Revamped Blackburn platform to open (From Lancashire Telegraph)

Revamped Blackburn platform to open

9:30am Saturday 22nd October 2011 in News

BLACKBURN Railway Station's new-look platform was unveiled yesterday.

The £1.7million renovation of platform four was officially opened by Blackburn MP Jack Straw and is set to make travelling on the Clitheroe line a more comfortable experience.

The improvements have taken five months to complete and include new lighting, passenger information screens, a public address system and CCTV cameras.

A new lift, which will make the platform more easily accessible to disabled passengers and those with luggage, has also been installed.

But the piece de resistance is the heated waiting room, where passengers can shelter from the elements.

"It gives such amazing resources for the customers and we are hoping it will encourage more passengers," said station manager Jane Murray.

"It is so bright and just gives a wow factor."

Blackburn with Darwen Council is aiming to increase the number of trains passing through Blackburn so that there will be a train to Manchester every half hour.

Mayor Karimeh Foster said that this would show everybody what Blackburn has to offer and might even encourage businesses to open here.

Funding for the developments was provided by Access For All For Life, the National Stations Improvement Programme and Blackburn with Darewn Council.

"This is a great day for rail passengers in Blackburn and for the town and the area as a whole," said Mr Straw.

"We now have a very fast service to Yorkshire and beyond,” he said.

Comments(19)

happycyclist says...
9:38am Sat 22 Oct 11

I hope the heated waiting room has different doors than the idiotic automatic doors on the other platform that open every time someone walks past, letting blasts of cold wind in. AND different seats than the uncomfortable metal things.

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chocky says...
10:13am Sat 22 Oct 11

About time, especially welcome on match day..

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shytalk says...
1:10pm Sat 22 Oct 11

All good stuff seeing as the only way to travel now is by rail unless you want to sit in traffic and find nowhere to park your car after taking out a mortgage to put petrol in it

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happycyclist says...
1:28pm Sat 22 Oct 11

£1.7m just for that shows how much of a pipe-dream things like the reinstatement of the Todmorden Curve or double track from Blackburn to Manchester are.

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Mothernature says...
2:07pm Sat 22 Oct 11

When are they going to get around to making Darwen platform more user friendly. Flipping freezing there.

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Brian Todd says...
3:51pm Sat 22 Oct 11

I could not believe that the first redesigned Blackburn RAilway Station could allow the platform where most passangers waited to be without a cover and had to add this protection as an extra.
Those planners thought little of the people who actua;ly pay for the railway.

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johnley says...
4:37pm Sat 22 Oct 11

I remember Blackburn station from the 1970’s, and when I was a lad, and old shep was a pup, we use to stand in awe at this wonderful ship that was in a big glass case, dose anyone know what ever happen to it, where is it now. I live in the south now, and I was last in Blackburn a few months ago, I visited Blackburn station to see if it was still there, sadly no. so now you have a faster service to Yorkshire, Halifax, Bradford, that will be very handy for 80% of Blackburn now, how sad

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s_smith says...
6:15pm Sat 22 Oct 11

Brian Todd wrote:
I could not believe that the first redesigned Blackburn RAilway Station could allow the platform where most passangers waited to be without a cover and had to add this protection as an extra.
Those planners thought little of the people who actua;ly pay for the railway.

Platform 4 was never designed to be in regular use - all trains were to use P1 to P3. P4 was used to stable trains for the evening peak to Manchester.
.
I am of the opinion, however, that Blackburn Station is in the wrong place.
.
The whole building should have been demolished and moved back toward where Vue Cinema is now, a multi-storey car park built adjacent to it and the space at the front made vacant by the demolished original building used for a new undercover bus interchange.
.
It should also have been moved closer to Darwen Street Bridge, to allow a new entrance to be built there. As it is, the station is tucked away either in the bus station, or at the back of the cinema.
.
Again though, it shows a lack of forward planning and thinking on the part of the council to have a "master plan" for the town and instead taking each element of the town separately and not thinking "well, if this could be moved slightly...".
.
So many wasted opportunities...

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Noiticer says...
6:54pm Sat 22 Oct 11

Blackburn Station is in exactly the best location for access to the town centre as our Victorian forebears worked out. Most people arrive by train and then walk into the town or catch a bus from the adjacent bus station - the envy of most towns but sadly not in the eyes of BwD planners who want to move the bus station away from its current location to release the land for commercial development. Who owns the land? Probably the Cathedral authorities, I suspect which ,if true, will also see profit writ large. Never mind the advantage of having a perfect rail/bus interchange. Only in Blackburn could such shortsighted plans be made.
In the 1980's British Rail also had plans to move the station's location back to the site now occupied by the Vue but the station building was Listed so couldn't. Again, this proposal was simply to release land for commercial development without thought for the passengers. Examples where such plans happened in the 1980's include Windermere, Southport (where more recent proposals suggested moving the platforms further back but strongly resisted), Blackpool, Morecambe, Wrexham all with detrimental effects on passengers.
As stated, Platform 4 was never intended for regular use when Blackburn Station was refurbished and now we have the ridiculous state of affairs when passengers bound for Manchester and Preston have to make a long detour to the booking office on the island platform or use the less flexible ticket machine in the subway. The current arrangement also involves at least four ticket inspectors to check tickets. Before the Station was remodelled and the booking office was downstairs it needed one!Removing the overall roof has allowed water to pour into the subway because the rail planners forgot thet the track above would need a waterproof membrane adding when the roof was removed.
Watching the contractors carrying out the work on Platform 4 has been an object lesson in why improvements on the rail network take such a long time and are so costly. Their workrate, or lack of, was frustrating to observe.

