Category:Brighton Station Cab Road

View looking out, back towards the red door. Note the buttressing and deliberate slope of the massive wall on the right - this was the original exterior wall of Brighton Station. [image info]

View in, from a little inside the tunnel entrance. The station's original exterior wall is now on the left. The right-hand wall is the back wall of the units of Trafalgar Arches. [image info]

Brighton Station's Cab Road ran alongside the station's original Eastward exterior wall, and seems to have been a feature of the original 1841 station.

Purpose

The slope of the land at Brighton Station's location was so severe that the Western side of the station area was cut into the hillside, while the Eastern side, alongside the Goods Yard off Trafalgar Street, was suspended in mid-air on a set of supporting brick archwork.

Trafalgar Street was the main link between the station and Grand Parade, and was initially the main way for horsedrawn cabs to reach the station. However, the slope at the top of Trafalgar Street was so severe that a separate cab road "ramp" was built alongside the station, running up the Eastern side between the upper level station and the lower-level goods yard, the idea being to institute a one-way system for cabs, so that horsedrawn cabs could come up Trafalgar Street, turn sharp right up the Cab Road to reach the station level, turn around, drop off and pick up passengers, and then proceed on a level ground to the top of Trafalgar Street before turning back down Trafalgar Street again. They'd still have to navigate the steepest part of the street, but only when travelling downhill.

At the time, the curved brick corner and sloping sidewall directly to the right on what's now the entrance to the Toy Museum was the Eastern limit of the station buildings.

Further developments

Access to the station was improved with the building of Queens Road in 1844.

The Cab Road was redesigned in the 1882-1883 redevelopment of the station. The road's gradient was made less severe by lengthening it, with the additional length was achieved by doubling the end of the road back on itself via a hairpin bend. Since the station redevelopment also needed new buildings along the Eastern side, a new set of arches (now known as Trafalgar Arches) needed to be built on the other side of the cab road. The top of the Cab Road was covered over, converting it into a tunnel with a new decorative gateway on Trafalgar Street, and its other end emerging inside the covered part of the station.

Disuse

Early motor vehicles found it difficult to navigate the tunnel's hairpin bend, and the tramway and new motor bus routes up Queens Road made the Cab Road progressively less necessary. Eventually the Cab Road closed - it was used for some years for storage, but is currently empty.

The cab road is now effectively a brick-lined tunnel that separates Brighton Toy and Model Museum from the businesses under the newer station arches. The entrance to the road/tunnel is behind the large wooden door directly to the right of the museum's main entrance.