Station names on the UK rail network that you would change

[William3000]

University is one that really needs sorting. I'm aware of people who have turned up at Manchester Airport and expected - quite reasonably, in my opinion - that the ticket machine offering to sell them a ticket to "University" is selling them a ticket to the University of the city they have just arrived in, which has a station right next to it, not one in another city a hundred miles away!

It's an excellent example of something which wouldn't have been a problem at all when tickets were sold overwhelmingly at ticket offices (I can't imagine a ticket office clerk in Manchester selling a ticket to Birmingham for someone who just asked for "University" without making very sure that was what they meant!) - but certainly is a problem in the age of computer systems where passengers are expected to serve themselves. Some such systems do say "University (Birmingham)" but plenty don't.

In general removing station names that happen to contain a major place name other than the one they serve (e.g. Liverpool Street) is probably not a bad idea in principle, but not something I see an urgent need for. Likewise with eliminating duplicate station names.

The other suggestions - in particular, changing compass points - I'm not sure is very important. Perhaps the names are technically inaccurate but I can't see how they are causing a problem.

Nor is the compass direction!
Most travellers trying to reach Wigan centre will follow signage (and if that signage isn't in place it should be - it's a relatively low cost and mitigates the frankly dreadful but all-too-common passenger experience of exiting a station and having no idea where you are), or look at a map, or plan their journey on their phone and follow the directions.
I would bet nobody is arriving at Wigan North Western, and saying "aha! I am at Wigan North Western, thus I know I must travel in a south-easterly direction to reach the town centre!" and then marching off in that direction with no further thought...

London Liverpool Street station is the busiest station in the country (even before Crossrail it was the 3rd or 4th busiest) and too iconic to change its name now. Equally there could be confusion between London Charing Cross and Charing Cross (Glasgow) or Manchester Piccadilly and Piccadilly (LU) but I think we should live with that.

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Gillespie Road underground station was renamed Arsenal, but since Arsenal moved grounds I think the stadium is marginally closer to Holloway Road

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Okehampton Interchange to me sounds wrong for the line. Parkway would be more suitable, or Exchange.
Kings Nympton was originally South Molton Road. It was changed in 1951ish because it was a. a long way from South Molton, and b. to distinguish it from the other South Molton on the Taunton-Barnstaple line.
Ashley Down revert to Ashley Hill for obvious reasons

Why ‘Exchange’?

 

[The exile]

University - University of Birmingham

• Just adding suffix at least avoids needing to change the CRS code.

Why would you need to change the CRS code? At some point we’re going to open a station where all meaningful codes have already been used and the CRS code will have to be completely unrelated to the name (I’m not a CRS code nerd - it may well already be the case)

 

[D6130]

Unless you're prepared to stand up for cathedral only being an adjective and agenda a plural, pull your troops back to join me in the last ditch defending data/datum as a plural/singular.

Not to mention Forum/Fora!

 

[birchesgreen]

University of Birmingham & QE Hospital would be a better, if slightly long title.

I'd look at the many --- Road, --- Lane and similar stations and see if a more useful name couldn't be found. My own local station is Chester Road, i've had a couple of guards over the years ask me why i was travelling towards Birmingham with a ticket for Chester

Maybe Chester Road could be renamed Wylde Green, as its actually next to Wylde Green shops and the actual Wylde Green could be renamed Boldmere as thats closer to there. Probably annoy some folks though.

 

[The exile]

Maybe Chester Road could be renamed Wylde Green, as it’s actually next to Wylde Green shops and the actual Wylde Green could be renamed Boldmere as thats closer to there. Probably annoy some folks though.

That kind of double renaming is inviting confusion unless you stagger it (rename Wylde Green first then Chester Road several years later)

 

[zwk500]

Wolverton - Milton Keynes North

Wolverton being a primarily local station does not need it's name changing. It's also very much Milton Keynes North-west, as it doesn't really serve the area out towards Newport Pagnell, who are better off getting the bus to MKC.

