Maledonian Central Station
Maledonian Central Station Maledonien Kozponto Togastas | |
|---|---|
 An aerial view of the Maledonian Central Station, taken in 2023. | |
| Location | Bács street 6 Maledonia Entropan |
| Owned by | ES |
| Operated by | ES Link |
| Platforms | 24 |
| Tracks | 32 |
| Connections | Bus terminal |
| Construction | |
| Parking | Yes |
| Bicycle facilities | Yes |
| Other information | |
| Station code | MKT |
| Classification | ATIV category A |
| Website | entropenrekkverk.en/ |
| History | |
| Opened | 1891 |
| Rebuilt | 1958 2019 |
| Electrified | 1991 |
| Original company | Maledonian Railway Leinten Railway |
| Pre-nationalisation | Leinten Railway |
| Key dates | |
| 7 June 1891 | General Station built by Leinten Railway |
| 1 September 1904 | Pétervására Station built by Leinten Railway |
| 7 July 1958 | Maledonian Railway demolished existing stations, replaced with Maledonian Central Station |
| Traffic | |
| 2018/19 |  33.873 million |
| Interchange | 1.259 million |
| 2019/20 |  33.088 million |
| Interchange | 1.085 million |
| 2020/21 | 32.958 million |
| Interchange | 1.103 million |
| 2021/22 | 43.618 million |
| Interchange | 1.260 million |
| 2022/23 | 48.213 million |
| Interchange | 1.337 million |
Maledonian Central Station is an ES Link station in Maledonia, Entropan, the principal railway station serving the city. It is located on the edge of the Old Town of the city, between the Bakonykúti and Majs neighbourhoods, opposite to Zöld Street. It is the busiest station in Entropan. The station is the terminus of the North West Main Line to Elveklo, the South West Main Line to Rockrsea, the North Main Line to Sáefi, the South Eastern Main Line to Mogyoróska, the North Eastern Main Line to Veli, and several commuter services around Maledonia, Salomvár, Detek, and Gyurus.
The station was opened in 1891 by Leinten Railway, replacing the Maledonian Station, which was badly damaged due to the Second Entropanian Civil War. In 1946, Leinten Railway was nationalised, integrated into the regional Maledonian Railway company. Shortly after this, as part of a wide-scale infrastructure program initiated by the Social Democratic Berkes administration, the station was rebuilt, re-opening in 1950. In 2011, as part of another infrastructure program, initiated by Maledonia Council, it was rebuilt again, re-opening in 2014. It is the busiest train station in Entropan, handling 48.213 million people in the year to March 2023.
History
First station
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The Maledonian Central Station was built by Leinten Railway. It replaced the Maledonian Station, which opened on 3 June 1847, and suffered significant damages during the Second Entropanian Civil War, due to Maledonia being the epicentre of the conflict. During 1891, the engineer Nagy Henrik, having been placed in charge of the proposed lines southward to Veli, produced a report which showed two options for the terminal station. Leinten Railway's management opted to construct the less spacious of the two options, despite warnings by Nagy that it would fail to meet demand at peak hours, due to it being considerably cheaper than the larger alternative option.
The station itself was designed by engineer and architect Orbán Szilárd. Its basic configuration accommodated a total of six tracks and two large platforms underneath a single shed. This shed, divided into two naves, was supported by a series of cast iron columns and wooden trusses, featuring a distinctive drainage system that used the hollow columns as drain pipes directly into the city's sewers.
On 7 June 1891, the Maledonian Central Station was opened. Later that same year, the Maledonia-Veli railway line was declared to be operational. The manufacturing boom in Maledonia over the following decade led to a major boom in railway traffic, which, when combined with the Social Liberal Maledonian Council and national government's emphasis on grand investment in infrastructure - especially railway - led to the rail network in Entropan rapidly expanding, and rail traffic significantly increasing.
Initial expansion
By 1900, it became clear that the original Maledonian Station was not alone sufficient to carry the demand of being Maledonia's primary station. Thusly, the city council worked with Leinten Railways to open a second railway, with the cost of doing so being eased considerably due to being shared between the city and the company. The chairman of Leinten Railway, Åsmund Norheim, chose the architect Paul Tangen to design the expansion. Construction of the expansion was carried out between July 1901 and September 1904, with the expansion opening on 1 September 1904.
In 1907, the Maledonian Station shut down for three months as a result of the 1907 general strike, the only documented closure between the construction of the expansion and the reconstruction of the station itself.
