Longest platform

[1ab]

Going on from condor7 post about the smallest platform length on the network. What is the longest?

 

[Western 52]

Gloucester?

 

[hexagon789]

Going on from condor7 post about the smallest platform length on the network. What is the longest?

Continuous structure or continuous face?

If the former, then Colchester 3/4 at 2,034ft. If the latter, then Gloucester 4 at 1,977ft.

 

[PGAT]

Gloucester. It got a Guinness record

 

[hexagon789]

It got a Guinness record

For what?

 

[weepingwillowb]

Scarborough is said to have the longest seat - 456 feet.

 

[devon_belle]

Formerly Manchester Victoria had a 2,238 ft platform, but obviously no longer.

 

[davews]

How do the Liverpool Street ones compare, they seem to go on for ages as you come out of the station?

 

[Snow1964]

Bournemouth (platform 3&4) is 1748ft
York has a platform face 1692ft

Think longest in Scotland is Perth at 1714ft,
followed by Edinburgh Waverley at 1596ft

Wales longest platform is Pontypridd

Depending on if you define them as platforms, or loading docks, the 10 at Cheriton (Eurotunnel) are each about 2400 feet (750m)

 

[Mcr Warrior]

How does Cambridge station measure up, these days?

 

[Merle Haggard]

Formerly Manchester Victoria had a 2,238 ft platform, but obviously no longer.

Pedantically this was the platform face that was in both Victoria and Exchange (the two stations were adjacent but one platform in effect connected the two)

 

[Magdalia]

How does Cambridge station measure up, these days?

The old through platform at Cambridge has never been especially long. In the old pre-powerbox age it was 1354 feet.

Both ends have since been extended but it is no longer a continuous platform: there is a fence adjacent to the scissors crossing between CA161 and CA162 signals.

 

[WestAnglian]

How does Cambridge station measure up, these days?

I don't think it can be counted as a single platform any more as they've erected a fence along the platform edge alongside the scissors junction.

 

[Western 52]

Slightly off topic, but how long was the platform at Limerick Junction? I think it may have been reduced when they added P4 though.

 

[Mcr Warrior]

I don't think it can be counted as a single platform any more as they've erected a fence along the platform edge alongside the scissors junction.

Thanks. Not been there (Cambridge) for several years.

 

[Merle Haggard]

Slightly off topic, but how long was the platform at Limerick Junction? I think it may have been reduced when they added P4 though.

Was that the one where a train from the Cork(?) direction shot past on the next track and then set back across a crossover? I was on a train that did it (long ago!) but don't remember the platform as being particularly long..

 

[Western 52]

Was that the one where a train from the Cork(?) direction shot past on the next track and then set back across a crossover? I was on a train that did it (long ago!) but don't remember the platform as being particularly long..

Yes that's the one! I've not been there since the 1990s, but two trains could use the platform at the same time.

 

[BeijingDave]

I don't think it can be counted as a single platform any more as they've erected a fence along the platform edge alongside the scissors junction.

Is it a simple separator between the two distinct platforms, or something longer?

 

[hexagon789]

Was that the one where a train from the Cork(?) direction shot past on the next track and then set back across a crossover? I was on a train that did it (long ago!) but don't remember the platform as being particularly long..

Was that the one where a train from the Cork(?) direction shot past on the next track and then set back across a crossover? I was on a train that did it (long ago!) but don't remember the platform as being particularly long..

1598ft

The need to reverse in and out of the through platform was done away with in the 1967 rebuild.

The main platform has been truncated, and is now used only by Dublin bound trains, these use what was formerly the Cork platform loop - the Dublin section being removed in the 2007 rationalisation which also removed the 'back road' and the Waterford Bay. A new through platform on the Cork-bound running line was opened in 2019.

 

[Haywain]

When I was a lad Colchester was alleged to be the longest platform in Britain although that probably referred to the structure as the platform face is not continuous.

 

[Western 52]

1598ft

The need to reverse in and out of the through platform was done away with in the 1967 rebuild.

The main platform has been truncated, and is now used only by Dublin bound trains, these use what was formerly the Cork platform loop - the Dublin section being removed in the 2007 rationalisation which also removed the 'back road' and the Waterford Bay. A new through platform on the Cork-bound running line was opened in 2019.

It was certainly a quirky layout! I remember arriving from Limerick into the bay at the south end. The train ran through to the south then reversed into the bay. It was loco hauled which made it more interesting.

 

[William3000]

How does Cambridge station measure up, these days?

This is what it looks like - it separate platform 1 to the far end of it and platform 4 out of shot to the right. I think both platforms have been extended in recent years to take 12 coach trains.

 

[The exile]

Would guess that the biggest mismatch between platform length and location must be the Aberystwyth side platform at Dovey Junction. The reason for its length is clear - but on a cold drizzly morning with no trains or other passengers it looks very out of place.

 

[swt_passenger]

How do the Liverpool Street ones compare, they seem to go on for ages as you come out of the station?

I don’t think any of those are continuous?

 

[Snow1964]

How do the Liverpool Street ones compare, they seem to go on for ages as you come out of the station?

Not that long, all about 820-900 feet.
A couple in middle used to be longer, went almost to hotel building, but were shortened during the 1988-91 rebuild to make the buffer stops line up.
Platform 1 and 2 had been partly filled in years earlier, (the tracks originally ran through to Metropolitan line) but were dug out again during the rebuilt, if you look at the platform face wall about where carriage 4 stops, will see it is old brick, but at same point on platforms 3-7 it is new concrete.

 

[edwin_m]

It was certainly a quirky layout! I remember arriving from Limerick into the bay at the south end. The train ran through to the south then reversed into the bay. It was loco hauled which made it more interesting.

At one time the station even had five lines going through it. Although I don't think any of them rhymed.

 

[Sun Chariot]

16th April 1929, Exchange's platform 3 was extended over the Irwell bridge to Victoria's platform 11; and so it became Europe's longest platform face, at 2,238 feet (682 m).

I've always wondered at the rationale. Does any forum reader know? Was it to facilitate easier movement of passengers / parcels, between destinations served by each of the former LNWR and L&Y stations?

 

[Mcr Warrior]

I've always wondered at the rationale. Does any forum reader know? Was it to facilitate easier movement of passengers / parcels, between destinations served by each of the former LNWR and L&Y stations?

Substantial newspaper traffic. The layout would have facilitated more than one train (for different regional destinations) being loaded at the same time.

 

[Sun Chariot]

Thanks. That figures. Three trains capacity on the platform face

 

[QueensCurve]

Going on from condor7 post about the smallest platform length on the network. What is the longest?

Traditionally I Believe it was the joint platform of Manchester Victoria and Manchester Exchange.