Bletchley - Milton Keynes South

Bletchley I can see more case for it (especially with EWR) but the town itself is still a relevant thing and the presence of Bletchley Park helps with recognition from a wider travelling public. The Milton Keynes South name could arguably be better applied to Bow Brickhill or Woburn Sands (or a future EWR station between them)

If this doesn't happen then rename Milton Keynes Central, "Milton Keynes"

Milton Keynes Central serves the district named Central Milton Keynes and helps emphasise that station's role as a transport hub. Removing it would be a downgrade.

University to Birmingham University

University of Birmingham would also fit better as that's the name of the institution. (I went to the University of York, regularly referred to as York Uni including by it's own SU, which occasionally caused confusion with an actual York University in Canada).

Colloquially most people call it Cambridge Main or Cambridge Central. I would go with Cambridge Central - while it’s slightly outside the city centre it is the most central station and a large employment location

As it's very much not central I'd go for Cambridge Hills Road. Cambridge Botanic Gardens sounds like a local tram stop not the main station, but Hills Rd is the one that takes you into the city centre if you follow station road up.

I would change Birmingham International to Birmingham Airport (for the NEC), and reserve ‘International’ suffixes for stations with international rail services.

This I'd agree with.

 

[AM9]

Or revert to Colchester St Botolph?

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Maybe Camulodunum for the traditionalists and tourists as it is located near the city wall and not far from the castle.

 

[Bletchleyite]

MK North and MK South were proposed before MKC was proposed, but there was significant pushback. This would be a very unpopular move locally for no actual benefit.

 

[Purple Train]

Why would you need to change the CRS code? At some point we’re going to open a station where all meaningful codes have already been used and the CRS code will have to be completely unrelated to the name (I’m not a CRS code nerd - it may well already be the case)

It seems to be the case even with stations that still have usable combinations (the imminent Bedlington comes to mind, which I seem to recall is BEJ).

I see lots of mentions of "Colchester Main" or "Colchester Mainline". I believe it is locally called Colchester North, but haven't been to the area in a while so may be misremembering. Colchester Town does need renaming, but I'm very much stuck between City and St Botolph's.

I agree that University should be renamed University of Birmingham. Plain "University" is okay for a tram stop but not for a National Rail station.

I'd be tempted to rename Gunnislake to something else, given Gunnislake proper is half a mile away down a very steep hill on a busy road with no footpath. Drakewalls perhaps? Gunnislake Road?

 

[hux385]

What about...

Pollokshields East becomes Polloksheilds
Pollokshields West becomes Strathbungo
Pollokshaws East becomes Newlands
Pollokshaws West becomes Pollokshaws

Would this make things clearer or more confusing?

 

[Zomboid]

I do think that the Liverpool/ Liverpool Street thing is really not helped by the Liverpool station being Lime Street. I can easily imagine someone unfamiliar and/or in a hurry at Norwich getting mixed up between "London Liverpool Street" and "Liverpool Lime Street", especially since it's common to drop the "London" from such stations.

I wouldn't change either station name to avoid that necessarily as it's very much an edge case, might just be better to change how trains are advertised at Norwich (and if there are any other stations with links to both - Ely?).

 

[Bletchleyite]

I wouldn't change either station name to avoid that necessarily as it's very much an edge case, might just be better to change how trains are advertised at Norwich (and if there are any other stations with links to both - Ely?).

As noted above the BR era CIS showed the North West city as "Lime St Lvrpl" at Norwich to avoid the confusion, and that could be done again if it isn't still like that. If you can override station names locally with ridiculous nonsense like "St Pancake" you can do it to fix a problem like this.

 

[zwk500]

As noted above the BR era CIS showed the North West city as "Lime St Lvrpl" at Norwich to avoid the confusion, and that could be done again if it isn't still like that. If you can override station names locally with ridiculous nonsense like "St Pancake" you can do it to fix a problem like this.

