• Our booking engine at tickets.railforums.co.uk (powered by TrainSplit) helps support the running of the forum with every ticket purchase! Find out more and ask any questions/give us feedback in this thread!

Stations not centrally sited where previous central ones were closed

Status
Not open for further replies.
Sponsor Post - registered members do not see these adverts; click here to register, or click here to log in
R

RailUK Forums

Springs Branch

Established Member
Joined
7 Nov 2013
Messages
1,418
Location
Where my keyboard has no £ key
Belfast Central is not at all central and, at the time it opened, the much more central Great Victoria Street closed, but has since reopened.
Two long-closed stations at Wigan Central and the original St Helens Central were quite peripheral to the town centres they served.

Both were early examples of corporate spin - despite the implication, the suffixes here really meant "belonging to the Great Central Railway Company".
 

johnnychips

Established Member
Joined
19 Nov 2011
Messages
3,675
Location
Sheffield
If we can go abroad, Gent Zuid in Belgium, which closed in 1928, would be considerably more convenient than Dampoort or Sint Pieters stations, which are well out of the centre.
 

Rail Ranger

Member
Joined
20 Feb 2014
Messages
581
Stockport Tiviot Dale was much better situated for the town centre than Stockport Edgeley, the surviving station. There were two terminal stations in Winsford (Winsford & Over and Over & Wharton) which were better situated for the town centre than the surviving Winsford station, which is well out of the town.
 

edwin_m

Veteran Member
Joined
21 Apr 2013
Messages
24,793
Location
Nottingham
There are of course many towns that used to have a railway station but are now served by one some distance outside the town, sometimes with "for" in the name. MAny of these smaller stations would have closed too, if it wasn't for the proximity of somewhere bigger. Examples include Alnmouth (for Alnwick), Ashchurch for Tewkesbury, Kemble (for Cirencester).
 

PTR 444

Established Member
Joined
22 Aug 2019
Messages
2,278
Location
Wimborne
I think the closed Bournemouth West station was slightly nearer to the town centre than today’s Bournemouth station even though it still required a half-mile walk down the hill to get there.
 

Old Yard Dog

Established Member
Joined
21 Aug 2011
Messages
1,466
There are of course many towns that used to have a railway station but are now served by one some distance outside the town, sometimes with "for" in the name. MAny of these smaller stations would have closed too, if it wasn't for the proximity of somewhere bigger. Examples include Alnmouth (for Alnwick), Ashchurch for Tewkesbury, Kemble (for Cirencester).

Also Gobowen (for Oswestry)
 

ijmad

Established Member
Joined
7 Jan 2016
Messages
1,810
Location
UK
Ivybridge. The old station (1848-1959) was at the North edge of the town, but at least right in the centre on the East-West axis.

The new station (1994) is on the Eastern edge of the town, and quite inconveniently sited. The main reason it was built here is they were intending it to be used for park-and-ride and so wanted more straightforward access from the A38. This never took off, evidenced by the large and perpetually empty car park which today is mainly used by driving instructors and skateboarding teens.
 

trebor79

Established Member
Joined
8 Mar 2018
Messages
4,435
Norwich City was even closer?

I'm not sure. I've never quite been sure of the exact location of City - I think somewhere between the retail park and the roundabout on the ring road where there is some sort of railway sculpture. I guess you'd have been near St Andrews, so probably a few minutes walk from the market square. From Victoria you'd just wander down St Stephens to Gentlemens Walk and enter the market square from the other end.
With Chapelfield etc Victoria would be a better option than City today.
Of course City went with the M&GNJR closure and passenger services had been consolidated to Thorpe many years before City finally closed as a good depot. I guess even the GER and LNER could see there was little point in having 2 termini and Victoria would have been too small to cope with everything being consolidated to that station (and you'd need to build a south the east connection towards Trowse and I'm not sure how feasible that would have been.
 

ashkeba

Established Member
Joined
13 May 2019
Messages
2,171
I'm not sure. I've never quite been sure of the exact location of City - I think somewhere between the retail park and the roundabout on the ring road where there is some sort of railway sculpture. I guess you'd have been near St Andrews, so probably a few minutes walk from the market square. From Victoria you'd just wander down St Stephens to Gentlemens Walk and enter the market square from the other end.
I apologise. https://maps.nls.uk/geo/explore/sid...t=52.6349&lon=1.2875&layers=168&right=BingHyb reveals Norwich City station to be a bit further out than I thought, north of the odd curved bit of Barn Road which was Station Road, with a depot between it and the city centre!

With Chapelfield etc Victoria would be a better option than City today.
Well, yes, but I think the city centre only drifted south after Victoria closed and the station complex, the neighbouring factories, Surrey Gardens and the cattle market were all gradually turned into shops and offices and the bus station. It looks like there was space around the oddly-angled Victoria station and I suspect a rebuild could at least have matched Thorpe's six platforms without the frustrating bridge on the approach, but it seems quite a bit uphill and it would not have been as good for the lines to the coast.
 

trebor79

Established Member
Joined
8 Mar 2018
Messages
4,435
@ashkeba No need to apologise! An interesting map site that I had no idea existed! That's going to keep me amused for hours.
Agree there's very practical reasons Thorpe won out over Victoria. I also think Victoria would have had relatively short platforms, looking at where the remains of the half demolished road over bridge near the back Sainsbury's is and the far end of the site.
 

