London & North Western Railway History Group
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The Engineer - The LNWR Hotel at Lime Street Station, Liverpool

Published 1868

Of all the large London & North Western Railway stations only one remains much as it used to be in LNWR days, namely Lime Street station at Liverpool. Euston was rebuilt in the 1960s during electrification and is shortly to be rebuilt again in preparation for HS2. Birmingham New Street essentially lost its overall roof during air raids in the Second World War, and as a result the remains of the roof were removed. Electrification brought more changes – the removal of the carriage road separating the LNWR and Midland sides of the station - and nowadays the station has been transformed again as the Grand Central shopping centre with platforms underneath. Manchester London Road was rebuilt as Manchester Piccadilly during electrification and modernisation. Although the buildings at such important traffic centres as Crewe, Preston and Carlisle still largely survive intact, none of them had large buildings as such, and of the larger stations only Liverpool Lime Street still survives substantially as it was..

These drawings show the hotel when first built in 1868. They are particularly fascinating in showing how the rooms were heated by coal fires, the smoke from which found its way through chimneys to larger chimneys and eventually to the outside of the building. Externally the building is still the same today, and the station itself has been recently refurbished. It is well worth a visit.

Original Document(s) kindly supplied by Greg Martin

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