| Road name harks back to the glorious
days of rail travel |
|
End of the line for city’s
grand station
September
23, 2004
MIDLAND STREET (Dereham Road to Heigham Street)
A NAME that recalls the glorious days of the railway
station on the line affectionately known as the “muddle
and go nowhere”.
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| A view from one of the platforms
at the City Station, which finally closed to passengers
during the 1950s, and was known as the “muddle
and go nowhere”. |
Up until 1907 this was called Tinkler’s Lane .
. . then the name was changed because it was a handy
route to the terminus of the Midland & Great Northern
Railway.
The much-loved old City Station stood by the roundabout
on the inner link road which joins Barn Road with St
Crispins Road.
The station opened back in 1882 when it was the third
station serving Norwich after Thorpe and Victoria.
It was a grand place. Built in Romanesque style with
Norfolk red brick and Costessey white brick dressings
and facings.
Its frontage was about 130ft with an approach through
a central archway to the four platforms, totalling 700ft
in length.
When the engineering contractors, Wilkinson and Jarvis,
finished building it, they had a fabulous feast at St
Andrew’s Hall where boar’s head, aspic à
la royal, beef, fowl, game and ornamented tongues were
on the menu.
The train bringing the toffs up from King’s Cross
was late!
The station served us well until the Second World War,
when it was hit during the 1942 Norwich Blitz —
and never really recovered. The station, the offices
and the sheds were all badly damaged. A driver and a
fireman were killed, but the station struggled on.
“What a scene of devastation met us as we tried
to get to work the next day. For months we had to use
railway carriages as offices,” recalled office
worker Barbara Thayne a few years ago.
City Station finally closed to passengers during the
1950s, although the line continued to carry freight
for a time.
The track has now long gone, but a section of it, from
Wroxham to Aylsham, forms the Bure Valley Railway —
a reminder of the great days on the “muddle and
go nowhere” line.
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