My most depressing station is ...

[John M Upton]

I had the misfortune once when attending a open day at Doncaster works to make the mistake afterwards whilst awaiting my train of leaving the station and approach the town centre.  Finding nothing more than depressing concrete and wall to wall shoplifters and other associated social detritus, I quickly retreated back inside the station again.

[rodent279]

Maybe not depressing, but a shadow of its former self, is Wolverton. I used it every day in the mid 80's, to travel from Leighton Buzzard to Wolverton College. By that time, the LNWR wooden station building, built on a framework adjoining the Stratford Road bridge, was in its last days.

In about 1989 it was demolished, and a new entrance & footbridge installed, fronting the car park on the up side. Many a cold evening I spent sheltering under the bridge, waiting for the train home after evening class!

Edited August 4, 2017 by rodent279

[Southernman46]

parts south have resisted the barbarians 

 

Nick

 

Just  of the Goodwin Sands

Agreed - that's a good bit

[meil]

That reminds me of when I was a kid and we had holidays in Filey ,for some reason I thought there were armed guards to stop people leaving Butlins!

Do you mean there wasn't?

[Stevelewis]

Stockport  TIVIOT DALE  very  dark  &  Dank  or  so  it  appeared  when stood  on  the   platforms  awaiting  a  train   to  Manchester  Central   the  year  was  prob 1958,  We  used  to  fill  our  holidays  taking  unusual  train  journeys  in  the  Manchester   Area   Also  riding  the  bus  routes  with  an  all day  travel  ticket!

 

I cannot  see  many parents  allowing  that  sort  of  thing  to  happen  these  days,   how  times  have  changed!!

[Northroader]

Bit of a cheat, as it's long gone, but ever tried Liverpool Dingle, the terminus of the Overhead? Only here it's underground, in a close approximation of a sewer, thankfully without the smell? Very poor lighting, so Stygian gloom, just enough to see a bare island platform.

[runs as required]

Bit of a cheat, as it's long gone, but ever tried Liverpool Dingle, the terminus of the Overhead? Only here it's underground, in a close approximation of a sewer, thankfully without the smell? Very poor lighting, so Stygian gloom, just enough to see a bare island platform.

I used to live over the top of it - on Grafton Street, Liverpool 8

Yes the smell was always around in our locality - actually from the Gasworks above the CLC Brunswick shed.

Nevertheless you could see Moel Famau and the Clwyds lying in bed on a fine Sunday morning.

 

dh

[Stevelewis]

I used to live over the top of it - on Grafton Street, Liverpool 8

Yes the smell was always around in our locality - actually from the Gasworks above the CLC Brunswick shed.

Nevertheless you could see Moel Famau and the Clwyds lying in bed on a fine Sunday morning.

 

dh

 

I can see  Moel  Famau  from  our  back  Garden!!

[johnd]

Park ! A long gone station. It served Mather & Platt ( engineering works/foundry ) also long gone and a council estate nearby . Like most of Manchester and around the places on which it's wealth and that of the country are long gone now we have stopped making things and are relying on smaller firms and service industry.

Edited August 4, 2017 by johnd

[SHMD]

I noticed today that Park's Up platform still has its lamp post.

 

It wouldn't take much to re-open Park. Just mow the platforms and it will be back to 1980s condition!

 

 

 

Kev.

[D854_Tiger]

Has anyone mentioned Severn Beach yet, let's just say Beach might be something of a misnomer.

 

If the weather is nice, not so depressing, but, as stations go, the very epitome of basic.

 

Somehow, I doubt Severn Beach has ever appeared on anyone's model railway project list.

 

I was going down that way on business and chose the train after discovering that Clifton Down station was right where I needed to be.

 

Business concluded, I had the afternoon free to explore the branch and, so I believed, its hourly service. Which it isn't beyond Avonmouth (something to do with the passenger trains not being allowed to get in the way of the freight trains) and something I discovered the hard way after deciding Severn Beach must be some kind of holiday resort (well it did have a caravan park) and that I should spend some time there, well one hour of my life.

 

All I will say is that Severn Beach was closed that day and an hour became two hours because I had not checked the timetable. Then, half an hour into what had been quite a nice day, it turned into rain.

 

Even the one ice cream stall was shut, there was a post office, come newsagent, that seemed to specialise in four magazines, crisps and for some strange reason I couldn't fathom Pollycell wallpaper paste. If you have ever wanted to stick four magazines to a wall, whilst eating crisps, this was the place to be, except on that Wednesday afternoon because it was closed.

 

In two whole hours and despite there being houses and stuff, I never saw a single person until five minutes before my (completely empty) return train arrived, when one other passenger turned up and they had been given a lift so were obviously not a Beachsider. Once on the train, I couldn't help but wonder quite where you had to be to find Severn Beach on the way with your journey home.

