Trivia: Stations that sound nice but really aren't

[Bevan Price]

One for the future. Eccleston Park.
Currently on the edge of an up-market suburb of St. Helens, but the whole area is under threat of being swamped by a massive housing estate proposed to be built on a local golf course.

 

[Bungle158]

St. Budeaux...both stations.

 

[Metal_gee_man]

Peartree is on a ring road and unmanned. Press a button to have the gates unlocked by East Midland staff

I was thinking Pear Tree too...
Geoff Marshall didn't think too much of it either

 

[Bletchleyite]

Pear Tree station itself is a pretty much spitting image of Aughton Park on Merseyrail, which is in a quite posh area (and sounds it, too). I believe outside the station isn't quite as nice, though.

It is on a ring road but it's hardly Denton - a bit of Street View suggests it's in generic leafy semi-detached suburbia, which is OK enough.

I believe the gate lock is due to a drug problem, which Aughton Park (being similarly hidden away in a cutting) also had, at least before the CCTV was installed - there was a big problem with needles being left around and behind the old wooden waiting shelter.

 

[ChristopherJ]

Ponders End - it certainly does make you 'ponder your end' when you see the chav invested Enfield council estates surrounding the station.

Same for Brimsdown (Grimsdown) next door!

 

[ValleyLines142]

That's a bit harsh and not quite true.

Oh come on!

 

[C J Snarzell]

Pear Tree station itself is a pretty much spitting image of Aughton Park on Merseyrail, which is in a quite posh area (and sounds it, too). I believe outside the station isn't quite as nice, though.

It is on a ring road but it's hardly Denton - a bit of Street View suggests it's in generic leafy semi-detached suburbia, which is OK enough.

I believe the gate lock is due to a drug problem, which Aughton Park (being similarly hidden away in a cutting) also had, at least before the CCTV was installed - there was a big problem with needles being left around and behind the old wooden waiting shelter.

I am actually very surprised about Aughton's drug problem and the undesirables - it's quite an upmarket commuter area along with nearby Ormskirk which has become a mini haven for premiership footballers and wealthy business people with property prices being quite pricey.

CJ

 

[HamworthyGoods]

Heading out of Liverpool Street calling at Bethnal Green, Cambridge Heath, London Fields and Hackney Downs sounds very exotic...,

 

[SteveyBee131]

I was thinking Pear Tree too...
Geoff Marshall didn't think too much of it either...

He also wasn't overly find of New Clee. His feelings are perhaps justifiable, New Clee is situated reasonably close to the docks (perhaps even closer than 'Grimsby Docks' station!), which these days is somewhat run down and a shadow of it's former self so not at all "New"! Not only that but I don't think I'd like to be there on a dark evening, but let's not think about that too much.

As for "Clee", if we take the Old English meaning there are no round topped hills in the vicinity of the station, that part of Grimsby is pretty much flat! And the station is at least ½mile away from the Cleethorpes boundary so that theory doesn't work either!

Indeed, that part of town isn't even known as New Clee, but East Marsh!

Having said all that, Grimsby is a really nice place, I wouldn't live here if it weren't!

 

[Bletchleyite]

I am actually very surprised about Aughton's drug problem and the undesirables - it's quite an upmarket commuter area along with nearby Ormskirk which has become a mini haven for premiership footballers and wealthy business people with property prices being quite pricey.

Sometimes posh places are worse for it (think rich City bankers). Everyone certainly knew who the local drug dealing family was and where they lived when I was at school, though more to ensure they were avoided rather than to partake of their wares!

FWIW Ormskirk isn't that pricey (Formby for example is considerably more expensive), though the large houses in Aughton are!

 

[Clip]

Oh come on!

?? I don't understand. It was built for the pleasure beach when they had opened entrances there? It's not in a bad area really either

 

[John Griffiths]

Brockley Whins on the T&W Metro sounds like a nice rural hamlet, maybe a thatched pub or so, not 80s housing estates and a huge ASDA. They should have kept the name Boldon Colliery.