Blackburn Station is in exactly the best location for access to the town centre as our Victorian forebears worked out. Most people arrive by train and then walk into the town or catch a bus from the adjacent bus station - the envy of most towns but sadly not in the eyes of BwD planners who want to move the bus station away from its current location to release the land for commercial development. Who owns the land? Probably the Cathedral authorities, I suspect which ,if true, will also see profit writ large. Never mind the advantage of having a perfect rail/bus interchange. Only in Blackburn could such shortsighted plans be made. In the 1980's British Rail also had plans to move the station's location back to the site now occupied by the Vue but the station building was Listed so couldn't. Again, this proposal was simply to release land for commercial development without thought for the passengers. Examples where such plans happened in the 1980's include Windermere, Southport (where more recent proposals suggested moving the platforms further back but strongly resisted), Blackpool, Morecambe, Wrexham all with detrimental effects on passengers. As stated, Platform 4 was never intended for regular use when Blackburn Station was refurbished and now we have the ridiculous state of affairs when passengers bound for Manchester and Preston have to make a long detour to the booking office on the island platform or use the less flexible ticket machine in the subway. The current arrangement also involves at least four ticket inspectors to check tickets. Before the Station was remodelled and the booking office was downstairs it needed one!Removing the overall roof has allowed water to pour into the subway because the rail planners forgot thet the track above would need a waterproof membrane adding when the roof was removed. Watching the contractors carrying out the work on Platform 4 has been an object lesson in why improvements on the rail network take such a long time and are so costly. Their workrate, or lack of, was frustrating to observe. Noiticer

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s_smith says...
10:16pm Sat 22 Oct 11

Moving the station would, yes, release land at the front of the station to allow for an enlarged public interchange facility; but that it not the only reason.
.
The station building itself is of no real architectural merit, so god knows why it is listed - it is essentially a big shed with a clock on top of it and a canopy in front. It is neither a welcoming building or anything to look at.
.
Moving the station back toward Vue and moving the platforms up toward Darwen St Bridge, would allow for a new entrances to be provided closer to the main shopping streets, longer platforms for longer trains (Blackburn is a calling point for many charter trains heading up the S&C for example).
.
But hey, forward thinking, even for someone of my advancing age isnt always appreciated obviously.

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tenerc says...
10:36pm Sat 22 Oct 11

i think the boat in the case is now in the museum

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Jerzei Balowski says...
1:26am Sun 23 Oct 11

Why is Platform 4 required at all ? 2 trains to Preston per hour and 1 train to Manchester per hour since they cut the service. Pretty shoddy if they can't schedule 3 trains per hour on a platform.

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happycyclist says...
12:26pm Sun 23 Oct 11

s_smith wrote:

Brian Todd wrote:
I could not believe that the first redesigned Blackburn RAilway Station could allow the platform where most passangers waited to be without a cover and had to add this protection as an extra.
Those planners thought little of the people who actua;ly pay for the railway.
Platform 4 was never designed to be in regular use - all trains were to use P1 to P3. P4 was used to stable trains for the evening peak to Manchester.
.
I am of the opinion, however, that Blackburn Station is in the wrong place.
.
The whole building should have been demolished and moved back toward where Vue Cinema is now, a multi-storey car park built adjacent to it and the space at the front made vacant by the demolished original building used for a new undercover bus interchange.
.
It should also have been moved closer to Darwen Street Bridge, to allow a new entrance to be built there. As it is, the station is tucked away either in the bus station, or at the back of the cinema.
.
Again though, it shows a lack of forward planning and thinking on the part of the council to have a "master plan" for the town and instead taking each element of the town separately and not thinking "well, if this could be moved slightly...".
.
So many wasted opportunities...

Another excellent comment from s_smith.

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doolish says...
1:24pm Sun 23 Oct 11

the ship in the glass case on platform 2, was a model of The Viking of the Isle Of Man Steam Packet Co, it always belong to them and as far as i know is in their offices

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johnley says...
4:22pm Sun 23 Oct 11

doolish wrote:
the ship in the glass case on platform 2, was a model of The Viking of the Isle Of Man Steam Packet Co, it always belong to them and as far as i know is in their offices

thanks for that mate, must se it agaian

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richard says...
11:20am Mon 24 Oct 11

Here you go: http://www.lancashir
etelegraph.co.uk/arc
hive/2002/04/22/Lanc
ashire+Archive/59731
25.Shipping_out_a_pi
ece_of_history/

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johnley says...
5:55pm Mon 24 Oct 11

richard wrote:
Here you go: http://www.lancashir etelegraph.co.uk/arc hive/2002/04/22/Lanc ashire+Archive/59731 25.Shipping_out_a_pi ece_of_history/

nice one

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richard says...
9:42am Tue 25 Oct 11

This is from the Steam Packet Co:

"Whilst I do not know the full history of the model can confirm that there is a large model of the Viking in a glass case which is on display in the board room of our Imperial Buildings office here in Douglas. I feel sure that it is the same one as you describe in your e mail."

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Noiticer says...
9:46am Tue 25 Oct 11

The ship in the glass case on Blackburn Sta was called The Viking with two funnels.

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Revamped Blackburn platform to open (From Lancashire Telegraph)

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