[D854_Tiger]

I have just though of another one Sinfin Central which sounded as if it might be rather grand.

 

The station is still there but it's closed down now and looks not much different to when it remained open.

 

It could have been Britain's most expensive taxi rank but it never had public road access, which rather begs the question how was the train service ever replaced by a taxi.

[big jim]

I nominate Wrexham Central...

http://s0.geograph.org.uk/geophotos/03/44/04/3440427_30d27786.jpg

I was also going to suggest Wrexham central too, built to replace a bus shelter on a platform which was located 100 or so meters further on the old ellesmere line when they built the island green shopping Centre

 

Further along the 'borderlands' line from wrexham to bidston you also have upton station which is a right dive, I actually had someone nick the coolant filler cap from my 153 unit as I departed there one day!

 

They also put a plastic vandal proof waiting shelter there in the late 1990's after the old one kept getting targeted by the local Chav's, easy to clam off the graffiti etc, it lasted 2 days before someone put a mattress in it and set it alight, the first train of the day came round the curve to find the now cooled down shelter melted solidly across the platform and down the platform face onto the track!

Edited August 4, 2017 by big jim

[D854_Tiger]

I was also going to suggest Wrexham central too, built to replace a bus shelter on a platform which was located 100 or so meters further on the old ellesmere line when they built the island green shopping Centre

 

Further along the 'borderlands' line from wrexham to bidston you also have upton station which is a right dive, I actually had someone nick the coolant filler cap from my 153 unit as I departed there one day!

 

They also put a plastic vandal proof waiting shelter there in the late 1990's after the old one kept getting targeted by the local Chav's, easy to clam off the graffiti etc, it lasted 2 days before someone put a mattress in it and set it alight, the first train of the day came round the curve to find the now cooled down shelter melted solidly across the platform and down the platform face onto the track!

 

 

The big mistake they always make with vandal proof things is to advertise the fact, usually with some big spread in the local press, which just guarantees every vandal, worthy of the name, turns up to give it a go.

 

The claim was once made in Birmingham that they had installed a vandal proof lift within a black of council flats. It took all of a week for the fire brigade to be called out and open the lift doors to find the steel ropes supporting a blob of metal where once a lift had been.

[wombatofludham]

I must have the mind of a sewer as every time I read the name "Penistone" I think of an exercise regime alternative to Viagra.

[Mark Saunders]

I must have the mind of a sewer as every time I read the name "Penistone" I think of an exercise regime alternative to Viagra.

What about Scunthorpe and Clitheroe?

[chris p bacon]

What about Scunthorpe and Clitheroe?

 

According to women, most blokes don't go there.

[D854_Tiger]

I must have the mind of a sewer as every time I read the name "Penistone" I think of an exercise regime alternative to Viagra.

 

I purchased an Amazon Firestick so I could access Youtube on the telly.

 

The search facility is a bit clumsy, involving fingers and thumbs, so to help you out Youtube has predictive text, it starts producing search results as soon as you type, even if you haven't finished typing.

 

All I will say is best not to type in railway or aviation search terms in polite company, my very first search was 'cockpit view'. I've since learned to use 'flightdeck view' instead.

[62613]

I must have the mind of a sewer as every time I read the name "Penistone" I think of an exercise regime alternative to Viagra.

Oh, yes! Going through said town about 25 years ago, en route to Thaxted, passed the 'Penistone Working Mens' Club; only the 'T' had fallen off.

[runs as required]

What about Scunthorpe and Clitheroe?

not forgetting Huddersfield (overemphasised with poshed up Yorkshire accent)

dh

[TomJ]

Has anyone mentioned Severn Beach yet, let's just say Beach might be something of a misnomer.

 

If the weather is nice, not so depressing, but, as stations go, the very epitome of basic.

 

Somehow, I doubt Severn Beach has ever appeared on anyone's model railway project list.

.

I think that Severn Beach was actually a Railway of the Month or similar in RM a few years back!!

[Northroader]

I always wonder if anyone ever says "nice sunny day, lets go to the seaside at Severn Beach"?

[Andy Kirkham]

I always wonder if anyone ever says "nice sunny day, lets go to the seaside at Severn Beach"?

They used to. In its heyday there was an open air pool swimming, funfair and a miniature railway, and literally thousands of passengers would arrive by train on a single day.

[Peter Kazmierczak]

I always wonder if anyone ever says "nice sunny day, lets go to the seaside at Severn Beach"?

 

It was wet and dismal the last time I was there..........

 

Nice view of the Second Severn Crossing from the "beach" though.

[D854_Tiger]

They used to. In its heyday there was an open air pool swimming, funfair and a miniature railway, and literally thousands of passengers would arrive by train on a single day.

 

I wonder how many faded one horse seaside towns there are in Britain nowadays you could say that about.