 

[61653 HTAFC]

The names of both Parson Street and Bedminster in Bristol write cheques that the surrounding environs can't cash.

 

[Djgr]

Sometimes posh places are worse for it (think rich City bankers). Everyone certainly knew who the local drug dealing family was and where they lived when I was at school, though more to ensure they were avoided rather than to partake of their wares!

FWIW Ormskirk isn't that pricey (Formby for example is considerably more expensive), though the large houses in Aughton are!

Of course Formby and Ormskirk are on different sides of the Scouse speaking Landsker line. The boundary on the Southport line is Freshfield. I imagine Town Green is the first stop on the Lancs. speaking side? (Basically aright dare la? is replaced with trouble a t'mill?)

 

[Bletchleyite]

Of course Formby and Ormskirk are on different sides of the Scouse speaking Landsker line. The boundary on the Southport line is Freshfield. I imagine Town Green is the first stop on the Lancs. speaking side?

Plenty of (fairly soft) Scouse spoken in Ormskirk (that gets roughly as far as Burscough), but the actual border is between Town Green and Maghull North, yes.

 

[C J Snarzell]

Plenty of (fairly soft) Scouse spoken in Ormskirk (that gets roughly as far as Burscough), but the actual border is between Town Green and Maghull North, yes.

Skelmersdale is full of 'Scousers' too - but many are people born and bred in Skem from Liverpool families who moved there during the regeneration project in the 60s.

CJ

 

[Skimpot flyer]

One stop along from there, Hattersley sounds like it should be really posh but it's actually an abject dump of a Council estate, albeit one with nice views.

Ok, don’t Labour the point

 

[Ianno87]

Ponders End - it certainly does make you 'ponder your end' when you see the chav invested Enfield council estates surrounding the station.

Same for Brimsdown (Grimsdown) next door!

And Enfield Lock. Not some pretty postcard canalside village!

 

[ValleyLines142]

?? I don't understand. It was built for the pleasure beach when they had opened entrances there? It's not in a bad area really either

Having lived in Blackpool for some time, the area leaves a lot to be desired. The Pleasure Beach itself is pleasant, but sadly is spoiled sometimes by some burly, pubescent teenagers.

Don't get me wrong, I've had some lovely times in Blackpool, but you do have to face reality.

 

[Gathursty]

I always like to make the point when people mention Southport and Formby that the closest stations to the beach are actually Hall Road and Hightown, not Ainsdale, Formby or Southport. In fact, I frequently drive to Hightown as it's only 30 mins away and the parking is unrestricted and the traffic is nonexistent after coming off the bypass.

 

[MadMac]

And Enfield Lock. Not some pretty postcard canalside village!

Not within our normal sphere, but this brought to mind an item on the Raymond Baxter-era "Tomorrow's World" about Liffey Junction in North Dublin. While the name conjures up visions of a peaceful wayside halt with boats ambling down the nearby river, the reality was one of the most-vandalised sites on the entire CIE network which would have probably been rejected as a filming location for "Assault on Precinct 13". The item was about the latest technologies in vandal deterrence.

 

[LowLevel]

Pear Tree station itself is a pretty much spitting image of Aughton Park on Merseyrail, which is in a quite posh area (and sounds it, too). I believe outside the station isn't quite as nice, though.

It is on a ring road but it's hardly Denton - a bit of Street View suggests it's in generic leafy semi-detached suburbia, which is OK enough.

I believe the gate lock is due to a drug problem, which Aughton Park (being similarly hidden away in a cutting) also had, at least before the CCTV was installed - there was a big problem with needles being left around and behind the old wooden waiting shelter.

Peartree's remote gate lock was derived from a 2 fold problem - one, youths kicking about causing trouble (as booked) and two, it was a suicide black spot with people coming and sitting in a lonely, dreary location contemplating the end, finding absolutely no hope or positivity and certainly no humanity to talk them out of it and then going through with the deed far too often. The latter was by far the bigger imperative for fitting the locks.

