Station: A Whistlestop Tour of 20th- And 21st-Century Railway Architecture

A glorious celebration of modern railway architecture in the 20th century and beyond, travelling all over the world.

Many railway books are about nostalgia for the steam age, but this one is different: a global study of railway architecture from the 1950s onward and into the future. In 50 fascinating entries, renowned travel and architecture writer Christopher Beanland looks primarily at stations but also covers starkly brutalist signal boxes and depots, romantic and cosmopolitan railway hotels, and sleek and streamlined interchanges, plus international examples of great logos and design.

The book explores the well-known Hauptbahnhof in Berlin, Madrid’s Atocha Station, and the brand new Penn Station Hall in New York, but it also includes less-prominent examples such as high-speed stations in Saudi Arabia, the Düsseldorf Art Tram line, and even the monorails at Walt Disney World. It contains in-depth features on repurposed urban railway infrastructure, hanging railways in Germany and Japan, and the mysterious glamour of travelling by night. There is also a selection of interviews with interesting people who regularly use these iconic buildings and railways.

Stylish and contemporary, this gloriously illustrated book is a celebration of modern railway architecture at its best, an ideal purchase for rail enthusiasts and architecture aficionados alike.

Christopher Beanland is a journalist and author who specializes in architecture and travel writing. He is the author of City Parks, Unbuilt: Radical Visions of a Future That Never Arrived, and Lido, also published by Batsford. He writes regularly for The Guardian, The Independent, The Telegraph, and Mr. Porter and is the star of the Park Dates podcast. He lives in East London.