Britain's 100 Best Railway Stations by Simon Jenkins

Author:Simon Jenkins
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780241978993
Publisher: Penguin Books Ltd
Published: 2017-07-27T16:00:00+00:00

DAWLISH

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The star on this stage is the sea, sometimes angry, mostly at peace. The down platform is virtually on the beach. On a fine day, we can enjoy a vista from Exmouth and the Dorset coast round to the red sandstone cliffs of Devon. Inland, the Haldon Hills rise steeply over the pretty resort.

The South Devon Railway was scene in 1846 of Brunel’s most swiftly abortive experiment, an atmospheric railway. This involved a piston descending beneath the locomotive into an iron tube in the bed of the track, with a leather flange along the top, along which it was sucked by compressed air. The leather leaked, the grease froze or was eaten by rats. Points and crossings failed and trains could not reverse. After under a year of chaotic service, even Brunel had to admit defeat.

Brunel’s sea-wall railway survived, along the south bank of the River Exe and round into Newton Abbot. At Dawlish, it runs above the beach, cutting the town off from the sea. On rough days, the waves beat against the station wall and drench the rails. In February 2014, a storm famously removed more than 100 feet of track. There has been talk of driving a new line inland, or even twenty-five yards out to sea, as yet to no avail.

Brunel’s station was wooden and burned down in 1873. The present one dates from 1875. It is handsomely Italianate, like a row of seaside townhouses, composed of projecting bays, heavily rusticated and stuccoed. The ticket hall rises to a fine ceiling.

The down platform on the sea side is in grey stone with bricked-up round-headed windows, defying the waves to do their worst. Viaduct arches and an ironwork colonnade carry the track along the beach, such that bathers could almost swim into the carriages at high tide. The station is best seen from the breakwater below, with a surreal view of express trains snaking past as if over the sand.

Dawlish station was given a handsome new footbridge in 2012, made of glass-reinforced plastic to defy the sea air. It was a faint hope. The station platforms are like the bridge of a battered trawler, their white paint perpetually stained with rust. Waiting passengers can at least taste the salt on their lips.

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