Why Temple Meads?

[Rescars]

What a shame Brunel didn't get his way. The link with the Thames makes perfect sense. A terminus at Vauxhall would have saved generations from the tedious trek across west London to Paddington!

 

[Shimbleshanks]

I wonder why the centre of Crewe is quite a distance from the station, given that it is a town almost entirely created by the railway. Whereas the historic core of Swindon is very close to the station.
Is being out of the city centre necessarily a bad thing, though? It's easier to deal with all the car and taxi traffic that a major station generates.

 

[zwk500]

I wonder why the centre of Crewe is quite a distance from the station, given that it is a town almost entirely created by the railway. Whereas the historic core of Swindon is very close to the station.

Quite possibly just due to the different way the towns and works were laid out, and how the towns have grown since the decline of the works.

Is being out of the city centre necessarily a bad thing, though? It's easier to deal with all the car and taxi traffic that a major station generates.

It will vary from city to city of course but you would want the station to be close enough to the major destinations that people could walk, to minimise on the traffic that needed to be handled. Very few stations are actually in the historic centres proper though, with Newcastle (upon Tyne) being a notable exception along with a few of the London Termini, but even the major stations like Leeds, York, Manchester Picc/Airport, Liverpool Lime Street, etc are built on the edge of the city as was and then later subsumed into the city by expansion.
A similar tale can be told with roads though - Euston road was originally built as a sort-of bypass-cum-distributor road away from the edge of London, then it became the boundary (which is why there's 3 stations on it), and now it's very much part of the city.

 

[Rail Ranger]

Yes the town of Crewe grew around the works rather than the station. There is an estate of Grand Junction Railway houses in the town centre.

 

[stuu]

If you look at old photos of Victoria Street, it was obviously a much busier and bustling street than it is now. It's fairly safe to assume that at least in part is because it was the road to the station, so I imagine TM would have felt less remote 100 years ago than it does now. Also as has already been mentioned, the centre was nearer the station as well

 

[The exile]

It will vary from city to city of course but you would want the station to be close enough to the major destinations that people could walk, to minimise on the traffic that needed to be handled.

Of course “reasonable walking distance” in the mid 19th century was much further than it is today.

 

[robert thomas]

I wonder why the centre of Crewe is quite a distance from the station, given that it is a town almost entirely created by the railway. Whereas the historic core of Swindon is very close to the station.
Is being out of the city centre necessarily a bad thing, though? It's easier to deal with all the car and taxi traffic that a major station generates.

I believe historic Swindon is on a hill some distance from the station.

 

[SwindonBert]

It's complicated.
Until 1900 Swindon was 2 towns, Old Swindon, which was the historic centre at the top of the hill and New Swindon was at the bottom of the hill which was built due to and around the railway work. That ignores other villages & parishes that have subsequently absorbed into urban Swindon.

Swindon Town station served Old Town whereas Swindon Junction (pretty much where the current station is) served the new town, it's about 1.5 miles between the 2.