Birmingham New Street named as Britain’s worst railway station

[JTG]

Yep. Such a shame with the grand old Post Office building opposite and the sky scrapers of Midtown up the road... MSG is a big disappointment as well considering its fame

 

[19sixtysix]

My memories of New Street are of cold and wind and them changing the destination of the train.

They changed the destination of the train I had boarded but didn't bother to tell me or the rest of passengers who had already got on.

 

[farmerbarleymow]

Like New Street, it didn't used to be.

That is (or was) a magnificent station. Train stations should be striking buildings, and thankfully we didn't demolish them all in the mad 'it's Victorian - flatten it' period where we lost out senses. With the dishonourable exception of Birmingham New Street of course.

 

[Crispy]

That is (or was) a magnificent station. Train stations should be striking buildings, and thankfully we didn't demolish them all in the mad 'it's Victorian - flatten it' period where we lost out senses. With the dishonourable exception of Birmingham New Street of course.

But plenty went. Highbury & Islington for example:

 

[kebabking]

But plenty went. Highbury & Islington for example:

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its things like that that persuade you of the merits of the old tradition of digging people up and hanging their decomposing bodies at tyburn...

 

[Dogsauce]

And this is to the halfwits at Birmingham New Street station control.

When you do a PA telling passengers their delayed train is passing through a random local station and that it won't be long before it gets into New Street - try to remember that that lots of passengers aren't from the city. The random station might as well be near Penzance for all we know! Try to stick to the mainline stations, then we'll all have a chance of understanding what the hell you're talking about.

In a similar vein, operators of those electronic signs on motorways could do with being a bit more informative than 'A1 Closed after A6342'. I haven't a fucking clue where the A6342 junction is.

 

[REFLECTIVE PETE]

That blog cites St Pancras as the best station in the country. It's pretty magnificent but somebody needs to sort the signage out because it's a fucking nightmare trying to find the right platforms for non-Eurostar trains.

There are also far too many expensive food outlets and nowhere to buy a sandwich and a cup of coffee that wasn't made by a quote unquote artisan. You can buy a new handbag or some ornaments, but can you buy a paper or a packet fags? No, those are far too common for St Pancras.

yes £4.95 for a pastie or a pie,,,,

 

[Bungle73]

Right. Who said there was nowhere to purchase cigarettes at St. Pancras? Wrong! I went into WH Smith on the upper level and low and behold, rows and rows of fag packets behind the counter. I looked in the one in the Circle too. Cigarettes on sale in there too. Did you even bother to look?

 

[existentialist]

Right. Who said there was nowhere to purchase cigarettes at St. Pancras? Wrong! I went into WH Smith on the upper level and low and behold, rows and rows of fag packets behind the counter. I looked in the one in the Circle too. Cigarettes on sale in there too. Did you even bother to look?

I am sure you must be gratified beyond belief to have been right. Indeed, I'm impressed at the effort you went to in order to find out.

 

[Bungle73]

I am sure you must be gratified beyond belief to have been right. Indeed, I'm impressed at the effort you went to in order to find out.

Do you get off on being a cock or what?

 

[existentialist]

Do you get off on being a cock or what?

If that were my thing, I probably wouldn't tend to exercise it here, where I might be so hopelessly outclassed by such as you, Mr Bungle

 

[Bungle73]

If that were my thing, I probably wouldn't tend to exercise it here, where I might be so hopelessly outclassed by such as you, Mr Bungle

Yes, musn't tell people they're wrong now must we.........

 

[editor]

Note to all: Any further off-topic cross thread beef will see the ban stick brandished.

 

[ItWillNeverWork]

It may be the worst station in the country but it's still the best thing in Birmingham, because it's where you go to get out of Birmingham.

Get to fuck!









*Train services to Fuck may be disrupted.

 

[SikhWarrioR]

Wonder how far the £0.5 billion that we taxpayers are giving in bonuses to the banksters at our taxpayer owned {and failing} RBS would go in giving Brummies and train passengers a truly decent railway station at New Street instead of the current dark dank miserable hole that currently passes for New Street railway station? I know as a taxpayer what i would rather spend £0.5 billion and its not bankster bonuses

 

[ItWillNeverWork]

Here's my favourite of all the Birmingham train stations. Curzon Street station; unfortunately no longer in use.

In happier days:

 

[ItWillNeverWork]

Oldest train station in the world, btw.

 

[ItWillNeverWork]

Some more Curzon Street nostalgia-porn, both the happy and the sad:

The proposed future of Curzon Street.

 

[ItWillNeverWork]

Oh, and the inside is not too shabby either. Not many people have had the chance to see it I don't think.

 

[farmerbarleymow]

Oldest train station in the world, btw.

