Grubbiest or most dilapidated station on the network in 2023

[david1212]

Cheltenham is not in the Cotswolds, it is in the Severn Vale.

Indeed, but try getting that message across to the people who market the town as a centre for the Cotswolds.

Being a 'base camp' for visiting the Cotswolds should not mean implying Cheltenham is actually in the Cotswolds.

I immediately thought of Bordesley but except if a football match only the occasional service calls.
Tyseley ?? It was tidied up but now neglected again.

 

[Mcr Warrior]

Being a 'base camp' for visiting the Cotswolds should not mean implying Cheltenham is actually in the Cotswolds.

Indeed. Perhaps it's more of a "Gateway to the Cotswolds".

In a similar way to Balham reputedly being the "Gateway to the South".

P.S. Back on topic, has Wakefield Kirkgate station had any TLC in recent years, or is it still a right grot spot?

 

[Parallel]

Polsloe Bridge is pretty dire, the prefab concrete platforms have been deteriorating for decades with temporary waist height lighting on the back of the fence. They've just spent months and probably tons of money strengthening the platforms and replacing the fence, when really it should have been demolished a replaced, its quite a busy little station too! The shelter is also pretty bad and the train departure screen is on the approach path 10ft below the platform!

I was surprised just how poor the lighting was at this station when I visited last year. The old (probably 1970s) lighting has been disused for some time and the waist height lighting really wasn’t fit for purpose. The station was eerie.

 

[Mcr Warrior]

That pic (of Polsloe Bridge) looks one short step away from trains no.longer being allowed to call after the hours of darkness.

 

[61653 HTAFC]

P.S. Back on topic, has Wakefield Kirkgate station had any TLC in recent years, or is it still a right grot spot?

It's a few months since I was last there, it has improved significantly but from such a low starting point that it still isn't great. Part of the issue is that it's at the a***-end of the city centre whilst much of the investment has gone in around Westgate (including making the station entrance way less convenient for bus interchanges, but that's another story).

 

[Dave91131]

Slade Green, especially the subway, wasn't particularly inviting a week or two back.

People slating Crewe clearly haven't visited any suburban stations in various parts of London, Manchester, Birmingham, Liverpool or Glasgow recently!

 

[Iskra]

It's a few months since I was last there, it has improved significantly but from such a low starting point that it still isn't great. Part of the issue is that it's at the a***-end of the city centre whilst much of the investment has gone in around Westgate (including making the station entrance way less convenient for bus interchanges, but that's another story).

It’s a lot better and has a beauty about, it but it still feels barren and will continue to do so until it gets permanent staff. Should be better now there is a waiting room too. At least it is safe to use these days.

 

[yorksrob]

P.S. Back on topic, has Wakefield Kirkgate station had any TLC in recent years, or is it still a right grot spot?

It's not bad these days. It's even got its new waiting room now.

Ore always has a bit of an "end of civilisation" vibe nowadays.

 

[leytongabriel]

Some of the outer District line stations at the east end do a splendid line in peeling paint.

 

[Hadders]

Essex Road station is pretty dingy, as are most of the stations on the Northern City line.

It's nowhere near as bad as it used to be, it had new signage installed about 3 years ago. I do recommend the spiral staircase for an utter decrepit experience!

 

[Liverpool 507]

Cleethorpes is getting renewed soon. The out of use dilapidated platforms don’t help the image. Has a decent pub though.

Those platforms are being brought back in to use.

 

[LLivery]

Although thankfully improvements planned/underway:

(Geoff Marshall's video on "Barking Station is being Upgraded")

Couldn't come soon enough. Hopefully the improvements are enough

 

[GoneSouth]

It’s a lot better and has a beauty about, it but it still feels barren and will continue to do so until it gets permanent staff. Should be better now there is a waiting room too. At least it is safe to use these days.

View attachment 129331

Ahhh a beautiful sunset over dereliction!

To be fair it looks a lot better than last time I was there (I know, that really is hard to believe), it looks like the subway might be usable and not just a public convenience anymore and now it looks well lit too.

It’s quite a sizeable old station considering it’s (as described above) the a*** end of the city.

Now I think about it, why would I have been there, was it an alternative route for cross country at some point in the past?

