The Updating Of Newcastle Station
Newcastle station is one of the most important stations on the East Coast Main Line. I took these pictures of the station redevelopment as I passed through.
My memories of the station usually involve how blustery it can be. The glazing of the front of the station, may not be as dramatic as that at Strasbourg, but it did seem to make the station entrance a lot more civilised. The position of the ticket machines and information screens under the portico, is an idea that could have been borrowed from the French station, with which it shares a lot of operational characteristics, like fast trains to the capital, an extensive regional network and a below-ground metro or tram.
Newcastle has now joined Kings Cross and Liverpool Lime Street, where you can walk straight outside the station and be in a partly-pedestrianised area, where you can get your bearings of the city, that might be unknown to you. As the pictures show work is still continuing in this area.
Newcastle is one of six operational stations in the UK, that is a Grade One Listed Building. The others are Bristol Temple Meads, Huddersfield, Kings Cross, Paddington and St. Pancras. I can see Manchester Victoria joining this elite group, when it is completed.
The Bridges Of Berwick-upon-Tweed
I took these pictures as my train from Edinburgh to Newcastle crossed the border into England on the Royal Border Bridge.
The main bridge in the picture is the Royal Tweed Bridge with Berwick Bridge behind.
This Google Earth image shows the three major bridges in the area and Berwick-upon-Tweed station above the town.
Berwick-On-Tweed
Note how you can make out the arches of the railway viaduct in the image.
Tracing The New Borders Railway
A friend and I traced the new Borders Railway from it’s terminus at Tweedbank, back into Edinburgh.
It certainly looks like the opening date won’t be far off the planned one of September 6th, 2015.
To my untrained eye, it looks like they’ve done a superb design and engineering job to squeeze the new railway through some of the places it serves like Galashiels. Especially, as the railway is being built ready for electrification and with a loading gauge that could take the largest freight. On the Borders Railway web site, they say they have no plans to carry freight at present, but in the future an important project may create a freight need, so it is wise not to rule it out.
In all the pictures you will not see any level crossings. The Borders Railway has been built without them, as they are too much of a safety risk.
The Anonymous Widower 