There are lots of competing claims for that title, so it is to be taken with a pinch of salt.

For example, there is, or at least was last time I was there, the booking office for the Stockton and Darlington Railway, so dating from 1825 on what is usually called the first passenger railway in the world.

Then there is the Liverpool Street station in Manchester, now part of the Museum of Science and Industry, dating to 1830. Referred to as the oldest passenger railway station in the world.

So the question is how old Curzon Street station is.

 

[Blagsta]

Here's my favourite of all the Birmingham train stations. Curzon Street station; unfortunately no longer in use.

In happier days:

I think there are plans to redevelop it for HS2 terminal.

 

[Diddly Squat]

I remember Brum New Street was 'under redevelopment' for what seemed like years, late 90's early 2000's. Loads of boards everywhere and half the platforms inaccessible, which made it all the more claustrophobic. When they'd finished the work it seemed to be no different than before

 

[elbows]

They hadn't yet unveiled the results of phase one of the new street development last time I was there, so I am yet to check it out. But I was gutted that they didn't go with a prior proposal that would have seen something a tad more radical than a facelift.

Mind you even if it didn't suck so much I think it would still be up there as a contender for worst station by the public, since its the busiest UK station outside London and so many people probably associate it with the stress of changing trains or doing the hideously crammed commuter rush hour thang.

 

[elbows]

The Curzon Street building has long made for an interesting scene for me as its visible from the train that leaves new street and goes to my hometown. Its so amusingly isolated at the moment, since they knocked down whatever large modern building used to occupy a chunk of space in that part of Brum some years ago.I'm not sure I ever noticed it properly before they did that.

Cheers for the view of what it looks like inside.

As for HS2, I'm torn on the project. I need it to link up better to more midlands locations, not directly but via a hub that enables more people to avoid new street. As it stands it won't help me get to London much quicker, since I'll have to go via new street or a slow way round via Coventry to get to the HS2 station. There is a slightly wacky proposal to re-open a line that goes from the planned HS2 hub near Birmingham International to the line that presently connects Birmingham to Leicester. If that came off it would help my location and make up for the fact Virgin shafted us by reducing the number of fast trains to/from London that actually stop here.

My towns station sucks, and back when I went to Uni most people seemed to have heard of Nuneaton only because they passed through its stain at some point. Mind you at least its on several useful lines. And we did actually get treated to two brand new additional platforms not all that many years ago. These were part of reworking the track layout so that the west coast mainline traffic wasn't slowed by other lines crossing, but unfortunately once that was done (and we'd endured years of no weekend services due to west coast mainline engineering work) Virgin got the most out of it by having far fewer trains stop here

Mind you as a non-driver and somewhat of a train fan, I am excited that we are due some more new stations round here in a year or so. The crappy Nuneaton-Coventry line is due some extra stations that increase my work and leisure opportunities, although part of the impetus behind the scheme may have been ruined by Cov City leaving the stadium thats about to get a station

 

[elbows]

Sorry for the non-new street waffle by the way, don't often post here about trains and so it all came out once I got started.

As for New Street, there is too much childhood nostalgia attached to the grotesque station for me to really hate it. The grotty Pallasades above the station was like a magic kingdom to a kid looking for whatever ZX Spectrum games were on his mind, although in hindsight I wish I'd paid more attention to the record shops instead. And the relatively short train journey seemed like a massive adventure, especially considering the somewhat creaky trains that revealed every bump in the track and whose carriages were not glued together seamlessly. And the panic of my dad leaving his pipe on the train.

 

[equationgirl]

I used to go the new street quite a lot because I lived at the end of a local branch line and to go ANYWHERE in the country you had to go to New Street first. It was worse just after they took the bins out after Kings Cross (I think) because rubbish just got left everywhere. There were also no seats whatsoever so waiting for the connection home became a special kind of torture known only to British Rail.

 

[dessiato]

It must be very very bad if it is worse than Cleethorpes station. Although Cleethorpes does have a good fish and chips place, and No2 Refreshments room. (CAMRA approved bar)

 

[Ultra7]

But plenty went. Highbury & Islington for example:

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It's like a Minecraft build with the first station built over an extended period by an experienced builder and the second a dirt hut built by a newbie.

 

[Ultra7]

Here's my favourite of all the Birmingham train stations. Curzon Street station; unfortunately no longer in use.

In happier days:

I think I could see that building from the train and was wondering what it was. Nice. Where did the talent go?

 

[Ultra7]

Some more Curzon Street nostalgia-porn, both the happy and the sad:

The proposed future of Curzon Street.

So will the Curzon Street station building be kept or demolished? According to the Wikipedia page it will become part of the very (un)popular HS2