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Worst station improvements/modernisations 1950s to today


QuoitsPlayer
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Hi

I'm updating the station on my 90s layout I want to build the most hideous looking "modernised" station I can - I'm thinking poor additions, unsympathetic extentions, generally an unpleasant place to be.

 

Has anyone any photos or examples they can think of?

 

I'm thinking really grim unwelcoming stations.

 

Many thanks, Matt

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Depends on the size you want to model, Birmingham New Street is the worst I can think of. Other than that just about any of the modern conversions to bus shelters and the like. Close to where I live Upwey, Dorchester South, Moreton & Wool fit that bill  although Dorchester West, Maiden Newton, and Wareham amongst others still have some of their old character left. I guess therefore pick your location and see what survives/has been wrecked.

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In my opinion dartford is absolutely hideous. It’s a big glass box monstrosity thing. And it’s a proper mission to get to the platforms. But they’ve kept the original platform layout it’s still as cramped as ever on the platforms. The original pre-grouping station was a pretty Italianate building now it’s been obliterated in favour of this thing we got now.

 

Big James

Edited by Big James
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I always thought Harrogate station was gruesome. Sixties concourse and towerblock grafted on to the remains of the Victorian station with replacement canopies and nasty eighties/nineties footbridge with elevator towers, bus shelter on platform two all overshadowed by a new multi storey.

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Based on virtually the entire BR network up to c. 1985 - Cleethorpes. It just looks like the rsole of the universe.

 

I saw plenty more on my travels, but I can't recall them all.

 

From the BR Modernisation Plan - Euston and Birmingham New St. were uninspiring but they did what they had to do at the time. The other major brutalist "concrete jungle" reconstructions on the LNWR lines were Macclesfield, Wolverhampton HL, Stafford, Northampton and Wembley Central, none of which ever qualified as an "oil painting" in any visual sense, except perhaps Coventry which may have been the best of the bunch.

 

At least Ivan Stedeford didn't manage to knock that lot on the head before they came to pass.

 

On the other side of the Beeching Part 2 "Network For Development", Stevenage ("new") on the former GNR just sucks. Then on the same lines,  Finsbury Park probably qualifies as "least sympathetic" cutback of station buildings/awnings.

 

Of the several "resurrections from the dead", Birmingham Snow Hill is probably among the least inspired - rightful and inevitable, but in no way a worthy successor to the sublime original.

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+1 for Wembley Central.

 

When someone decides to build a shopping center where once there was no more than a bridge it’s doomed to failure. See the medeieval London Bridge for example.

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This thread is going to produce multiple opinions, and examples.

 

But the worst, by far, of any station I have ever experienced, was Moston (Manchester) in the 1980's, which I used many times when my wife's grandmother lived nearby. You accessed the platforms by long ramps, and it was unmanned by then. Even the rats only entered in pairs. The sights, smells and detritus left by the locals were a revelation. Although the station opened in the 1870's, I have been able to find nothing (on-line) which suggests when the structures extant in the 1980's were built, and no pictures of the original buildings. These certainly did not look 1870-ish. (They were demolished in the 1990's, replaced by the modern version of bus shelters which were, quite frankly, a considerable improvement!) Picture acknowledgement: Peter Whatley collection on Wikiwand.post-13143-0-47365500-1548272316.jpg

 

 

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Bradford Interchange.

 

1970s design and construction at its finest.

 

Closely followed by its close neighbour, Bradford Forster Square.

 

I think BR architects must have had something against Bradford, although having worked in that city I can probably understand their motivation.

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attachicon.gifBNS4 281015.JPG

 

The British knacked Escalator museum, aka Birmingham New Street.

You of course mean John Lewis International .You may find your way in after negotiating several barriers.Finding your way out is challenging.Finding a shop til you drop is the easy bit. Now finding a train.......you descend to the bowels of Hades...if you survive that long.

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Ditton Junction.  60s concrete sh1thole that closed for good back in 1994 as so few people were using it.  Cr@p station with cr@p trains (Pacers, even though it was on an electrified route).

 

Edited by Phatbob
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Bradford Interchange.

1970s design and construction at its finest.

Closely followed by its close neighbour, Bradford Forster Square.

I think BR architects must have had something against Bradford, although having worked in that city I can probably understand their motivation.

Actually. Bradford Forster Square station is a late 1990s build.

 

The original station site was abandoned in the mid 1980s with 3 new platforms built to the north. For around 10 years it only had tenpory facilities as the original intention was that the new station facilities would be incoperated into a large commercial development on the site of the old station only for the recession of the early 1990s to torpedo the plans.

Edited by phil-b259
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Dundee's 1980's station frontage was pretty awful, now replaced by another more modern monstrosity. Thankfully the old Tay Bridge station below has seen little change over the years.

Fort William station is another choice for grim replacement compared to the old NBR station.

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Bradford Interchange.

 

1970s design and construction at its finest.

 

Closely followed by its close neighbour, Bradford Forster Square.

 

I think BR architects must have had something against Bradford, although having worked in that city I can probably understand their motivation.

 

Actually, having used Interchange many times in the past 7 years (less so lately, as there are more through fast trains to Leeds from Hebden B), I would have to slightly disagree. It may not look pretty, but it works pretty well, especially since they added the new lifts. There are a lot worse than this around.

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All in the name of modernisation!  There were a considerable number of hell holes due for improvement but sadly they weren't necessarily improved.  Most were rebuilt in a terrible sixties style sometime with office towers that were hard to find tenants for.  OTOH, some of the more recent improvements have survived the ordeal quite well and preserved lines have done their part in more sensitive restoration.

 

Brian.

Edited by brianusa
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This thread is going to produce multiple opinions, and examples.

 

But the worst, by far, of any station I have ever experienced, was Moston (Manchester) in the 1980's, which I used many times when my wife's grandmother lived nearby. You accessed the platforms by long ramps, and it was unmanned by then. Even the rats only entered in pairs. The sights, smells and detritus left by the locals were a revelation. Although the station opened in the 1870's, I have been able to find nothing (on-line) which suggests when the structures extant in the 1980's were built, and no pictures of the original buildings. These certainly did not look 1870-ish. (They were demolished in the 1990's, replaced by the modern version of bus shelters which were, quite frankly, a considerable improvement!) Picture acknowledgement: Peter Whatley collection on Wikiwand.attachicon.gifMoston_Station_Peter-Whatley.jpg

 

Looks very similar to Lea Hall on the Birmingham to Coventry line, built 1939 

Original Down platform

http://www.warwickshirerailways.com/lms/lnwrlh2829b.htm

 

 

Post-vandalism alterations, Up platform  c1970.

http://www.warwickshirerailways.com/lms/lnwrlh1596.htm

Edited by TheSignalEngineer
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Pre 1990s Oxford.

 

Absolutely; The 1970s on-the-cheap rebuild of Oxford was so poor that BR had to do it all again 20 years later ! (and it's still not fit to be the gateway to one of Britain's major tourist centres).

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+1 for Wembley Central.

 

When someone decides to build a shopping center where once there was no more than a bridge it’s doomed to failure. See the medeieval London Bridge for example.

And another, absolutly dire, plus Wembley Complex as it was, wasn't much better at the platform. It did have a ticket office that was sometimes open at the road entrance.

 

Marlow for sheer minimalism.

 

Dave

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Any thoughts on the fall of once-grand stations and their utilitarian replacements:

 

Manchester Victoria, Blackburn, Rugby, Fenchurch St...add your own?

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