Nationalisation
In 1945, Parliament passed the Transport Act 1947, which nationalised nearly all forms of mass transport in Entropan, under the national Entropanian Railway company.. Under this act, Leinten Railways was nationalised, placing the Maledonian Central Station under the administration of the newly created regional Maledonian Railway company. While a lot of the core operations stayed the same, the station was refurbished extensively in the following decade. However, in the 1950s, it became clear that the infrastructure was structurally incapable of dealing with the strain that increased tourism had brought, and that the station itself was far too small to accommodate the demands of a major terminal station, so the decision was made to replace it entirely.
Second station
To design the next iteration of the station, the architect Ketil Vigen was chosen. Construction of the new complex was carried out between May 1954 and June 1958, but the new station actually opened for service while still under construction during 1956. The new building was an increase of size from the first station, with the number of tracks doubled, with fourteen sculptures representing fourteen northern Ecrosian cities, with the sculptors represented being:
- Sáefi, by Lina Flatten
- Mogyoróska, by Frank Valla
- Elveklo, by Vászoly Réka
- Rockrsea, by Bierrán Elejas
- Veli, by Oláh Nóra
- Innsbruck, by Gárral Ommot
- Balsan, by Henrik Thuesen
- Freista, by Ketil Arntzen
- Portsmouth, by Pál Árpád
- Hafnir, by Csatár Jakab
- Höfða Nátfari, by Mihkkil Simmá
- Laugleós, by Petra Truelsen
- Franconia, by Trude Bell
- Trënt, by Robin Ringdahl
Originally, the expansion was planned to be larger, with a monumental avenue being constructed leading up to the entrance of the station, and during the design process, around a dozen proposals to redevelop the streets surrounding the station were tabled to the city council, which was overseeing the process. However, no such redevelopment happened.
High-speed lines
In 1989, as part of extensive development plans initiated by the Holsen Administration (most well-known as "Service 1"), high-speed rail lines began construction throughout Entropan, with the newly centralised Entropan Rail overseeing the constructions. Five of the lines proposed proposed terminated at the Maledonian Central Station; the Elveklo-Maledonia line (602.1km), the Rockrsea-Maledonia line (849.4km), the Sáefi-Maledonia line (277km), the Mogyoróska-Maledonia line (793km), and the Veli-Maledonia line (280.1km). The open nature of the second station meant that the terminus points for these lines were easily constructed, with platforms 3 & 4 of the Maledonian Central Station shutting down during the construction. Construction began on 3 Jan 1989, and the final line - Rockrsea-Maledonia - finished construction in July 2008.
Current station
Since the Service 1 lines were fully opened in 2008, Maledonian Central Station persistently suffered problems with a lack of space and poor access. The extensive rebuilding of Maledonia under the city council's plan to revitalise the city's infrastructure included in it an absence of the Maledonian Central Station, which drew significant criticism to the redevelopment project, with several commentators suggesting that the absence of the Maledonian Central Station from the redevelopment plans was "an exhibition of the redevelopment's arbitrariness and inconsistency".
In 2010, a Social Liberal administration was elected to the Maledonian City Council, on a platform of radically reshaping the city and improving its infrastructure. On 3 March 2011, a competition was announced, under the name Maledonia Connect, to reconstruct the station itself, dealing with excessive demand and forming a more attractive station square, opened up to international and domestic architects. The competition task involved designing the Maledonian Central Station complex, central station square, and public transport terminal, with ƒ300,000 for the winner(s), ƒ150,000 for second place, and ƒ75,000 for fourth and fifth place.
The competition officially ended on 31 May 2011, with the winner being the domestic company NOA, who designed a sweeping 46-metre-wide bridge across the Maledonian Central Station, with a curved timber roof, spanning 150 metres across the existing railway tracks and their platforms, 10 metres above ground level, containing inside a concourse for the station, improving transport links and incorporating walkways and cycle lanes within it. In NDA's proposal, entitled "Green Connect", emphasised reducing the environmental damage of the station, with tree-lined avenues along the main axes of the station, rain gardens and bioswales along the urban axes to facilitate water collection and filtering, small floodable tanks distributed in the square to slow down the refill of the aquifier and help water purification, and green roofs for drainage, biodiversity protection, and improved energy performance of the buildings. Additionally, the light management system proposed included settings such as dimmering functionality at different times of the day or season, with multifunctional sensors measuring natural light levels and processing artificial light increasing to the proper level and preventing light spillage.
Construction began on 3 June 2011, and ended more than four years later on 7 July 2015.
On 19 July 2016, the Entropanian Government announced a plan to introduce a "Travel Card", which would provide free bus, train, & tram travel to under-25s and over-60s, as part of a trial for a nationwide abolition of fares on bus, train, & tram services, with ticket costs subsidised by the central government. The Maledonian Central Station became the first train station in the country, on 28 October 2019, to have free fares, two years before the rest of the country.
