Category:Brighton Station

Steam locomotive at Brighton Station (stained glass window at Brighton's Palace Pier) [image info]

"Brighton from the Terminus", "Railway Chronicle Travelling Chart or Iron Road Book", "London-Brighton", James Holmes circa ~1846 [image info]

Engraving of Brighton Station's interior, from an 1885 publication [image info]

The front-facing clock on the "Moccata" station building facade [image info]

The 1883 extension to the rear of David Mocatta's original 1841 Brighton Railway Station building [image info]

Brighton Station's blue roof supports [image info]

Brighton Station, blue girderwork including roundels with the helmet and dolphins of Brighton's coat of arms [image info]

Brighton Station approach, showing "cliff" [image info]

Brighton Station, view from the top of the "cliff" [image info]

"Black Five" steam loco 44932 at Brighton Station, 8th June 2014, for the "Seaford150" 150th anniversary of the Brighton to Seaford line. The area to the rear of the photograph was originally occupied by the locomotive works [image info]

Brighton Railway Station, "BTN" (built 1840) was originally a simpler white rectangular Italianate building designed by David Mocatta, with an unbridged Trafalgar Street running downhill in front of it. Over the following years, the forecourt and the eastern side of the station were extended, Trafalgar Street was bridged (in three stages), glassed roofing was put over the platform areas, and the current permanent awning with its vine-tendril design was built over the forecourt.

The bulk of Brighton Toy and Model Museum is built into these slightly later arches supporting the station forecourt, with some extension back under the main station structure.

Alternative locations

Other locations were originally considered for the terminus of the London-to-Brighton line. On suggestion was to put the station just north of Western Road, near the Brunswick Estate, but residents objected to the idea that their area might be then be filled with visiting Londoners.

Another suggested location was at or around "The Level" - the wedge of open land at the top of the the chain of green areas running up from Old Steine. Putting the station in the top of this valley area would have been more convenient for visitors as it would have provided a grand route down to the most popular section of the seafront, but would have involved a more severe gradient for the track, and having a valley on each side would have made it difficult to build connecting lines to other towns to either side of Brighton.

The station was finally constructed by building to between these two locations, by excavating a vast amount of material from the hillside and setting the station into the side of a hill, creating a brick "cliff" along one side of the station track. The line was then able to straddle the valley area to the East with the London Road Viaduct.

History of Brighton Station - timeline

1837 – London and Brighton Railway Act passed
1838 – Construction work starts
1839 – Mocatta station house designed
1840 – Shoreham branch line opens, initial Shoreham terminus building at Brighton.
1841 – main line opens, Mocatta building finished
1844 – West Street extended to the Station, as Queens Road
1844 – Initial Trafalgar Street Bridge
1846 – LBRC joins London and Croydon Railway Company to create the London, Brighton and South Coast Railway (LB&SCR)
1847 – branch line to Lewes and Newhaven opens
1852 – new goods branch line built
1863 – Trafalgar Street Bridge widened
1875 – Trafalgar Street Bridge widened for a second time
1882 – New longer glass station platform roof built over the existing roof (removed 1883)
1882-83 – station extended eastward over the Cab Road,
- New buildings built along the East and West sides
- Jutting parcels depot
- Demolition of Mocatta ground floor frontage, construction of forecourt roofing
1883 – Cab road redesign
1883 – Suspended four-faced clock
1883 – Rear of Mocatta building ground floor extended back
1883 – Electric lighting fitted
1899 – Roof steps added for maintenance access
1924 – Creation of stair access to Trafalgar Street
1979 – Travel Centre created
1980 – New Ticket Office
2013 – Building work on travel centre and other centre station frontage, internal reorganisation