King's Cross station
The London King's Cross Station (often only briefly King's Cross , without apostrophe Kings Cross is written) one of the main stations of London . The terminus of the East Coast Main Line is in the London Borough of Camden , next to St Pancras Station . King's Cross is named after a monument to King George IV that no longer exists . In 2011, 26.255 million passengers used the station.
function
The station is the terminus of the railway lines from North East England and East Scotland . Trains u. a. to Cambridge , York , Durham , Newcastle and Edinburgh . Below the train station is the sprawling King's Cross St. Pancras underground station , where six lines of the London Underground cross. The partially underground King's Cross Thameslink station is about five minutes' walk away .
Since the privatization of the British rail network, trains from King's Cross have mainly been operated by the following railway companies:
- East Coast : intercity services along the eastern main line ( East Coast Main Line )
- First Capital Connect : Express trains to Cambridge and King's Lynn and local trains to North London, Hertfordshire , Bedfordshire and Peterborough
- Hull Trains : Direct express trains to Kingston upon Hull
- Grand Central Railway : express trains to Sunderland via York and Hartlepool (from September 2007)
History and reception building
King's Cross was planned and built as the terminus for the Great Northern Railway . The architect in charge was Lewis Cubitt , and construction began in 1851 on the site of a former fever and smallpox hospital . The new station replaced a makeshift facility on Maiden Lane that had opened on August 8, 1850. The main part of the building, which today includes tracks 1 to 8, was opened on October 14, 1852. To the west of the station building, the railway company opened its Great Northern Hotel in 1854.
The arrangement of the tracks has been changed several times: At the beginning there was - as was common in the operation of large terminal stations at the time - only one arrival and one departure track (today the area of tracks 1 to 8), the tracks in between were used as storage facilities and for relocation used by locomotives. Due to the growing traffic, the station was constantly expanded. A second building with tracks 9 to 11 was added. A one-story extension was built at the front of the station in 1972, which obstructed the listed facade of the main hall.
Renovation and expansion
In the years 2008 to 2013 the station was completely renovated and expanded for 547 million pounds , after the neighboring St. Pancras station was converted into a Eurostar terminal in 2007. The measure comprised a large number of individual measures:
- The hall roof was renovated.
- To the side of the main hall, an additional track "0" was created next to track 1, also to create an alternative for the track closures during the construction period.
- In the main hall, pedestrian bridges were built or expanded as platform access.
- The Great Northern Hotel has been refurbished and is back in operation as a luxury hotel.
- In the area between the Great Northern Hotel and the historic reception building, an underground counter hall was built for King's Cross St. Pancras underground station with new, barrier-free platform access.
- and then built the new, semicircular ticket hall of the railway over it. From here, the platforms, the underground and St. Pancras train station are within easy reach. The London system of platform barriers ensures that departing passengers can reach the platforms via the upper floor of the new hall and the new pedestrian bridges and that those arriving leave the building at ground level via the cross platform .
The renewed station was opened on March 19, 2012, in time for the Summer Olympics . After the games, the extension from 1972 was demolished and a representative station square was created again, which brings out the historical facade.
At the same time, the area north of King's Cross is being developed as a new urban quarter. This area between the tracks of King's Cross and St. Pancras was characterized by industrial wastelands such as a former gas works , the freight yard , the railway depot and a canal port . The most important historical buildings such as the gas boiler and the goods hall will be preserved; otherwise, a highly dense high-rise building is planned. West Handyside Park, designed by Dan Pearson , opened in November 2013 . In the design, Pearson draws on native plants and neophytes that have spread along the railway lines in Great Britain since the Industrial Revolution, such as asters and willows, but dispensed with Japanese knotweed , which is notifiable in Great Britain.
King's Cross in literature, film and music
In the Harry Potter novel series by Joanne K. Rowling , the main hall of King's Cross station is the starting point of the Hogwarts Express , which Harry takes to boarding school. The train departs from the secret platform 9¾, which is hidden behind an invisible portal in a wall between platforms 9 and 10. In reality, tracks 9 and 10 are in an outbuilding and there is no wall between them. In 2001, Joanne Rowling admitted in an interview that when she wrote the first book she had confused King's Cross with Euston station , but there was also no wall between platforms 9 and 10. When the books were made into a film, the station scenes were filmed in the Main hall, tracks 4 and 5 were briefly renumbered 9 and 10 for this purpose. In the last film, because of the construction work on the train station during the shooting, the final scene (the time jump at the end of the novel) showed the exterior view of the St Pancras train station .
In the station a sign with the inscription "Platform 9¾" was attached to the wall between track 4 and 5. There is also an installation in which the front section of a luggage trolley was attached to the wall as if the trolley was about to disappear into the wall. After moving several times during the construction work, it has been located in the new entrance hall since 2012, on the right-hand side on the way to platforms 9, 10 and 11 (Western Departures). There is also a Harry Potter shop there.
On the Pottermore website , Rowling explains that there are other magical platforms in addition to platform 9¾. Platform 7½ is a kind of Orient Express only for wizards that connects London with the wizarding villages in continental Europe. There are also special trains to magical concerts or events on other tracks.
The crime comedy Ladykillers from 1955 was made in King's Cross train station and in its vicinity. The exterior shots of the film show the state before the extensive traffic and urban development construction measures since the turn of the millennium.
In the Doctor Who novel Transit , King's Cross is an important transfer hub for an interplanetary transport system based on the London Underground.
The Pet Shop Boys released a song called King's Cross on their Actually album in 1987 . The music video for the song Rent , which is also from the album Actually , was partly shot in and around King's Cross Station.
The main setting for Anthony Minghella's film Breaking and Entering is, in addition to the Kings Cross district, the major construction site of the new Eurostar terminal at St Pancras / Kings Cross.
British indie rock band The Holloways released the song King's Cross Cutie on the album So This Is Great Britain? (2006).
Notation
The correct spelling of the station name is controversial. With or without an apostrophe, both variants are correct:
- Kings Cross is the name of the surrounding area.
- King's Cross is the "official" lettering in the train station and in the underground station, it is also used on the route network of the London Underground ...
- ... but Kings Cross is the "official" name in online timetables and is also used in other "official" railway documents.
- since 2004, the railway infrastructure company Network Rail has been using the name King's Cross .
- The name London Kings X is also used on electronic destination displays at train stations .
See also
Web links
Individual evidence
- ^ Office of Rail Regulation - station usage
- ↑ History and Heritage , Great Northern Hotel website
- ↑ Conversion of London's King's Cross station at Zukunft Mobility , accessed on December 17, 2013
- ^ Description of the renovation work at Network Rail , accessed on December 17, 2013
- ↑ site of the Great Northern Hotel (english)
- ↑ pson: Spectacular Hall in London's King's Cross station . In: Eisenbahn-Revue International 7/2012, p. 361.
- ↑ website development company King Cross
- ↑ https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2013/nov/17/dan-pearson-design-for-kings-cross-garden
- ^ JK Rowling : Platform Nine and Three-Quarters. In: Pottermore . Retrieved August 11, 2016 .
- ↑ Descriptions of the locations of Ladykillers : in German and in English, very detailed, with photos and plans
| Previous station | National Rail | Next train station | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| final destination | First Capital Connect | Finsbury Park | ||
| East coast | Stevenage | |||
| Hull Trains | Grantham | |||
| Grand Central | York | |||
Coordinates: 51 ° 31 '55 " N , 0 ° 7' 22" W.