Though the need for integrated public transport is widely accepted, the only town or city on the UK mainland with a rail-bus interchange under one roof is Hull. This was created when the station was redeveloped in 2007. However, with the opening of Belfast’s Grand Central in 2024, the number of such interchanges in the British Isles has now doubled. With 28 bus stands and eight rail platforms, Belfast Grand Central is the largest such interchange in Ireland.
Great Victoria Street station
Grand Central station is in Belfast’s Weavers Cross neighbourhood which is a 12-minute walk from the city hall. It replaces the Europa bus station and Belfast Great Victoria Street (GVS) railway station. There has been a station on this site since 1839. In 1962, the Ulster Transport Authority removed one platform and built a bus station under its canopy to create the city’s first rail-bus interchange.
With the reduction in rail traffic the original GVS station was closed in 1976 and all rail services, including those for Dublin, were transferred to the newly built Lanyon Place station which is some distance from Belfast’s commercial centre. The station site was then cleared and, in 1991, used to build the 18-stand Europa bus station.
However, with growing rail traffic and Lanyon Place’s poor location, it was decided that a new station was needed at Great Victoria Street which would also provide an easy interchange with the Europa bus station. The new GVS station opened in 1995 and had two 150-metre and two 75-metre platforms.
At the same time, the junction beyond GVS was made into a triangular junction by the provision of an eastern chord to enable trains from GVS to serve destinations north and west of Belfast via Lanyon Place. GVS then became the hub for all suburban services whilst trains from Dublin terminated at Lanyon Place.
When it opened in 1995, it was predicted that the GVS station would serve 800,000 passengers. When it closed on 11 May 2024, it was used by 4.9 million passengers a year.
A new interchange
As a result of strong growth in public transport and the constraints of GVS and Europa rail and bus stations, in 2012, there were preliminary discussions about a new Belfast hub that would provide transport led regeneration in the Weavers Cross area. Northern Ireland’s public transport operator, Translink then developed proposals for a new station. In 2016, Translink launched a public consultation regarding the proposed construction of an integrated transport hub to replace the Europa bus station and GVS railway station. This new station was designed by Arup and John McAslan and Partners to cater for 20 million journeys annually.
The new station has 28 bus stands and eight platforms. Platforms 1 to 4 are 153 -metres long to accommodate six-car trains whilst platforms 5 to 8 are 224-metre long and can accommodate the nine-car Dublin enterprise service which was transferred from Lanyon Place when Grand Central opened. With double the number of GVS platforms there is ample provision for a significant increase in service frequency.
Beyond the station
To allow for this increase in traffic, the transfer of Dublin services from Lanyon Place, and to connect it to the station throat, the triangular junction outside the station had to be remodelled to incorporate bi-directional working and reduce its southern chord from double to single track. Due to space constraints, trains from platforms 7 and 8 can only be routed south through this junction.
Prior to the Grand Central project, all signalling operations in Northern Ireland were controlled from three signalling centres at Belfast Central, Portadown, and Coleraine. Translink have a strategy to replace these signalling centres with a Northern Ireland Rail Operating Centre (NIROC) located at Lanyon Place station. The opportunity of installing new signals in and around Grand Central was taken to transfer their control from the southern area of Belfast Central signaller centre to become the first area controlled by the new NIROC.
Enabling works
The first significant works of the Grand Central project started in 2020 with the diversion of the Blackstaff river culvert. With rapid urbanisation, the Blackstaff and other rivers in the city became severely polluted with sewage and industrial waste and so these rivers were culverted to remove their smell and create urban space.
The Blackstaff river was a two-metre-deep by four-metre-wide wide culvert that passed under the station site at a level that conflicted with the station’s track design and bus stands. This culvert also had insufficient capacity for the increased run off from the large area of the new station’s hard surfaces. As a result, it was replaced by a 360-metre-long, two-metre-deep, by seven-metre-wide box culvert formed from 600mm-thick reinforced concrete box designed for a one-in-100-year flood. This new culvert runs approximately under the new platform ends and was completed in February 2021.
December 2021 saw initial site preparation which involved the demolition of old railway buildings, site clearance, remediation, and levelling. Around this time bridge 308A over the north-western chord of the triangular junction was widened by 3.5 metres with a new 22.5-metre span to accommodate reconfiguration of track at the junction.
The interchange has a busway bridge with a 51-metre span to separate heavy bus traffic from regular passenger vehicles and pedestrians on the surrounding city streets.
Piling work on this bridge started in September 2021 and required heavy piling up to 28 metres deep due to challenging ground conditions. The bridge’s two 150-tonne weathering steel girders, fabricated by Thompson Project Management, were lifted in place in October 2022. The bridge was opened in August 2023.
All these enabling works were undertaken by GRAHAM construction.
Station work
Construction of the station building by a Farrans Sacyr joint venture started in March 2022. Due to poor ground conditions this work required over 1,400 piles which were installed by September 2022. To give the station’s 7,500 square metre concourse a column-free space, the structure spanning the main concourse is formed from long-span steel trusses that support a series of beams spanning 22 metres to support the feature saw tooth roof.
