To intensely dislike Birmingham New Street station

[StealthPolarBear]

The train I am on is stopping there because its running too late and its all change. I know (because I did it on the way down) that I will lug my bag down to the platform I am currently told the next train departs from, only to find with a few minutes to spare that the platform has altered. I will race up to the top, try to get from one side of the station to the other which as far as I can tell is near impossible, clatter down to the new platform with my big bag and cram myself on a train where I will no doubt not get a seat.
Great fun.

I get confused there because my memory hasn't caught up with it no longer being a black hole of decaying brutalist architecture. It wasn't great in the 70s and it was downhill from there by the time I went to uni in the late 90s, changing trains regularly there as the whole lot was being redeveloped.

Ah, I bought my student pans etc in the original Bull Ring. Gosh, it was a total shit hole.

Leeds is tiny and the platforms are all laid out in lines so you can get to them all from the top concourse. There isn't suddenly a large window dividing the platform in two

Yanbu! I spent a hellish hour there as a 17year old with a very big suitcase in the 90s and have never forgiven it.

New St is the ultimate fur coat no knickers station. Spunk a heap of money on the exterior, add some expensive shops and leave the platforms the same depressing subterranean hovels they've always been. Having diesel trains pumping out all sorts of filth in an enclosed environment isn’t much fun either.

😂 now I'm quite embarrassed about getting lost in Leeds! But I genuinely do 🙄 maybe I expect too much of it 😂

Bowchic Moor St is wonderful! When I go to London I always go from Moor St to Marylebone, both are such lovely stations. It might take a bit longer but I much prefer going that route than New St to Euston.

I wish as much investment went into modern local trains as has gone in to New Street (or London Kings Cross, or Manchester Victoria, or Edinburgh Waverley).

Moor Street is lovely.

I have to go to BNS tomorrow...praying the weather means my train is cancelled

I like Marylebone.

Moor Street to Marylebone isn't a bad journey.

That station is terrifying. Most of them are though if you can't stand hordes of folk!!

The station is infinitely better than the rest of the city centre when the Christmas market is on.

Does the pallasades (shopping centre above new street station) still have that invisible line that you crossed and the music changed and everything suddenly got dingy? I swear there was an underground shopping area and then we never found it again. I don't know if I dreamt it!

It really was the strangest shopping centre although not as bad as the original Bull Ring. I've never experienced anything like that since.

New street is ok on the days I don’t get lost. Which is about 50% of the time.

I’ve never done the journey from NS to Moor Street. I’m a bit worried I might never find myself again.

YANBU

I’ve always found it ugly and miserable

I got horrifically lost trying to get from Moor Street to New Street, took me the best part of an hour

Isn’t it like a 2 minute walk? You don’t have to go in the shopping centre.

it most likely is a two minute walk, but when the direction signs just stop, and you are looking for something which actually looks like a train station rather than a shopping centre, it gets tricky. Add in the Christmas market and a suitcase on wheels, and I'm surprised I even made it .

Hang on, you don't need to go through the shopping centre? Is there a side door or something?

Hang on, you don't need to go through the shopping centre? Is there a side door or something?

No! There’s like a underpass/tunnel thing that you walk through. Takes 4-5 minutes max.

The reason BNS is so confusing is that to keep the direct access to Moor Street meant having that awkward ‘you can see them but not get to them’ bit at one end of the platforms.

I know this because I googled it after having a lot of trouble changing platforms and wondering why it was so hard. There’s a whole load of train enthusiasts who post about this stuff in great detail.

YANBU - I have only been through New St a handful of times and each time was blood awful.

Up and down all the bloody sets of stairs to change platforms.

As far as the design of the place goes - wtaf it's like concrete jungle where the platforms are!

Hideous place!

But oat why does that make a difference? Loads of stations have various different exits eg Leeds

Hang on, you don't need to go through the shopping centre? Is there a side door or something?

No! There’s like a underpass/tunnel thing that you walk through. Takes 4-5 minutes max.

Yep, come out of the front entrance and follow the road around to the left through an underpass and Moor St is opposite as you come out of there.
Alternatively there's a walkway down to Moor St between the building where Nationwide is (opposite the statue of the Bull) and the Bullring itself.

Not unreasonable at all. I find it really confusing with the red, yellow, blue lounges and got completely stuck at one point last year where I couldn't walk from one side of the station to the other without hitting barriers.

I also got lost in Leeds station but this was more about me not understanding which exit I actually needed.

OP

See post 15 on this highly technical thread for the detailed explanation.

I don’t like the platforms, the smell of the diesel is awful, and then like today they change platforms at the very last minute and you have to sprint to the right one. Last week I got off the train and was one side and couldn’t figure out how to get to the other as the barrier was in the way. I think I needed to go down to the platform and along and back up the other side!!