Although the new board apparently has reverted:

[Image showing new departure board at Norwich showing 'Liverpool Lime St' and 'London Liverpool St' from Greater Anglia Press release: Link:https://www.greateranglia.co.uk/abo...eils-new-integrated-train-and-bus-information]

Although I agree it can and should be overridden to show 'London Liv. St' and 'Lime St, Liverpool' if they're not going to rename London Liverpool Street (which would cost millions to update everything and fixes a comparatively small problem).

 

[Zomboid]

As noted above the BR era CIS showed the North West city as "Lime St Lvrpl" at Norwich to avoid the confusion, and that could be done again if it isn't still like that. If you can override station names locally with ridiculous nonsense like "St Pancake" you can do it to fix a problem like this.

In addition to that I'd just advertise the London trains as "London". I don't think there's much risk of some OA operation introducing an alternative that runs to Paddington or something.

 

[zwk500]

In addition to that I'd just advertise the London trains as "London". I don't think there's much risk of some OA operation introducing an alternative that runs to Paddington or something.

I'd not do that, as at Ely you do have trains to King's Cross or Liverpool Street. You might get away with it at Norwich, but I'd put something like 'London LS via Colchester' if you were, rather than omit the station entirely. The via point would be further confirmation

'London Liv St via Ipswich/Colchester' and 'Lime St, Liverpool via Peterbrough/Nottingham' would probably be enough to help all but the most determined people reach the right destination.

 

[Howardh]

Wolverton - Milton Keynes North
Bletchley - Milton Keynes South

If this doesn't happen then rename Milton Keynes Central, "Milton Keynes"

I get the idea but do the good people of Wolverton and Bletchley actually want to be associated with Milton Keynes?!! (At this point I'll hide behind the sofa!)

More appropriate for me is Adlington (Lancs) and Adlington (Cheshire) so I wonder why the brackets, just incorporate the county into the name, problem solved!

 

[Bletchleyite]

I get the idea but do the good people of Wolverton and Bletchley actually want to be associated with Milton Keynes?!! (At this point I'll hide behind the sofa!)

As mentioned upthread it was proposed in the early days of the New Town but was roundly shot down in flames. The locals would hate it and it would have no actual benefit; in the UK suburban stations are not generally prefixed to the city anyway - are you going to start doing stuff like Liverpool Huyton and Manchester Stockport* otherwise?

* Yes I know not technically accurate but comparable. And yes I do know there's Liverpool South Parkway so I suppose you could call that Manchester South Parkway

 

[dosxuk]

I do think that the Liverpool/ Liverpool Street thing is really not helped by the Liverpool station being Lime Street. I can easily imagine someone unfamiliar and/or in a hurry at Norwich getting mixed up between "London Liverpool Street" and "Liverpool Lime Street", especially since it's common to drop the "London" from such stations.

I wouldn't change either station name to avoid that necessarily as it's very much an edge case, might just be better to change how trains are advertised at Norwich (and if there are any other stations with links to both - Ely?).

The worst era was the early 00's when the screens were still CRT monitors, when the two destinations were listed as "L Liverpool St" and "Liverpool L St". I've got a photo of it somewhere I'll have to dig out because it was confusing even to regular travellers - who would just ignore the screens and look at which trains were on which platforms instead - again not helping that the two services would depart within a couple of minutes of each other, often from adjacent platforms.

I'd say back then there was someone going the wrong way on every trip I made - it's far from forum myth!

 

[Oxfordblues]

Confusion might be reduced if every station had a unique name. I heard of someone once who used a return ticket from Gillingham to Gillingham to commute for a week from Salisbury to Waterloo!

 

[zwk500]

The worst era was the early 00's when the screens were still CRT monitors, when the two destinations were listed as "L Liverpool St" and "Liverpool L St".

If it was London L St and Liverpool L St I could at least have seen the logic....