The trusses vary in length from 32 metres long to 65 metres long, as the public area splays outwards on plan. The largest truss over the platform entrances is 65 metres long and 4.8 metres deep. The roof structure sits on 45 circular steel support columns covered in distinctive metal casings. The station has reinforced concrete spine walls which are designed to absorb vibrations from passing trains. Within the concourse, the steel frame also forms a two-level mezzanine.
After the main structural frame was completed in July 2023, the external glazing was installed by William Cox. During the fit out mechanical, electrical, and plumbing work was done by the Dowds Group. Once this was completed the station opened to the public on 8 September 2024 with the transfer of bus services from the Europa bus station.
Track and signalling
Babcock Rail undertook the design and installation of track and signalling though it contracted the design and build of the NIROC to Siemens Mobility. Complex staging arrangements were required to provide new track for the new station, remove the track for GVS, and reconfigure the triangular junction and the associated signalling alterations beyond, all while minimising impact on train services. A further constraint was limited space and other contractors working nearby which required complicated arrangements for the transport and storage of materials.
The initial civil works in the existing railway corridor was for 10km of new cable routes which included 11 new Under Track Crossings as well as bases for signals and equipment housings. The first track within the new station was laid in November 2023. By Christmas 2023, all platforms had plain line track installed, and switch and crossing work at five locations had been completed.
Before much further track work could be undertaken, a concrete slab had to be provided between the station throat and triangular junction. This was needed due to the Belfast Sleech below it, which is a thick, high-plasticity, organic clayey silt. This slab is 160 metres long, up to 20 metres wide, with varying thickness around 600mm, and required over 1,000 cubic metres of concrete.
The first part of this slab, an isolated finger section, was poured during the 2023 Christmas blockade. The remainder of the slab could not be cast until the tracks to GVS had been dismantled in May 2024.
Track work between the station throat and triangular junction was undertaken in Easter 2024. In addition, track and a new switch were laid on the north-western chord of the junction. Thereafter there were a series of blockades as shown below.
This work involved laying 4.8km of new track, 19 sets of points/turnouts, 25 signals, and 50km of cabling. Driver training started immediately after the last blockade. There then followed a period of testing and regulatory safety certification before the new lines into Grand Central Station were officially opened on 13 October 2024.
Unlike any other
In many ways Belfast Grand Central station is unlike any other railway station. Some have commented that its high, airy, modern look is more akin to an airport than a station.
As previously mentioned, it is a rare example of a combined rail and bus station under one roof. Hence it offers excellent transfers between bus and train helped by an integrated customer service point where all rail and bus tickets can be purchased. There are also no announcements as it would be particularly intrusive if all bus and train departures were announced. Hence there are sufficient clear display boards in the concourse and at departure points.
The station was designed inclusive of those with disabilities with input from organisations such as the Royal National Institute for the Blind and the Inclusive Mobility and Transport Advisory Committee. Key features include tactile paving routes, hearing loops, lowered information counters, and NaviLens codes throughout the station. On the UK mainland, NaviLens is used at Euston and some Docklands Light Railway stations.
These NaviLens codes are squares of cyan, magenta, yellow, and black on a black grid with a thick white frame and can be seen in the train and bus departure photographs. In public areas they are typically 200mm square. They can be detected by a phone with the NaviLens Go app. The user does not have to look out for the codes as it will detect them 30 metres from the code at an angle of 160°. Once detected, the app provides the user with visual and audible information about their location and train services.
In its first five months, Grand Central attracted three million rail passengers. This is equivalent to over six million a year and compares to the 4.9 million passengers a year using GVS when it closed it. Translink advises that the station welcomed over eight million rail and bus passengers in its first year when there were more than four million additional public transport journeys which is a significant modal shift. Looking to the future, it is good to note that the station was designed for 20 million passengers a year.
Belfast Grand Central is now the main terminus for all rail services in Northern Ireland including the Enterprise to Dublin which now has an hourly service due to the extra platforms at the station. Prior to its opening there were some services that ran through Belfast such as trains from Bangor to Portadown. Northern Ireland Rail services are now operated in a ‘hub and spoke’ model centred on Belfast Grand Centre which provides an easy interchange between different rail services.
The station is also the cornerstone for the 20-acre transport-led Weavers Cross urban development which will revitalise the area around Great Victoria Street. This consists of Saltwater Square which will provide 260,000 square feet of prime office space, the Flax Yards offering at least 400 residential units, and the Worx Innovation Campus which is a 635,000 square feet technology, innovation, and life sciences hub close to Queen’s University Belfast.
The development has outline planning permission and is expected to have a gross development value of £500 million and stimulate more than £1 billion of additional spending in the Northern Ireland economy.
Thus, the transport and development benefits offered by Belfast Grand Central station makes its £340 million cost a worthwhile investment.
Image credit: David Shirres