As the resident (but maybe not the only one, I think?) Newportonian on this forum, I think that the whole story has been blown up out of all proportion.
Firstly, I find it amazing that the poll covers the whole of the world .... Wales maybe, Britain possibly, but the whole of the world .... never! I also find it amazing that I never get asked for my views on things like this - or, for that matter, anything - and I know very very few people who have been asked; you may be the same.
Having said all of that, however, there's no doubt that it is a pretty ugly building, and completely out of context with the old station building. It was built (too quickly, I think) for the Ryder Cup in 2010 and was seen to be the gateway to Newport for the thousands of people who were going to go to the golf. Sadly, as the venue for the golf is some five or six miles out of the city, a lot of the visitors didn't actually visit or stay in the city, going direct to and from the course. Friends of mine acted as welcomers at the station, and weren't very busy at all.
My feelings when it opened were that it was too expensive (around £22 million, I think, although this did include other works elsewhere) and would be good when it was finished. I actually wrote a traveller's eye report on it (I was using it every day at that time) and sent it to various bodies, most of whom either ignored it or gave me very bland replies.
My report covered what I thought were the main points about the facilities as follows:
The entrance isn't really big enough, especially since they extended the front of the ticket office into the circulation area. It's quite often full and people have to wait outside, which isn't good, especially in the rain.
People have criticised the lifts, but I don't really have a problem with them - at least they work most of the time. Given the space that's available, they couldn't really have been much bigger anyway.
The main problem is the entrances to the platforms, where the designers have completely ignored the need to provide cover for the people walking from the lifts to platforms one, two and three (platform four isn't too bad, but even there there's a small gap where it's easy to get wet). You are out in the open until you get to the existing cover, so why that wasn't extended to the lifts or the stairs I have no idea.
The rain has, though, been a constant problem from the very start. The bridge to the platforms has always leaked and quite often badly in some places. They're working on part of it now, but I don't have much faith in them finding a cure.
One of the problems with the new station building is that I don't really think that it was necessary to build it at all. The old building, built by the GWR in the 1930s, was perfectly able to cope with the volume of traffic. Yes, it needed some work done to it, but that wouldn't have cost anywhere near as much as the new station did. The new station building has also had the effect of moving the entrance to the station further away from the main areas of the city, and I'm sure that was not a good thing for travellers.
Anyway, that's my view; if anyone has any questions or comments, please let me know.
www.southwalesargus.co.uk
I wasn’t aware anyone was made to live in Newport, all students tend to be based around Cathays, Gabalfa and Heath.
