Utrecht Centraal railway station

Utrecht Centraal, officially Station Utrecht Centraal (Dutch: [staːˈʃɔn ˈytrɛxt sɛnˈtraːl]), is the transit hub with three bicycle parks, two bus stations, two tram stops and the central railway station for Utrecht, Netherlands. It is the biggest train station in the Netherlands. Both the railway station and the bus station are the largest and busiest in the Netherlands. The bicycle parking station on the east side is the largest in the world. The railway station has sixteen platform tracks (of which twelve are through tracks) and 207,360 passengers per day, excluding transfers. Because of its central location in the Netherlands, Utrecht Centraal is the most important railway hub of the country with more than 1,000 departures per day. History The first railway station at the site was opened on December 18, 1843, when the Nederlandsche Rhijnspoorweg-Maatschappij opened the first station on Utrecht territory. In 1938, the station became the central station as the Maliebaanstation, on the other side of the city, was closed and the line from Hilversum was diverted into the central station. The station building of 1865 remained in place, though a fundamental renovation was done in 1936. Two years later, a fire burned down most of the building, which was later rebuilt. The station building was demolished in the 1970s to make way for Hoog Catharijne, then Europe's largest enclosed shopping mall, which opened on 17 December 1973. From that moment onwards, the station no longer had a real entrance; the passageways of the shopping mall just continued into the station. In 1989 the station hall was enlarged (tripling the original size) to increase capacity. In 1995, the station hall was again enlarged, with a new platform. Between 2011 and 2016, the station underwent a major reconstruction as one of the NSP projects of the Dutch government and as part of a general reconstruction of the Utrecht station area. The station hall was replaced by a new, much larger hall, housing all modes of public transport. The new structure with its curved roof, was designed by Benthem Crouwel Architekten. The roof has three curves: a large one in the middle for the railway station and two smaller ones for the bus/tram stations on either side. New sheltering roofs were built for all platforms and the station was separated from the Hoog Catharijne shopping area. A scale model of Utrecht Centraal is on display at Madurodam. References