Accidents and Incidents
There have been relatively few accidents at the Maledonian Central Station in its history. On 2 June 1897, an engine leaving the locomotive yard overran its clearance point, colliding with a departing passenger train, injuring five passengers and killing one. On 5 March 1915, a passenger train collided with the buffers, injuring two. The following year, a linesman accidentally stepped on a signal wire, giving a false signal to a goods van, colliding with a passenger train, killing one, and on 27 August 1917, an empty stock train derailed due to inadequate signalling arrangements, leading to four injuries.
On 8 July 1930, the fascist paramilitary group S Legion exploded several bombs in the Maledonian Central Station's luggage office. 17 people were severely wounded and two men were killed. Two years later, on 9 November 1931, the station was again targeted by the S Legion, exploding a bomb in a litter bin, injuring 39 people and killing three.
On the afternoon of 18 September 1981, a passenger train collided with a rake of parcels vans. At least ten people were injured.
On 29 November 2009, a passenger train collided with an empty stock train on platform 6 due to driver error. 35 people were injured.
Station facilities
Platforms
There are 24 platforms at the station, numbered 1-24. Platforms 1-11 are on the terminal gallery's platform level L01 (surface level), and platforms 12-24 are on the terminal gallery's platform level B02 (tunnel level).
- Platforms 1-11 are used for the high-speed rail lines for Service 1, and are planned to be used for the Service 2 lines.
- Platforms 11-17 are generally used for long-distance service, to other Leinten cities such as Pestbuda and Sajósenye, as well as to select Rockr and Uryha cities, including Pecha and Askim.
- Platforms 17-24 are generally used for suburban services to towns near to Maledonia, including Salomvár, Detek, and Gyurus, with platform 3 generally used for services to Vorasta Station, in the Maledonian New Town.
Police Station
The Transport Police maintain a police station across the street from the Maledonian Central Station, serving over 40 police officers. Sharing this station is the Neighbourhood Policing Team for the Maledonian Central Station, consisting of 17 police community support officers.
Bus stations and cycle/walkways
Maledonian Central Station is one of the most trafficked places in Entropan, having thirty-one bus routes serve the four bus stations outside the train station day and night. The pedestrian and bike-friendly Stoties square is the entrance gate for those who arrive from the City Centre to the Maledonian Terminal, and southward Pelos Street serves as Stoties Square's symmetrical counterpart. On the north-east side of the terminal bridge, an external, green promenade next to the façade connecting Stoties Square to Pelos Street. The station's square is a low-traffic zone, with private carparks moved underground, with 250 carparks underneath the PT Terminal, and 60 underneath the station's "square". In the southern part of the PT Terminal, there is a large storage room for bicycles and scooters, accessible from Bakonykúti street, and connecting directly with all three bicycle paths near and above the station.
Outdoor seating
Concrete linear benches and colourful furniture are lined along the arrival path to the station, with the benches integrating LED stripes. Furniture around the area of the Maledonian Central Station integrates natural materials like wood and stone. Linear benches with informal seating facilities are placed alongside the green stripes. A significant portion of the outdoor seating around the Maledonian Central Station are situated under metallic pergolas, with such seating, particularly for outdoor dining, being in Pelos Street, opposite the primary entrance to the station.
Services
Suburban services
The following local passenger services run from and to Maledonian Central Station:
- Maledonia - Salomvár
- Maledonia - Detek
- Maledonia - Gyurus
- Maledonian Central Station - Vorastra Station
- Maledonia - Pálháza
- Maledonia - Varga
- Maledonia - Ås
- Maledonia - Vámosoroszi
- Maledonia - Jenő
Long distance services
The following long-distance services run from and to Maledonian Central Station:
- Maledonia - Pestbuda
- Maledonia - Apdusbet
- Maledonia - Sajósenye
- Maledonia - Pecha
- Maledonia - Askim
- Maledonia - Vigma
- Maledonia - Østerå
- Maledonia - Vóla
- Maledonia - Jászladány
- Maledonia - Tarcal
High-speed rail
Service 1
Service 1 is the first high-speed rail development in Entropan. Five of its lines come from and terminate at Maledonian Central Station:
- Maledonia - Sáefi line
- Maledonia - Rockrsea line
- Maledonia - Veli line
- Maledonia - Mogyoróska line
- Maledonia - Eleveklo line
Service 2
Service 2 will be the second high-speed rail development in Entropan. Construction began on July 1 2023, and is expected to take until 2030. The planned lines for Service 2 which terminate/come from the Maledonian Central Station are:
- Maledonia - Sande line
- Maledonia - Flaten line
- Maledonia - Konsmo line
- Maledonia - Tompa line
