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Reading railway station (formerly Reading General) is a major railway station and transport hub in the English town of Reading. It is on the northern edge of the town centre, near the main retail and commercial areas, and also the River Thames. Next to the railway station is a bus interchange, served by most of Reading's urban and rural bus services. With almost 15.7 million passenger entries and exits between April 2013 and March 2014, Reading is the ninth-busiest station in the UK outside London. It is the second busiest interchange station outside London, after Birmingham New Street, with over 3.8 million passengers changing trains at the station annually.〔(【引用サイトリンク】url=http://orr.gov.uk/__data/assets/excel_doc/0018/15363/station-usage-2013-14-data.xls )〕 Reading is one of 19 stations managed by Network Rail. The station is served by three train operating companies: Great Western Railway (formerly First Great Western), CrossCountry and South West Trains. ==History== The first Reading station was opened on 30 March 1840 as the temporary western terminus of the original line of the Great Western Railway (GWR). The time taken to travel from London to Reading was reduced to one hour and five minutes, less than a quarter of the time taken by the fastest stagecoach. The line was extended to its intended terminus at Bristol in 1841. As built, Reading station was a typical Brunel-designed single-sided intermediate station, with separate up and down platforms situated to the south of the through tracks and arranged so that all up trains calling at Reading had to cross the route of all down through trains. In 1844, the Great Western Hotel, was opened across the Forbury Road for people visiting the town. It is thought to be the oldest surviving railway hotel in the world. New routes soon joined the London to Bristol line, with the line from Reading to Newbury and Hungerford opening in 1847, and the line to Basingstoke in 1848. In 1860, a new station building, in Bath Stone and incorporating a tower and clock, was constructed for the Great Western Railway. In 1898 the single sided station was replaced by a conventional design with 'up', 'down' and 'relief' platforms linked by a pedestrian subway. Access to the station from Broad Street was not direct, until Queen Victoria Street was built in 1903. This provided a route through to Friar Street and Station Road. The station was originally named ''Reading'' and became ''Reading General'' on 26 September 1949 to distinguish it from the ex-South Eastern Railway station nearby. The "General" suffix was dropped from timetables in 1973, but some of the station nameboards still stated "Reading General" in 1974. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Reading railway station」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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