Places that seem small if you go there by train

[mrcheek]

OK, I think about some daft stuff sometimes.

This could be one of those really fun threads. Or maybe one that dies after one post.

"Places that seem small if you go there by train".

Sometimes, the railway line passes through a supposedly large town or city. But only on the outskirts. Or maybe you just cant see any of the town from the railway. So a large town might seem to be very small if you've only ever travelled through by train.

Like Cheltenham. First you know about it is when you pull into the station. Then you pull out of the station, and its gone. Yet its actually a pretty big place.

So. any more examples like this?

 

[MCR247]

Coventry for me. I can just remember seeing trees on either side, then the Leamington tracks joined onto it and we were in the station. Then after that it was just trees again

 

[MidnightFlyer]

Cambridge looks smaller.

Warrington from Bank Q looks smaller too

preston as well I suppose, but nothing like Cheltenham/Cov though

 

[mrcheek]

How about the opposite?

Small places that seem to take ages to travel through...

Obvious answer is Weston-super-Mare (if you take the loop). The town itself is shaped on an angle that follows the railway line. So it seems to go for ages for such a small town.

 

[MCR247]

Leicester looks quite small on the London end.

Edinburgh also looks really small actually. From London the train starts slowing down where this is a load of trees, and you go through a tunnel into Waverley. Then after Haymarket its gone.

Glasgow Queen St? Can't remember that well, I think I fell asleep as soon as I got onto the 170 but I think once you are through the tunnel it looks like countryside?

How about Darlington? Haven't been there in ages though

 

[atomicdanny]

Of the places that I know, Canterbury seems small when leaving Canterbury east, even smaller when compared to say folkestone!

 

[ainsworth74]

How about Darlington? Haven't been there in ages though

Thinking about it yeah if you don't get off the train (and go through the station not the avoider) then Darlington actually just looks like a station and perhaps some houses in the distance!

 

[MCR247]

Thats what I was thinking but I couldn't really remember.

What about Durham thinking about? You may not count it though because of the viaduct, but its a load of tress and greenery then you are on a viaduct going over it, then the station. On the otherside its just greenery.

Tamworth looks like the middle of nowhere

 

[generalvegitable]

Milton Keynes I think is a bit like that, even more so if you drive in

 

[MidnightFlyer]

Nuneaton, Crewe you see a bit of, Stafford, Telford

 

[me123]

Glasgow Queen St? Can't remember that well, I think I fell asleep as soon as I got onto the 170 but I think once you are through the tunnel it looks like countryside?

Well, the upper level goes to countryside pretty soon, although you do have to pass through the lovely Sighthill and Springburn areas beforehand.

However, on the low level, you enter Greater Glasgow at Easterhouse, and you're in Greater Glasgow until about Dalmuir. So on the North Electric, Greater Glasgow definitely seems much bigger! This is because of the Glasgow "overspill" projects, which created the lovely areas that are Castlemilk, Easterhouse and Drumchapel to the South, East and West respectively. However, there's not as much to the North of the city.

Cumbernauld has to be a contender. The station itself is just a small shack in a small council estate, but the whole area is pretty big! Same for Croy station as well (which serves the same town); you look like you're in countryside, but you're actually in one of the biggest towns in Scotland!
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Milton Keynes I think is a bit like that, even more so if you drive in

Like Cumbernauld, I think it's how the New Towns work. There's lots of space in them, which in all reality is a testament to the planning (even if they aren't exactly the nicest places in the world!).

 

[Drsatan]

Exeter seems quite small when traveling through Exeter St David; this is because St Davids is on the outskirts of the city. When heading towards Dawlish, the only time a passenger can glimpse the city is before the train heads through St Thomas station, until the train heads past Marsh Barton industrial estate and along the river Exe.

 

[Max]

Doncaster is probably a candidate if travelling on the ECML.

 

[rail-britain]

Cumbernauld has to be a contender. The station itself is just a small shack in a small council estate, but the whole area is pretty big! Same for Croy station as well (which serves the same town); you look like you're in countryside, but you're actually in one of the biggest towns in Scotland!

Look on a map and you realise that Cumbernauld extends all the way from Cumbernauld (southern edge) to Croy (northern edge)
There are virtually no council owned properties in Cumbernauld now, the majority is privately owned now (ironically many are leased back to the council)
North Lanarkshire Council now only offer their own houses in Motherwell and Wishaw

As for the views from Glasgow QS and Edinburgh, wait until the A2B route is completed
Virtually all of it is through urban areas

The entry from east of Edinburgh appears less built up, but from the west it is vastly more, especially from the Airport / Gyle

 

[12CSVT]

Thirsk, Long Buckby, Brampton (Cumbria), Market Harborough all look small when passing on the train, but that is because the station is a long way from the town it serves.

