Bristol Temple Meads Railway Station - Station Approach, Bristol, UK
N 51° 26.980 W 002° 34.864
30U E 529111 N 5699914
Bristol Temple Meads railway station handles services operated by three rail franchises: Great Western, Cross Country and South Western railways. The station opened in 1840 and has eight tracks that comprise 15 platforms.
Waymark Code: WM12ZKM
Location: South West England, United Kingdom
Date Posted: 08/15/2020
Views: 4
Wikipedia has an article about the architect Sir Matthew Digby Wyatt that tells us:
"Sir Matthew Digby Wyatt (28 July 1820 – 21 May 1877) was a British architect and art historian who became Secretary of the Great Exhibition, Surveyor of the East India Company and the first Slade Professor of Fine Art at the University of Cambridge. From 1855 until 1859 he was honorary secretary of the Royal Institute of British Architects, and in 1866 received the Royal Gold Medal."
Wikipedia has an article about Bristol Temple Meads station that advises:
"Bristol Temple Meads is the oldest and largest railway station in Bristol, England. It is an important transport hub for public transport in the city. In addition to the train services there are bus services to many parts of the city and surrounding districts, and a ferry to the city centre. Bristol's other major station, Bristol Parkway, is on the northern outskirts of the conurbation.
Temple Meads was opened on 31 August 1840 as the western terminus of the Great Western Railway from London Paddington, 116 miles 31 chains (187.3 km) from Paddington. The railway (including Temple Meads) was the first to be designed by the British engineer Isambard Kingdom Brunel. Soon the station was also used by the Bristol and Exeter Railway, the Bristol and Gloucester Railway, the Bristol Harbour Railway and the Bristol and South Wales Union Railway. To accommodate the increasing number of trains, the station was expanded in the 1870s by Francis Fox and again between 1930 and 1935 by Percy Emerson Culverhouse. Brunel's terminus is no longer part of the operational station. The historical significance of the station has been noted, and most of the site is Grade I listed.
The platforms are numbered 1 to 15 but passenger trains are confined to just eight tracks. Most platforms are numbered separately at each end, with odd numbers at the east end and even numbers at the west. Platform 2 is not signalled for passenger trains, and there is no platform 14.
Temple Meads is managed by Network Rail and the majority of services are operated by the present-day Great Western Railway. Other operators are CrossCountry and South Western Railway. In the 12 months to March 2014, 9.5 million entries and exits were recorded at the station.
In Britain's 100 Best Railway Stations by Simon Jenkins, the station was one of only ten to be awarded five stars."
As mentioned, the station is Grade I listed with the entry at the Historic England website telling us:
"Railway station. 1865-78. By Sir Matthew Digby Wyatt. For Great Western Railway and Midland Railway. Additional platforms of 1930-5.
Conglomerate with limestone dressings. Booking office with forward projecting screens to train sheds. Tudor Revival style. 2 storeys; 3-window range, with single storey; 19-window range to right and 17-window range to left. Booking office has a symmetrical crenellated front with lower angled side blocks and a central 2-stage tower, and octagonal turrets to the corners; ground-floor 4-centred arches have banded Purbeck marble shafts, a label mould with quatrefoil spandrels, and C20 doors; first floor has 6-light square-headed windows with transoms and cinquefoil heads, stilted labels over panels with quatrefoils over the middle window; a half-quatrefoil arcade below the parapet, with blind lancets to the merlons; the turrets have 2 crenellated courses below pyramidal tops. The tower has an arcade of engaged shafts which pass through the drip to pointed arches, under a large square panel and clock with a trefoil-headed blind arcade above. The shed screens have mullion and transom windows separated by octagonal buttresses, with a glazed cast-iron canopy all around the frontage.
INTERIOR: high booking office of brick with octagonal tas-de-charges, but a C20 concrete ceiling; mezzanine with panelled ceiling and 4-centre arched windows with 4 lights and intersecting tracery. The main train shed has a 2-centred trussed roof with traceried arch braces on octagonal corbel shafts and black diaper work under the eaves. Further platforms of 1930-5 by PE Culverhouse have cream terracotta buildings with BRISTOL in glazed letters.
HISTORICAL NOTE: the station was a joint venture between the Great Western Railway and the Midland Railway, and was originally called Bristol Joint Station. It had a steep French Empire roof to the tower, which was destroyed in the Second World War, and crockets to the turret tops."