Bwlch y Groes

Member
Joined
22 Jul 2017
Messages
210
Lydney Town (although open on preserved line).

On a similar note, Bodmin

Merthyr, also possibly Aberdare, but not certain of that one.

Aberdare certainly is. The Taff Vale Railway station (Low Level) was next to the town centre and is now a car park. The GWR station (High Level), which was essentially reopened in 1988 is a bit further on, and the road that was built on the TVR line is now a barrier in between, albeit with a footbridge over it

Ivybridge. The old station (1848-1959) was at the North edge of the town, but at least right in the centre on the East-West axis.

The new station (1994) is on the Eastern edge of the town, and quite inconveniently sited. The main reason it was built here is they were intending it to be used for park-and-ride and so wanted more straightforward access from the A38. This never took off, evidenced by the large and perpetually empty car park which today is mainly used by driving instructors and skateboarding teens.

Yeah, I don't think they could rebuild it in its original location as it was on a curve and access to/from the town was, at best, not ideal

I guess nearby Plymouth (North Road) would be another candidate - Friary and Millbay were probably both slightly closer to the current city centre
 

ijmad

Established Member
Joined
7 Jan 2016
Messages
1,810
Location
UK
I don't think they could rebuild it in its original location as it was on a curve and access to/from the town was, at best, not ideal

Ironically this may have been the case when they envisioned 8 car HSTs stopping regularly at the station, but most of what it gets now are single or dual car class 15x's which probably would be ok to stop on a curve, or at least it wouldn't be as much bother to straighten track for that length of train.

I guess nearby Plymouth (North Road) would be another candidate - Friary and Millbay were probably both slightly closer to the current city centre

Indeed - Though Plymouth city centre's shopping focus has shifted slightly closer to North Road with the opening of Drake's Circus shopping centre, yet it is a horrible walk from the station via foot through dank tunnels or across several very busy roads, or of course you can get a bus.
 

geoffk

Established Member
Joined
4 Aug 2010
Messages
3,223
Fort William, further away from the town centre.
There are other similar examples of a branch line being truncated to release land for other purposes - Looe, St. Ives, Felixstowe, Morecambe, Saltburn.
 

bussnapperwm

Established Member
Joined
18 May 2014
Messages
1,506
Sandwell and Dudley is further from both the former Dudley and West Bromwich stations to the two town centres :)
 

Kettledrum

Member
Joined
13 Nov 2010
Messages
790
I'm wondering whether we could add Bournemouth to the list. The current station was previously known as Bournemouth East - and there was a also a Bournemouth West station - now occupied by the A338 Wessex Way. Whilst neither station was particularly central to the town centre, the old Bournemouth West was more central to the conurbation that is the modern Bournemouth.
 

Chris M

Member
Joined
4 Feb 2012
Messages
1,057
Location
London E14
Swansea Victoria was closer to today's centre of economic activity than High Street station is. This wasn't always the case though, the centre has moved quite a bit south since Victoria was closed.

No city in the UK has made an edge-of-city station work for long-distance trains, unless there's some other factor such as airport access.
Bristol. But that's only because Bristol Temple Meads also exists as a central station.
 

Tomos y Tanc

Member
Joined
1 Jul 2019
Messages
640
Merthyr, also possibly Aberdare, but not certain of that one.

They're both a bit moot. Both the current and previous Merthyr stations are equally close to the high street, just the current one is slightly further south. It depends what you class as the centre, I suppose. The old station was slightly closer to the Town Hall but the new one is slightly closer to the parish church.

Much the same could be said of Aberdare. I would say the current station is very slightly more central, if you take the market hall and the bus station as being the centre of the town. If you regard Aberdare Square as being the centre, you'd get a different answer!

Both current stations are pretty basic though and Merthyr, in particular, looks like an afterthought.

I think I'm right in saying that TfW are planning to install a second platform and some proper station buildings. It might even be possible to integrate the station better with the shopping arcade on the old station site, making the arcade feel like a station approach rather than a seperate development. Just renaming the arcade 'Merthyr Station' might make a difference.
 
Last edited:

Tomos y Tanc

Member
Joined
1 Jul 2019
Messages
640
Bristol. But that's only because Bristol Temple Meads also exists as a central station.

Ah, Bristol Parkway. One of BR's better ideas!

I can't think though of another UK city which has or had a main line to its centre and a different one brushing its edge. From Bristol's point of view it was a very fortunate quirk of history and geography.
 

trebor79

Established Member
Joined
8 Mar 2018
Messages
4,435
I reckon Newcastle Central’s site was effectively chosen so as to be Gateshead’s main station as well. When it opened the earlier station across the river at Greensfield closed.
I think it had far more to do with geography. To get any further into town would have required a deep cutting, very steep gradients or tunnel. Wasn't Greenfield replaced by Gateshead East so as to serve both the London line (via Leamside in those days) and the line towards Dunston when the High Level Bridge opened?
 
Status
Not open for further replies.

Top