 

[Basil Jet]

Cleethorpes, lack of roof over most platforms, poor toilets you need a key/code from the desk, just feels really drab when using it.

Roof? Who goes to Cleethorpes on a rainy day?

I quite liked Cleethorpes - it's a delight after Grimsby Dock and New Clee.

 

[fgwrich]

Slough was repainted recently
I think Basingstoke is a lot worse

Big Basingstoke News! Amazingly, the scruffy and cold Network SouthEast / SWT toilets on Platform 1 are FINALLY, I repeat, FINALLY, being refurbished as we speak!

It's just a shame that the rest of the recently repainted parts across the station are already looking scruffy already - it seems to be a symptom of the repainting program across the SWR network, it's either poor prep or poor paint application or both. Mind you, they've finally settled on the location of the PA screens on the country end of Platform 2/3 and have since demolished the planter down there too.

 

[Requeststop]

If ever a station needed a total re-vamp it must be Plymouth. There is nothing appealing on the outside the car park casts a shadow all day on the entrance which is out of the view of the main road nearby. Internally the layout is dingy and cramp. Then there is that awful undergrond tunnel everyone has to pass through to get to and from the trains. The waiting rooms are unappealing and cold in winter and no refreshments on the platforms. To me it's a station that need razing to the ground and re-built. Get someone with a bit of imagination to work on the place. Actually it's an embarrassment to the City.

 

[railfan99]

As a foreigner, despite three visits to your nation(s), I've not alighted at as many stations as many of you, but I thought Machester Piccadilly in late 2022 (second visit) was excellent: a booking office adjacent to platforms and lots of retail that wasn't in the way. Heavy patronage: great, and a good escalator to Manchester Metrolink though returning from the ELR, the 'up' one was inoperable: the lift sufficed.

I did not like Manchester Oxford Road's island platform. Poor train information indicators, and peak period commuters (even with reduced numbers post-COVID-19) struggling to get through barriers efficiently. It was difficult to walk down from the nearby mini Sainsbury's and try to enter the barriers when a crowd was exiting onto the station access road.

I spent half an hour changing train at Hellifield: the area with the building was barricaded as the cafe was not open (on a Monday, IIRC?) but in contrast to one poster above, it looked OK (though couldn't see the brickwork and windows close up).

It was difficult at Leeds to change trains quickly: I missed a Bradford Forster Square service by 30 seconds as burdened with luggage it took a while to work out from which platform the train was departing.

Shipley station had a strange layout where to change trains to get to Bradford Forster Square I had to race up and down a footbridge in the rain, after half running with my suitcase and backpack across a fairly grotty carpark at night.

On a previous visit in 2013, I thought an intermediate station on the Saltburn line (out of Darlington) was grotty and unappealing. Maybe it was the Redcar one at the closed steelworks?

Edinburgh was OK but arriving at 0630 on Caledonian Sleeper on a strike day, I found the layout confusing, perhaps testimony to how I'd slept poorly in the less than ideal CAF-manufactured sleeping car.

Lancaster was an especially beautiful station and staying at Preston (Lancs) for three nights, I loved it but stupidly managed on my first visit to find myself in some subway that was deserted and perhaps unused. Dumb foreigner the locals would have thought had they seen me, and cannot even plead that English isn't my first language.

Carlisle was also attractive.

 

[GoneSouth]

If ever a station needed a total re-vamp it must be Plymouth. There is nothing appealing on the outside the car park casts a shadow all day on the entrance which is out of the view of the main road nearby. Internally the layout is dingy and cramp. Then there is that awful undergrond tunnel everyone has to pass through to get to and from the trains. The waiting rooms are unappealing and cold in winter and no refreshments on the platforms. To me it's a station that need razing to the ground and re-built. Get someone with a bit of imagination to work on the place. Actually it's an embarrassment to the City.

Totally agree about Plymouth being a place that has a feeling of desolation, whenever I’ve had to wait there it feels like the end of the world with no staff, all the shops / catering are closed and the wind chills you to the bone. It’s truly horrible.

However… badly designed as it is, does it really look like it’s crumbling away like some other stations? unfortunately not. It’s horrid but I think it’s going to be there for many years to come unfortunately.

 

[BeijingDave]

Not the worst admittedly, but Chester feels quite run down. Half the roof is missing, which I think may be WW2 damage. Coupled with the poor facilities you might expect in a station where lots of people change trains, it could be much improved.

