station is a railway station located in Wick, in the Highland council area in the far north of Scotland. It serves the town of Wick and other surrounding areas in the historic county of Caithness, including Staxigoe, Papigoe and Haster. The station is the terminus of the Far North Line, 161 miles 36 chains from Inverness. It is managed by ScotRail, who operate all trains serving the station.
Shippea Hill railway station is on the Breckland Line in the east of England, serving the Burnt Fen area of Cambridgeshire and Suffolk. The line runs between Cambridge in the west and Norwich in the east.
The Subway Challenge entails navigating the entire New York City Subway system in the shortest time possible. This ride is also known as the Rapid Transit Challenge and the Ultimate Ride. The challenge requires competitors to stop at all 472 stations; as of 2023, this record is held by Kate Jones of Switzerland. One competitor held the record for 469 stations, as he had competed before the January 2017 opening of the Second Avenue Subway. Three teams held the Guinness record for 468 stations, as they had competed prior to both the opening of the Second Avenue Subway and the September 2015 opening of the 7 Subway Extension, but after Dean Street station was closed in 1995. Records set before 1995 had a varying number of stations.
The Tube Challenge is the competition for the fastest time to travel to all London Underground stations, tracked as a Guinness World Record since 1960. The goal is to visit all the stations on the system, not necessarily all the lines; participants may connect between stations on foot, or by using other forms of public transport.
The London Underground 2024 Stock, known as the New Tube for London (NTfL) during development, is a London Underground train being built by Siemens Mobility at its facilities in Goole, United Kingdom and Vienna, Austria. It is part of the Siemens Inspiro family of metro and rapid-transport trains.
The Night Tube and London Overground Night Service, often referred to simply as Night Tube, is a service pattern on the London Underground ("Tube") and London Overground systems which provides through-the-night services on Friday and Saturday nights on the Central, Jubilee, Northern, Piccadilly, and Victoria lines, and a short section of the London Overground's East London line. The service began on the night of Friday 19 August 2016, providing 24-hour service on these routes from Friday morning to Sunday evening each weekend. It was suspended from Friday 20 March 2020 because of the COVID-19 pandemic, with the service partially reopening on Saturday 27 November 2021 and fully restored by Friday 29 July 2022.
All the Stations is a documentary series published on YouTube, which sees Geoff Marshall and Vicki Pipe visit all 2,563 stations on Great Britain's National Rail rail network, and all 198 stations in Ireland, on the railway networks of Iarnród Éireann in the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland Railways in Northern Ireland. The journey across Great Britain took fourteen weeks and six days, starting at Penzance station on 7 May 2017 and finishing at Wick station on 19 August.