Peterborough is a major stop on the East Coast Main Line in Cambridgeshire, it is also a stop on the Birmingham New Street-Stansted Airport line and local East-West services.
Information
Type:
National Rail
(East Coast Main Line)
Station code:
PBO
Opened:
1850
Platforms:
7
Peterborough was opened in 1850 by the Great Northern Railway for it's services to London. The station was predated by five years by the now closed Peterborough East. The GNR's Peterborough station has had a number of names over the year including Peterborough Priestgate and Peterborough North when the station was owned by the LNER after 1923 [1] to avoid confusion with Peterborough East which was also taken over by the LNER. After Peterborough East closed in 1966 Peterborough North lost it's suffix for good.
The lines through the station were remodelled to allow greater speeds (from thirty two to one hundred and sixity kilometres per hour) for passing trains in 1973 [2][3]. The original GNR station buildings were also replaced by new build in the late 1970s. The ECML through Peterborough to Edinburgh was electrified in the 1980s, the first mast of the project was indeed installed at Peterborough.
In the privatisation era Peterborough has seen more upgrades and remodelling including the removal of a bay platform in 2013. The station is managed by LNER's modern day namesake and also served by Cross Country, East Midlands Trains, Thameslink, Greater Anglia and Great Northern.
EMT 156 411 departs
The DVT end of a North bound LNER express
XC 170 520 departs heading for Stansted Airport
A LNER HST passes through
The new order: LNER 800 113 departs
Greater Anglia 170 205
[1] Vic Mitchell & Keith Smith, Lines Around Stamford (Middleton Press, 2016) Fig. 54 [2] Ibid. Fig. 55 [3] Chris Heaps, BR Diary 1968-1977 (Ian Allan, 1988) p. 64
