This is the new entrance. They have been working on this for a long time
and but I knew they were getting close to finishing because, after they laid
the nice, new entrance patio, they ripped it up to lay underground cables and
pipe. This is standard procedure in British construction.
The interior of the station is cavernous compared to the old one, and
really looks spiffy.
Also, we still have our Solo Café, one of the few independent railroad cafés
in existence. They were going to give them the heave-ho in favor of a chain café,
but popular opinion won out and Solo remained.
These are the new gates. They put in a reduced, but still respectable,
number of them. When they revamped the station in Newport—a large city with a
heavy commuter flow—they reduced the bank of gates to two, one for entering and
one for exiting. Madness; and I wonder how that works out during rush hour. I
was glad to see some degree of sense prevailed in our case.
The shiny, new stairway going up into the old bit.
Here’s where the old bit starts.
And this is the old bit. Nothing wrong with it; it looks comforting and
familiar.
This was where we had to get tickets and access the station for I don’t know
how many months. I’m going to miss it; it was fun climbing up the scaffolding to
the train platforms.
Sorry about the lag in real posts but, hey, life happens.
When I got to the photo of the stairs labeled "The shiny new stairway going up into the old bit", I was shocked because the stairs looked like they are going down! I see you've adopted the use of "bit" instead of "part". To my midwestern sensibilities, a bit is merely a small part (or bit) of a part. I guess that can be attributed to English understatement!
ReplyDeleteYes, the stairs do look like they are going down, don't they. And, yeah, I have adopted a bit of the Brit-speak ;)
DeleteIs that just a case of papering over the cracks though?
ReplyDeleteNo, this was a total revamp. I'm disappointed that I didn't have any photos of the old station to compare with. They really did a bang up job.
DeleteI can't believe that station is in the UK - it looks as if it should be in Scandinavia! I had no idea there were stations in the UK - apart from a few in London - that aren't victorian through and through!
ReplyDelete