Tag Archives: Station

Trains at Glasgow Central

I make pretty frequent work trips to Scotland, and, on some occasions, it is most convenient to stay at a hotel right next to Glasgow Central station. One side of the hotel looks out over the street but the other overlooks the station itself. I was in a room with this view on one occasion. I was looking right down on the platforms and the tracks heading out of the station to destinations near and far.

The structures for the overhead lines obscure a lot of potential shots but I did have a camera with me, so I was going to get a few shots of the trains coming and going. Here are some of those shots.

Ozzy the Bull

Leave a Reply

I travel through Birmingham New Street Station a lot these days. It is a connection for a bunch of my journeys and sometimes a destination in its own right. The station had a major rebuild a few years ago and one of the features in there now is Ozzie. Ozzie is a huge mechanical bull. It is such an imposing device and I do find it cheers me up. If you are ever heading that way, do find the time to check it out.

Severn Valley Railway at Kidderminster

Leave a Reply

2025 is the 200^th anniversary of the first passenger railways in the world and the UK is celebrating this throughout the year with the Rail200 events. Our company is supporting this at a few events including a weekend at the Severn Valley Railway in Kidderminster. I volunteered to take part in this event so spent a couple of days showing people around our hydrogen fuel cell demonstrator train. More of that in a separate post.

The Severn Valley station is alongside the mainline station in Kidderminster. I guess you had to walk between the two stations when this line was still a part of the national system. The mainline station is a modern looking affair, but the Severn Valley’s station has a far more period feel to it. Here are some images of the station itself. It will come as no surprise to find out that I shall have more posts to come from the weekend before too long.

Lyon Saint-Exupery Airport TGV Station

Leave a Reply

I took the rail service from the heart of Lyon out to the airport. It dropped us off next to the TGV station from which it was a short(ish) walk to the terminal. (The sign doesn’t lie about how many minutes it is to get to the terminal, but it doesn’t highlight that the time is to the beginning of the terminal and the bits you want are quite a bit further on to walk!) Anyway, I digress. The TGV station itself is a really stunning piece of architecture. The curves and vaulted ceilings are really cool. There is a central atrium but then the wings that come out each side for the platform access are equally lovely. If you find yourself travelling through the airport and have a few minutes, do pay it a visit!

Disused Platforms

Leave a Reply

I was walking back into Crewe Station on my way home after a work visit. Crewe was a major part of the UK rail industry at its peak and it still has many rail businesses. The station is sized for the significance that it once held. There are plenty of platforms. What I hadn’t noticed before is that there used to be more. As I approached the station, I saw these extra platforms that are now disused. Standing on what would be track level looking up at them, I wondered what things might have looked like when they were in use and things were really buzzing at this station.

Metalwork Used to be More Complex

Leave a Reply

One of the cool features of older large stations in the UK is that their original owners were into making statements with the architecture. Consequently, you end up with some gran roof structures – not least to allow a number of tracks to be covered to keep the travelling public dry – it does rain in the UK occasionally. In the Victoria era, they would make sure every detail was taken care of. The cast iron pillars on which everything was built would not just be functional. They would let you know who built it. I loved the ironwork detail on this part of the station in York. The North Eastern Railway may have been superseded by many other companies, but they are still remembered here.

Old Power Station Buildings (Still in Use)

Leave a Reply

The falls in Spokane are a perfect spot for a hydro power station and there are two rather than one. The first provided power for the developing town and a second was needed as the demand increased. The larger building is lower down and is a most impressive brick structure. It has an imposing look to it. The upper station is a lot less dramatic. A pale concrete structure but it has some architectural features to it, so it is not totally innocuous. Both of them are still providing power to the region and I imagine will for a long time to come.

St Pancras Sculptures

Leave a Reply

While walking through the station at St Pancras, I realized that there are more sculptures than I had thought. The one of Sir John Betjeman I knew of from previous visits, but the others were new to me. I rather like the stark nature of their textures and imagery. They have a rather aggressive feel to me which got my attention. It’s nice that public spaces make the effort to add art to the functional areas.

Clifton Rocks Railway

Leave a Reply

The area of Bristol known as Clifton sits on the top of the hill overlooking the Avon. To get from the water to Clifton is quite a climb. These days you would drive up there but, in the days, when vessels would be bringing passengers in by boat along the river, an alternative was required. The Clifton Rocks Railway was the solution. This was a funicular railway that ran in a tunnel from alongside the river up to near the suspension bridge.

Built in the 1890s, it operated until the 1930s when the decline in passenger numbers meant it was no longer viable. The tunnels were used as office space during the Second World War with the BBC being one of the tenants and they continued to use the space into the 1960s. There is now an effort to restore aspects of the tunnels although the railway will never operate again given the usage the tunnels have had since service ended. The station at the bottom is still visible but is now alongside a busy roadway so might easily be missed as you drive past.

Elizabeth Line Station

Leave a Reply

Last year, while we were staying in London, I got to take my first trip on the Elizabeth Line or what was known for a long time as Crossrail. This is a major addition to the transportation network of the town and appears to have been very successful. I only took one trip through the core of town and one to the airport. It was a very quick way to cover a journey that previously was a lot more drawn out. However, the thing that impressed me most was the stations. They are huge. The trains are long from the start, but they have built capacity to have them longer and the platforms are about 250m long as a result. You need to know which end to get out to make sure you don’t find yourself several blocks from where you intended when you get to the surface.