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Confusion might be reduced if every station had a unique name.

Then you'd end up with stations being assigned names of seemingly questionable relevance (at best) while some settlement 200 miles away kept their name.

I heard of someone once who used a return ticket from Gillingham to Gillingham to commute for a week from Salisbury to Waterloo!

Wouldn't the outbound portion be valid for one day only?

 

[William3000]

Wolverton being a primarily local station does not need it's name changing. It's also very much Milton Keynes North-west, as it doesn't really serve the area out towards Newport Pagnell, who are better off getting the bus to MKC.

Bletchley I can see more case for it (especially with EWR) but the town itself is still a relevant thing and the presence of Bletchley Park helps with recognition from a wider travelling public. The Milton Keynes South name could arguably be better applied to Bow Brickhill or Woburn Sands (or a future EWR station between them)

Milton Keynes Central serves the district named Central Milton Keynes and helps emphasise that station's role as a transport hub. Removing it would be a downgrade.

University of Birmingham would also fit better as that's the name of the institution. (I went to the University of York, regularly referred to as York Uni including by it's own SU, which occasionally caused confusion with an actual York University in Canada).

As it's very much not central I'd go for Cambridge Hills Road. Cambridge Botanic Gardens sounds like a local tram stop not the main station, but Hills Rd is the one that takes you into the city centre if you follow station road up.

This I'd agree with.

I disagree with Milton Keynes South. Bletchley is a large historic town in its own right that has been there for centuries.

 

[zwk500]

I disagree with Milton Keynes South. Bletchley is a large historic town in its own right that has been there for centuries.

Milton Keynes has also been there for centuries, although admittedly as a small farming village not the large market town that Bletchley is. However you may note (and apologies for it not being clear) I don't particularly support the renaming of Bletchley station, just that it has more of a case than for Wolverton.

in the UK suburban stations are not generally prefixed to the city anyway - are you going to start doing stuff like Liverpool Huyton and Manchester Stockport* otherwise?

Worth pointing out that some other countries (e.g. Germany) do exactly this.

 

[William3000]

I don’t particularly like Worcestershire Parkway. Worcester Parkway would make more sense. And I would prefer East Midlands Airport (Parkway) - instead of East Midlands Parkway but it needs a regular bus link to the airport.

Given Oxford now has a Parkway. The central station could do with a suffix Central. Especially if the new stations on the Cowley Branch have Oxford prefixes. Perhaps Edenbridge to Edenbridge North in The North Downs.

Also could the use of ‘for’ be more widely and officially used. I think Ashchurch for Tewkesbury is shown on maps but Audley End for Saffron Walden and Pokesdown for Boscombe aren’t.

Other possibles could be Meldreth for Melbourn, Radley for Abingdon, Campsea Ashe for Wickham Market, Rye House for Hoddesdon.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Worth pointing out that some other countries (e.g. Germany) do exactly this.

Certainly. But as the UK doesn't, other than specific parkway stations it doesn't make sense to prefix suburban stations.

 

[Djgr]

It is a city centre station, but Moorfields and James St aren't prefixed, nor is "downstairs" at Lime St. It also grates because "Baltic" is an adjective, not a noun; you can have the Baltic Sea or the Baltic Triangle but not just the Baltic unless it is simply a contraction of one of those.

At least they had a competition for this name, unlike the unfortunate Headbolt Lane.

I think that Baltic is indeed Baltic Triangle, with Triangle understood.

I believe that the hope is that the Baltic Triangle will grow to be more than a triangle in area (Square/Oblong?!) and actually becomes the name that this area of the City is known by.

In other words it becomes a noun!

 

[Bletchleyite]

At least they had a competition for this name, unlike the unfortunate Headbolt Lane.

I don't see a major issue with Headbolt Lane other than that it's a terminus of trains from a fair way away - plenty of local stations the whole country over are named after the road they're on if there's no other obvious thing to call them. It just needed a Kirkby prefix, which could be dropped if/when the Merseyrail service extends to Wigan and it loses that terminus role.

