Liverpool Lime Street

Description

Liverpool Lime Street is Liverpool’s principal station, and is the oldest still-operating grand terminus mainline station in the world [Wikipedia]. It was built by the Liverpool and Manchester Railway Company to replace the first terminus (Crown Street) in order to be closer to the city centre. Construction started in 1833, just three years after the line was opened, and the first phase was completed in 1836. The line was the first steam-operated inter-city line in the world, operated by Stephenson’s ‘Rocket’ and her sister locomotives after she won the famous Rainhill Trials.

The simulation incorporates ground level services from the station from 6:00am until 4:00pm on a typical weekday of the 2024 winter timetable. Underground services are incorporated in mathstrains19’s Merseyrail simulation at https://www.railwayoperationsimulator.com/catalog/community-projects/united-kingdom/merseyrail

There are four routes out from the station:

1. East then north to Wigan and the West Coast Main Line (WCML) to the north of England and Scotland.
2. East to Manchester via St Helens Junction (the original route of the Liverpool and Manchester Railway).
3. South East to Manchester via Widnes and Warrington.
4. East then south via Runcorn to the WCML south to London.

All four routes are very heavily used, and care is needed in managing traffic in and out of the station to avoid delays and blockages. Detailed operating recommendations are given in Liverpool Lime Street.pdf in the Documentation folder.