Nottingham Victoria Railway Station - Construction and Opening

Construction and Opening

The station's construction was on a grand scale: a 13-acre (53,000 m2) site was acquired at a cost of £473,000 (£39.1 million as of 2012), in the heart of Nottingham's city centre; negotiations for the acquisition of the land had taken three years. The construction called for the demolition of whole streets of some 1,300 houses, 24 public houses and St. Stephen's Church, Bunker's Hill, following which around 600,000 cubic yards (460,000 m3) of sandstone was excavated from the site. The site measured around 650 yards (590 m) in length from north to south and had an average width of 110 yards (100 m) with a tunnel at each end of it for access.

Both the Great Central Railway and Great Northern Railway shared the station (they split into two lines at Weekday Cross junction). The two owners failed to reach agreement on the station's name; the Great Central naturally wanted it called "Central", a proposition the Great Northern, still smarting from the incursion into its territory made by the London Extension, would not accept. The two railway companies operated separate booking offices, the Great Central issuing tickets bearing "Nottingham Central", whilst the Great Northern's window bore the legend "Nottingham Joint St'n". The Town Clerk tried to resolve the situation by suggesting the name "Nottingham Victoria" to reflect the fact that the planned opening date coincided with Queen Victoria's birthday; this was readily accepted at a meeting of the Nottingham Joint Station Committee on 12 June.

Nottingham Victoria station was officially opened without ceremony in the early hours of 24 May 1900 - over a year after the commencement of services on the new railway line. The first service to call at the station was a Great Central express from Manchester to Marylebone which pulled in at 1.12am; it was followed fifteen minutes later by a Great Central express travelling in the opposite direction.