 

[MCR247]

Wellingborough station is quite far from the town I think

 

[tripleseis]

Oxford surely! It's basically fields before you enter the station and fields after you leave.

 

[MidnightFlyer]

Oxford surely! It's basically fields before you enter the station and fields after you leave.

yep, true, Cov too if you enter from Bhm and head towards Rugby - quite built up out towards Keniulworth though

 

[scotsman]

Edinburgh also looks really small actually. From London the train starts slowing down where this is a load of trees, and you go through a tunnel into Waverley. Then after Haymarket its gone.

Glasgow Queen St? Can't remember that well, I think I fell asleep as soon as I got onto the 170 but I think once you are through the tunnel it looks like countryside?

1 - I think Edinburgh looks pretty big, considering that you can see it from the window from Craigentinny, right up to Saughton.
2 - You see a bit of Glasgow around Cowlairs junct. (the real nice bit in the East End)

 

[Nightrider]

You see a bit of Glasgow around Cowlairs junct. (the real nice bit in the East End)

:roll:

Cowlairs is in the north of the city.

 

[scotsman]

You see a bit of Glasgow around Cowlairs junct. (the real nice bit in the East End)

:roll:

Cowlairs is in the north of the city.

Agh! You're heading east anyway

 

[LE Greys]

Northallerton looks fairly small (you see a few houses on one side and a brief glimpse of something on the other). And you can't actually see much of York either (plenty of the yards and the NRM, but only a brief glimpse down the river). As for Winchester, all you see is one long cutting. The ultimate would probably be Stratford. Going by HS1, Stratford is a brief window of daylight with a station in it.

 

[Galvanize]

Basingstoke: You don't seem to see much of the town from the train, not any of the "old town" anyway! Only when I actually visited Basingstoke on the 1st of September for an assessment with SWT did I notice that the place is massive! Certainly has a large shopping precinct, followed by an even larger shopping centre (Which appeared on Top Gear when Jeremy was reviewing that new Ford Fiesta!). Either side of the station, within a couple of minutes its back to the countryside!!

Sevenoaks: One end of the station is in a cutting, the other end its back into the countryside again! The actual town of Sevenoaks is built to one side of the station, so you can't really see much of it. IIRC the town center is quite far from the station!

 

[starrymarkb]

Exeter seems quite small when traveling through Exeter St David; this is because St Davids is on the outskirts of the city. When heading towards Dawlish, the only time a passenger can glimpse the city is before the train heads through St Thomas station, until the train heads past Marsh Barton industrial estate and along the river Exe.

The Reason Exeter looks so rural is also down to the Flood Prevention, Large parts of St Thomas are near or below river level, and following a major flood in the 60s the defenses were built. With a lot of the cities expansion being post 60's everything is set back from the river (and therefore railway)

Certainly if you travel via Central, the urban area pretty much stretches as far as Pinhoe and Topsham

 

[37372]

Norwich IMO. It's constant countryside then within a minute or two you suddenly find yourself arriving into a city terminus.

 

[317 forever]

This might not be quite what you mean, but Crewe has a remarkably large station for a relatively small town, which is not even big enough to have its own political constituency (being represented by Crewe & Nantwich).

 

[MCR247]

This might not be quite what you mean, but Crewe has a remarkably large station for a relatively small town, which is not even big enough to have its own political constituency (being represented by Crewe & Nantwich).

What is meant, is that when you go to some places on the train, you wouldn't think it is that big, but it is actually quite big

 

[TGV]

Basingstoke: You don't seem to see much of the town from the train, not any of the "old town" anyway! Only when I actually visited Basingstoke on the 1st of September for an assessment with SWT did I notice that the place is massive! Certainly has a large shopping precinct, followed by an even larger shopping centre (Which appeared on Top Gear when Jeremy was reviewing that new Ford Fiesta!). Either side of the station, within a couple of minutes its back to the countryside!!

Sevenoaks: One end of the station is in a cutting, the other end its back into the countryside again! The actual town of Sevenoaks is built to one side of the station, so you can't really see much of it. IIRC the town center is quite far from the station!

Basinsgtoke - that depends on what side of the train you sit on! Coming FROM London, if you are on the left hand side, you will see the AA tower next to the ring road, then all the large business buildings and the huge Baclays glass skyscraper which looks very impressive, and Skyline Plaza (tallest residential building in Hampshire apparently), and as you said, hidden in there somewhere along with the other high-rises is Festival Place - the UK's largest town-centre shopping mall (i.e. not built out of town on it's own site like Lakeside or Bluewater), where Clarkson drove the Fiesta (see YouTube). But yeah, if you sit on the other side of the train and don't look to the left, you'll only see some industrial units, then the junction with the Reading line, the signal box, station, then a couple of roads on the way out of town and that's it.

My vote would be Huntingdon - a town of 20,000 people, but coming from London, because the station is the southern most part of the town, the first you see of it is the platform itself.