If you're talking about the roof over platforms 5 and 6, it was due to this...

Chester General rail crash - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[Bletchleyite]

Lancaster was an especially beautiful station and staying at Preston (Lancs) for three nights, I loved it but stupidly managed on my first visit to find myself in some subway that was deserted and perhaps unused. Dumb foreigner the locals would have thought had they seen me, and cannot even plead that English isn't my first language.

The subway has that feel but is public.

 

[birchesgreen]

......Bordesley.

I dunno, Bordesley on the platform isn't a bad station at all, certainly a lot worse out there. Duddeston isn't that inspiring for example.

 

[mike57]

Manchester Victoria has to be amongst the worst for a 'major' station, certainly the platform area. Lack of passenger waiting area and seating. No toilets inside the gate line. Gloomy. Fume laden atmosphere. Dirty. Vermin running about in broad daylight (They badly need to create a similar post to that held by Felix in Huddersfield). Not even a basic shop where you can buy a drink/sandwich within the platform area while waiting hours (seems like it anyway) for the next TPE service to York.

Scarborough stations leaking roof was pretty bad when it rained hard, but that is being fixed now, otherwise OK however.

Low level platforms at Glasgow Central. I only used them once, some years ago, they may be better now.

 

[Mzzzs]

The platforms under the shopping centre (I think) in London Victoria station are not very pleasant. Always seems dark, damp and aged.
Always hate getting of a southern train on those platforms.

 

[fandroid]

I think Basingstoke is a lot worse

Not since they smartened up the toilets and opened the new "Cycle Hub". Granted that the front of station facilities occupied by Destino until the pandemic are empty and forlorn, but there are plenty of passengers back using the station so they should get tenants fairly soon.

Were Ryde Pier Head and Ryde Esplanade smartened up in the revamp of the Island Line? When I used to go there fairly regularly they were both glorious dumps, totally unfitted to be "gateway" stations to the island. Quite daft when Brading, Sandown and Shanklin stations were well-kept and smart.

 

[John Luxton]

Green Lane (Birkenhead)

Never boarded or alighted but pass through quite often.

Its semi-underground setting probably doesn't help seems dismal and dank.

 

[DarloRich]

Crewe is fairly grotty sadly. Just feels very tired and worn out.

Wakefield Kirkgate always gets brought up but it much better than it ever was!

 

[urbophile]

Quite a few Merseyrail stations have an air of dilapidation and poor maintenance.

Considering some of them were refurbished or even newly built only a few years ago, I agree. Brunswick: a shining example of industrial-tech architecture, is rusting away alarmingly in parts. The (grade 2? ) listed Cressington, a beautiful building, is desperately in need of a coat of paint.

On the wider network, I'm more conscious of the larger stations which suffer from architectural clutter and poor layout, rather than scruffiness per se. Though one can easily lead to the other. The contrast between the fine main buildings of Chester and Huddersfield, for example, and the gloomy mess on the platform side, comes to mind.

But for an air of total desolation it's hard to beat those unstaffed, bus-shelter stations across Northernland, as well as in other parts of the country.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Green Lane (Birkenhead)

Never boarded or alighted but pass through quite often.

Its semi-underground setting probably doesn't help seems dismal and dank.

It is indeed quite grim. Has a feel a bit like London Underground in the 80s.

 

[fandroid]

Lord Adonis, when SoS for Transport, did a whistle-stop tour of the railways and picked out Wakefield Kirkgate as a horror story. Southampton Central also got a dishonourable mention. Both have had work done since. I can't comment on Wakefield but I do use Southampton fairly regularly, and can say that for a city's principal station, it's still a bit of a dump. The platform 1 side is just about unchanged since Adonis was there, facilities have got worse since then, and that's the busiest part of the station! There's investment planned AFAIK but that again seems to be on the far side, once more.

 

[urbophile]

Although platform 2 at Holyhead has recently had its roof refurbished, platform 1 (the one most Avanti services use) is in a right state, as shown in photos.

Photos show moss and vegetation growing on a wall, peeling and missing signage, a permanently boarded up door panel, and general neglect

And a strange lack of Welsh-language signage.

Barking. Worst station in London.

Architecturally, one of the best. So that's a pity.