Headbolt Lane, by the way, is the intended name right back to the 1970s Merseyrail plan. Baltic would have been St James as per its original name, but I can see why that might have been confusing!

I think that Baltic is indeed Baltic Triangle, with Triangle understood.

I believe that the hope is that the Baltic Triangle will grow to be more than a triangle in area (Square/Oblong?!) and actually becomes the name that this area of the City is known by.

In other words it becomes a noun!

The "-ic" suffix can't be used for a noun (it means "related to" or "of", e.g. "Masonic" means "related to or of the Freemasons"), so it'll forever sound ridiculous*. It needs to be the Baltic something, or "Baltic Liverpool" if they absolutely have to have the name of the city in it. While people might nickname it, "The Masonic Arms" (i.e. the coat of arms of the Freemasons, which you'd find on its sign) has historically been a common Liverpool pub name, but "The Masonic" only a nickname.

* Not half as ridiculous as the half-baked attempt to rename the area known as "The Old Roan" after the now-closed pub and the station as "Aintree Village" - now that's a station renaming I would find totally unacceptable were it to be proposed.

 

[D6130]

I don't see a major issue with Headbolt Lane other than that it's a terminus of trains from a fair way away - plenty of local stations the whole country over are named after the road they're on if there's no other obvious thing to call them. It just needed a Kirkby prefix, which could be dropped if/when the Merseyrail service extends to Wigan and it loses that terminus role.

Headbolt Lane, by the way, is the intended name right back to the 1970s Merseyrail plan. Baltic would have been St James as per its original name, but I can see why that might have been confusing!



The "-ic" suffix can't be used for a noun (it means "related to" or "of", e.g. "Masonic" means "related to or of the Freemasons"), so it'll forever sound ridiculous*. It needs to be the Baltic something, or "Baltic Liverpool" if they absolutely have to have the name of the city in it. While people might nickname it, "The Masonic Arms" (i.e. the coat of arms of the Freemasons) has historically been a common Liverpool pub name, but "The Masonic" only a nickname.

* Not half as ridiculous as the half-baked attempt to rename the area known as "The Old Roan" after the now-closed pub and the station as "Aintree Village" - now that's a station renaming I would find totally unacceptable were it to be proposed.

I thought that 'Baltic' was named after the sea of that name. Presumably there was once a Baltic Dock in that area?

 

[telstarbox]

Realistically a station will only be renamed to drive an increase in usage, or reflect a change in the locality.

Sandling won't change (it feels quite remote from Hythe on the ground) but Westenhanger (a handful of houses) could become Otterpool which is the big development springing up around it.

 

[Djgr]

I thought that 'Baltic' was named after the sea of that name. Presumably there was once a Baltic Dock in that area?

Apparently many sailors from around the Baltic Sea settled in this area of Liverpool.

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I don't see a major issue with Headbolt Lane other than that it's a terminus of trains from a fair way away - plenty of local stations the whole country over are named after the road they're on if there's no other obvious thing to call them. It just needed a Kirkby prefix, which could be dropped if/when the Merseyrail service extends to Wigan and it loses that terminus role.

Headbolt Lane, by the way, is the intended name right back to the 1970s Merseyrail plan. Baltic would have been St James as per its original name, but I can see why that might have been confusing!

But the name could have been a lot better and there is no real reason why more effort couldn't have been made to "brainstorm" alternatives, given that they have had fifty years to do so.

Of course if we had simply stuck to the plans of the early 1970s we would have elevated walkways all through Liverpool City centre!

On a slightly different note, I believe that the "disused" platform at James Street says Liverpool James Street, at least in places.

 

[Thebaz]

My twopennorth - leave Cambridge as it is and since the two new stations have yet to open, just to rename them South Cambridge and North Cambridge.