Leeds railway station

Leeds railway station (also known as Leeds City railway station) is the mainline railway station serving the city centre of Leeds in West Yorkshire, England. It is the third-busiest railway station in the UK outside London (as of 2018). It is located on New Station Street to the south of City Square, at the bottom of Park Row, behind the landmark Queens Hotel. It is one of 20 stations managed by Network Rail.

Leeds is an important hub on the British rail network. The station is the terminus of the Leeds branch of the East Coast Main Line (on which London North Eastern Railway provides high speed inter-city services to London every half hour from the station) and is an important stop on the Cross Country Route between Scotland, the Midlands and South West England connecting to major cities such as Birmingham, Glasgow, Edinburgh, Derby, Nottingham, Reading, Bristol, Exeter, Plymouth and Penzance. There are also regular inter-city services to major destinations throughout Northern England including Manchester, Liverpool, Newcastle and Sheffield. It is also the terminus for trains running on the scenic Settle to Carlisle Line. Future expansion will link the station to the proposed High Speed 2 (HS2) network.

Leeds is a major hub for local and regional destinations across Yorkshire such as to York, Scarborough, Hull, Doncaster and Sheffield. The station lies at the heart of the Metro commuter network for West Yorkshire providing services to Bradford, Wakefield, Dewsbury, Huddersfield and Halifax.

With over 31 million passenger entries and exits between April 2017 and March 2018, Leeds is the busiest railway station in the North of England and the third-busiest railway station in the United Kingdom outside London, after Birmingham New Street and Glasgow Central.

Description


The railway station is situated on a hill falling from the south of the city to the River Aire and the Leeds and Liverpool Canal basin. Much of it is supported on Victorian brick-vaulted arches situated just off Neville Street which contain a centre consisting of cafés, restaurants, shops and exhibition spaces called Granary Wharf, known locally as the Dark Arches.

The railway station has 17 platforms, making it the largest by number of platforms in England outside London. There are 11 terminus and six through platforms. Most platforms are subdivided into up to four sections, i.e. 1a, 1b, 1c etc. All together including the numbers, there are 47 platforms. Retail facilities in the station include coffee shops, fast food outlets, a bar, newsagents, chemists, and supermarkets. A British Transport Police station on New Station Street houses officers who police the West Yorkshire railway stations.

Leeds railway station retained manned ticket barriers through the 1990s until 2008 when they were replaced by automatic barriers by Northern to reduce congestion around the barriers at peak times.

Platform usage varies depending on operational circumstances but is generally:
 * Platforms
 * 1–5 – Bay platforms mostly used by MetroTrain services operated by Northern, towards Harrogate, Ilkley, Bradford Forster Square and Skipton.
 * 6, 8 – 6 is a Bay Platform used for terminating London North Eastern Railway services from London, 8 is a through platform used for London North Eastern Railway services which both terminate and continue onward to Bradford, Harrogate and Skipton, as well as the early morning LNER departure to Aberdeen.
 * 8, 9, 11, 12, 15, 16 – through platforms. CrossCountry services heading north to York and beyond depart from Platforms 8, 9 or 11; services heading south use platform 12. Platforms 15 and 16 are used by north/east and south/westbound TransPennine Express services to Hull, Newcastle, York, Scarborough and Middlesbrough and Huddersfield, Manchester Airport and Liverpool Lime Street.
 * 7, 14 – Bay platforms used for local Northern services running north/east from Leeds.
 * 10, 13, 17 – Bay platforms used for local and regional services running south/west to Manchester Victoria and Huddersfield, alongside southbound services towards Wakefield, Barnsley, Meadowhall, Sheffield and Nottingham.

Transport links
Leeds Interchange, located at the New Station Street exit, provides onward transport connections from the station. There are five bus stands serving Arriva, First and Yorkshire Tiger routes 4, 5, 16, 16A, 19, 19A, 40, 85, 87, 90, 757, 870 and DalesBus services. A 24-hour taxi rank also operates at the interchange.

Further bus stops are located on Neville Street below the railway station, as well as around City Square outside the railway station. Infirmary Street and Boar Lane Bus Points are a short walk for more bus connections.

Cycle hub
Leeds Interchange hosts one of the UK's first cycle hubs that allows a number of cycling services including repair, storage and rental. The facility opened in summer 2010 and is designed to encourage visitors and commuters into Leeds to continue their journey from the railway station by bike. Its design is based on the Dutch cyclepoint concept.

Services
The railway station is served by train operators, London North Eastern Railway, CrossCountry, TransPennine Express, Northern and East Midlands Railway. It is also the hub of the MetroTrain network in West Yorkshire, being the terminus of the following lines:
 * The Leeds branch of the East Coast Main Line to London King's Cross
 * Midland Main Line to London St Pancras
 * Airedale Line to Keighley/Skipton/Heysham Port/Morcambe/Carlisle
 * Caldervale Line to Manchester Oxford Road /Blackpool North/Huddersfield
 * Hallam Line to Castleford/Wakefield/Barnsley/Sheffield
 * Harrogate Line to Harrogate/Knaresborough/York
 * Huddersfield Line to Dewsbury/Huddersfield
 * Pontefract Line to Castleford/Pontefract/Knottingley/Goole
 * Wakefield Line to Wakefield/Doncaster/Sheffield
 * Wharfedale Line to Ilkley
 * Leeds-Bradford Lines to Bradford