Said locks occasionally go wrong and more than once I've been working the Crewe bound service in the evening and heard hollering from the gate when the intercom has failed and the intending passenger has been unable to get in.

The station is on too busy a mainline to receive many calls and has been left behind by time in terms of it's original purpose. A handful of regulars do use it but I was always surprised it wasn't shut with the rest of the Sinfin branch.

It is a contrast with Spondon, which has a fairly solid core of commuter traffic during peak times but no interest during the rest of the day.

 

[Jamesrob637]

St. Budeaux...both stations.

Keyham is rougher but St Budeaux isn't exactly the prettiest part of what isn't particularly a pretty city to begin with (waterfront bits excepted)

 

[norbitonflyer]

"Carstairs" sounds as though it ought to be quite well heeled, with a big country house to me.

Possibly by association with one of the upper-class-twit British airmen in "'Allo 'Allo" ?

Can I nominate Colliers Wood and Shepherds Bush?

 

[yorksrob]

Possibly by association with one of the upper-class-twit British airmen in "'Allo 'Allo" ?

Undoubtedly, yes

 

[Gathursty]

Ninian Park

 

[Cheshire Scot]

A colleague of mine who was a big football fan once went to a weird football match (Airdrie v Derby County in some obscure Anglo-Scottish pre-season competition). Evening kick off. The trip was principally remembered for someone urinating down his back during the match and a 2 hour wait on Coatbridge Sunnyside - in pitch darkness of course - for the Up Royal Highlander.

I was at that match, it was the 1971/72 Texaco Cup Final, a tournament in the early seventies involving the next 6 highest placed teams in Scotland, England behind those who qualified for European Competitions, and 2 teams each from Northern Ireland and The Irish Republic.
As pointed out by Mcr Warrior, the train south would have called at Coatbridge Central, not Sunnyside although the traveller would probably have travelled from Airdrie to Sunnyside on a class 303 then walked across town to Central. The train south might more likely have been the Perth to Euston at 23.11 (approx. 2 hours after the match ended unless he overstayed in a local hostelry and ended up having to wait on that desolate station for the 00.32 Highlander.
The then freight only Airdrie to Bathgate line ran along the back of Broomfield, the old Airdrie ground. The name Broomfield, perhaps conjures up thoughts of a nice country location?

 

[Bletchleyite]

The station is on too busy a mainline to receive many calls and has been left behind by time in terms of it's original purpose. A handful of regulars do use it but I was always surprised it wasn't shut with the rest of the Sinfin branch.

What was its original purpose? It looks to me like a classic suburban station which would carry a reasonable number of people (in normal circumstances) to the city centre for work and shopping if it was offered a reasonable service (at least hourly), on the basis that people tend to prefer train over bus in most cases?

Or does it lose out over bus because Derby station is, as seems to be the theme on the MML, anything but central?

 

[LowLevel]

What was its original purpose? It looks to me like a classic suburban station which would carry a reasonable number of people (in normal circumstances) to the city centre for work and shopping if it was offered a reasonable service (at least hourly), on the basis that people tend to prefer train over bus in most cases?

Or does it lose out over bus because Derby station is, as seems to be the theme on the MML, anything but central?

It was the junction for Melbourne once upon a time but that line was one of several LMS casualties in the 30s in terms of passenger trains. Basically pre widespread road transport it catered for moving people in to and out of the city centre and also to local industrial sites. It was a very early opening - 1830s I think - so back when suburban heavy rail was king even in smaller towns and cities.

It was closed in the 60s and reopened in the 70s with the Sinfin branch - I assume given it's location on a route that had a choice of 2 local services it was harder to justify withdrawing the passenger service in the 90s when Sinfin finally failed.

 

[backontrack]

The connotations of 'Easter' aren't the same as Easterhouse...