# Liverpool Baltic railway station

Liverpool Baltic railway station is a proposed station awaiting planning permission in the Baltic Triangle area of Liverpool, England, which is to be built on the Northern Line of Merseyrail. The station is to be built on the site of the former St James station, which closed to passenger services in 1917. Construction is expected to start in 2025, with opening around three years later.

## History

In 2012, Liverpool's Strategic Investment Framework listed the reopening of St James as important to the success of the Baltic Triangle development. Merseytravel agreed to work with Liverpool Vision in March 2014 to investigate the cost of reopening the station and its projected usage. In January 2015, Merseytravel confirmed that they would be carrying out a study for the station's potential reopening in the 2015–16 financial year. Merseyrail listed the re-opening of the station as a 'top rail project' during a presentation on rail development and delivery in November 2016.
Merseytravel commissioned a report into the reopening of the station which was completed in September 2017. The report compared reopening St James against the construction of a new station in the Chinatown area of Liverpool. While the report found many benefits to opening a station in the city's Chinatown area, it concluded that: "A new station at St James is feasible and potentially highly beneficial, albeit at a high cost and with correspondingly reduced value for money." Merseytravel's chairman Liam Robinson stated in an interview with the Liverpool Echo in February 2019 that reopening the station would be a significant task and would involve the construction of new platforms, ticket offices, waiting areas and lift shafts.
Liverpool City Region Combined Authority announced in August 2019 that they were planning to use part of a £172 million funding package to reopen the station, subject to the plans being approved.
In October 2020, it was announced that £1.2 million of these funds were to be used to commission Network Rail to complete the next stage of design work for the reopening project. A further £300,000 of these funds had been used to purchase a plot of land adjacent to the station site upon which the Combined Authority hopes a future ticket office might be constructed. In 2020, the Combined Authority applied for additional funding for the reopening project from the third round of the Department for Transport's New Stations Fund. A public vote was put forward in January 2022 by Merseytravel and the Liverpool City Region Combined Authority, to choose a name for the station when it reopens. Officials felt that the existing name for the station would cause confusion with James Street station. The public were asked to choose a new name between:
* Liverpool Baltic
* Liverpool Parliament Street
* Liverpool Riverside
On 12 April 2022, the results of the vote were announced, with 77.7% of the public voting for Liverpool Baltic as the name of the new station.
Work on the station was intended to start in 2024, however, as of December 2023, planning work was still being undertaken. The Liverpool City Region Combined Authority expect to apply for planning permission in 2024 with construction commencing in 2025, for completion in 2027 or 2028.

## Services

The station will be between Liverpool Central and Brunswick, and would be served by trains operating between Ormskirk and Hunts Cross.
| Preceding station | National Rail | National Rail | National Rail | Following station |
| Liverpool Central | | Merseyrail Northern Line | | Brunswick towards Hunts Cross |