Train Station

Nothing to do with this really, but do you watch the excellent Michael Portillo series about the railways? Not sure what he calls things, though.

Whilst we're on the subject an engine is not a train. A train is pulled by an engine.

Rolling stock [cariages]is/are pulled by an engine. I'm not really sure what a train is..I was thinking about that just now.

Isn't a train a number of carriages pulled by an engine along a permanent way (track)?

cariages it's been a long day.....

Thomas, Percy, Henry, James, Toby............................

Oh railman I have railed against train station. Railway station is what I grew up with and what I shall stick to. I live in the North-east where the railway started and I rejoice in its heritage.

I also write cookbooks an find cupcakes an abomination!

"cookbooks"??

gracesmum It's what they call them these days. I didn't choose it.

Ah - that's why I persist with cookery books /railway station /fairy cakes etc.

Maybe it's to match up with 'bus station'?

Tram station too!

But I agree its a railway station. I live in The Stationmaster's House so I ought to know!

Hunt that bus station used to be the 'terminus' when I was a kid!

gracesmum I used to dread the children asking for those books at bedtimes as they almost sent me to sleep. I felt the same about Beatrix Potter books, too [hangs head in shame] emoticon

I agree about railway station but do find myself talking about the train station

You're talking about the painfully written Thomas books gracesmum - if so i agree. terrible to read aloud indeed.
Does the train not stop at the station? The railway itself appears to continue.

Train station isn't so bad. They are stations for trains, after all, as well as being stations on the railway. We say bus station – station for buses – not road station. We are just objecting to change rather than objecting to a misnomer when we object to train station.

Sign of aging?

I'm not sure about the Thomas books. I used to collect the old Ladybird books for my grandson, and found they had a nice rhythm to them, and he liked the repetition. Just the right length to send him off to sleep [till he sussed that out and started to keep himelf awake].They were very moral little tales as well. I was sad when he grew out of them and was actually looking forward to reading them to the younger boy, but he shows no interest. Never thought I'd say that at the height of his Thomas obsession. Alas, it's now Star Wars . Going back to the nature/nurture debate, he never showed any interest in Beatrix Potter books.

There is something mesmerising about trains both old and new; and I have enjoyed Portillo's series and also the oft-repeated one on Indian railways and the place they have in the hearts of that country.

For grandmas who have grandsons, have you seen the wonderful series of books called Peter's Railway? - stories accompanied by detailed diagrams of how trains, points, signals etc work - ideal for Christmas.

We're a railway family; even my grandad used to work with the railway horses [used to sleep with them when they were ill, even though he supposedly used to chase his wife round the house with the frying pan] which probably gives me my love of trains and horses. Alas, my grandson is no longer even slightly interested in trains, unless Darth Vader happens to be driving one. The S.O's grandad was a train [I mean engine] driver; he used to tell him to be near a local embankment at a certain time of day and would throw a bar of chocolate down to him; how Railway Children is that .

Yes, I have often wondered when and why railway stations became train stations. But railway language has got really bizarre. There are 'station stops', whats wrong with 'the next stop will be' and when I am on a train heading for London they alweays announce that the train will terminate at Paddington. I always get off in a hurry in case it suddenly blows up or collapses into a little heap of oil and splinters.

I do not think it is objecting to change so much as querying it. Both phrases mean exactly the same thing. I think this changed vocabulary is the result of the management speak that bedevils big companies. From my own experience working within one managers really hate any written material that is written in simple clear language, they always want to introduce complicated ways of saying anything, partly the reason is to obfuscate and confuse others, partly because they are afraid of being asked to defend ideas that are expressed to clearly and partly it is from fear that they might be misunderstood, that is why a spade becomes a manual excavation tool.

flickety, in some places, trains stop where there is no station, so there is a distinction between a station stop and other stops.

Bags But surely not for passengers to get off? Presumably they say "the next station stop" because trains don't necessarily stop at every station on the line, but it seems awfully cumbersome.

Whoops – just noticed that I said passengers. I meant customers.

flickety you have beaten me to it!"The train will terminate" is hilarious, but annoying, "station stops" meaningless, arriving into also drives me bonkers. I think it is an attempt to speak "posh "- rather like a caricature pompous mayor or civil servant and on the few poccasions the announcement is made in plain English by a real human being, I feel the need to cheer!
"Train station" is I think an Americanism, but it seems unfair to blame them for it.