The debris from the collision was strewn over a large area a large part of it struck Central station, causing severe damage and killing twelve people. On 27 August 1941, two aircraft-a Blackburn Botha trainer and a Boulton Paul Defiant fighter-collided in midair over the sea, just off Blackpool's central seafront. Blackpool was home base for a major flight training centre and a fighter squadron during the war. Ĭentral station was the focus of Blackpool's worst incident during the Second World War.

The station was the world's busiest railway station in 1911. This arrangement made for very convenient and direct access to Blackpool's town centre, particularly the sea front and Blackpool Tower. A further development came in 1903 when an additional 'Marton Line' was added, routed directly from Preston and considerably shorter and quicker. In 1901, the station was enlarged to include 14 platforms-the same number of platforms as London's busy Paddington terminus in 2006. In 1874 this line was connected to another branch from Lytham to Kirkham, allowing through trains from Preston and beyond. Initially, it was a relatively small town centre terminus for an isolated line running along the south Fylde coast from Lytham. The station opened on 6 April 1863 as ' Hounds Hill' and was renamed 'Blackpool Central' in 1878. Principal railway services to Blackpool now terminate at Blackpool North. It contained 14 platforms at its closure in 1964, it became the station with the highest number of platforms ever to close. Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway / London and North Western Railwayīlackpool Central was the largest railway station in the town of Blackpool in the county of Lancashire, England. Illustrated with more than 200 photographs, Abandoned Train Stations provides a fascinating pictorial journey through the little-known remnants of rail transport infrastructure from every part of the world.Blackpool Central railway station and Blackpool Tower in 1959ĥ3☄8′51″N 3☀3′15″W / 53.8141°N 3.0542°W / 53.8141 -3.0542

Explore Canfranc International Railway Station, once a busy mountain hub of international travel between France and Spain see the eerily empty platform at Kings Cross Thameslink, London, today a service tunnel following the station’s closure in the early 2000s examine the grandiose Michigan Central Train Station in Detroit, an historic Amtrak rail depot, and once the tallest rail station in the world marvel at the dusty, overgrown shell of Abkhazia’s once beautiful railway station in Psyrtskha, a physical legacy of the former Soviet era in the Caucasus see the disused Tiwanaku train station, situated almost 4,000 metres above sea level in the Bolivian Andes or learn about the fascinating Istvántelek Train Yard, in the Hungarian capital of Budapest, better known as the ‘Red Star train graveyard’ because of its many Soviet-era engine wrecks. Organised by continent, this book takes the reader to every corner of the globe. Mysterious ghost stations forgotten beneath the cities of Paris and London desolate grand rail hubs in the Pyrenean mountains metro stations in China that terminate in a wasteland Abandoned Train Stations looks at some of the thousands of disused station buildings, platforms, lines, tunnels, and rail yards left behind by modernity.

Abandoned railway wasteland 2