Milton Keynes Central is a large railway station that serves Central Milton Keynes and the surrounding area of Milton Keynes, Buckinghamshire. The station is located on the West Coast Main Line between the stations of Bletchley and Wolverton, both of which are also within Milton Keynes. The station is served by Virgin Trains inter-city services and by London Midland local services. Also, Southern provide services to East Croydon via West London.

This station is one of the five stations serving Milton Keynes. The others are (north Milton Keynes), (south Milton Keynes), (also south Milton Keynes) and (south-east Milton Keynes). In addition, Woburn Sands railway station is just outside the Milton Keynes boundary and serves the south-east of the Borough. Milton Keynes Central is by far the busiest and most important of these, as well as being the largest in terms of platforms in use, having overtaken Bletchley when platforms 2A and 6 became operational.

Scale

Milton Keynes Central has a total of seven platforms. Platforms 1 and 3 are the south and northbound slow platforms, while 4 and 6 are the south and northbound fast platforms. Platforms 2 and 5 are reversible, being slow and fast respectively. Platform 2A is a four-car south-facing bay platform built for the extension of Marston Vale Line services into Milton Keynes Central. To the north of the station the six lines reduce to four (two slow and two fast), whilst there is a mile of five-track running to the south before this also reduces back to four.

2006–08 developments

In May 2006, the Department of Transport announced a plan to upgrade the station. The first phase added a down fast line platform 6, so that the existing platform 5 could be used for stopping express trains in either direction. The second phase provided an additional terminating bay platform (2A) for the Marston Vale Line / service via the WCML to Milton Keynes Central. This new 4-car bay platform is indented into platform 1. The original platform 1 line was extended northwards from 'bay' to 'through' (becoming the up slow line), and platform 2 line is now a 'centre' terminating and reversing line, avoiding conflicting crossing movements. This work was completed on 29 December 2008. However, Marston Vale Line services to Bedford are not expected to start before 2012 at the earliest.

Future plans

More speculatively, a "strong" case has been made to Government to reopen the western section of the historic Varsity Line from and extend the service via Bletchley and the WCML to Milton Keynes Central.

Local facilities and interchange

The station is the terminus for many bus services and almost all intra-city buses stop there. The frontage of the station has six bus stops, four for local services and two for long-distance services. Virgin Trains operate a coach service from the station to Luton Airport, providing a direct link between Milton Keynes and the Midland Main Line at Luton Airport Parkway station. Stagecoach stop here on their route from Oxford to Cambridge and their route from Milton Keynes to Northampton and Peterborough.

The station building is home to a shop and there are other shops and restaurants on the south side of the station square. There are a number of hotels on Midsummer Boulevard (which begins opposite the station and leads up into Central Milton Keynes). Numerous bus services each hour traverse Midsummer Boulevard, connecting the station to Midsummer Place and Central Milton Keynes Shopping Centre. The Milton Keynes redway system, a comprehesive network of cycle/pedestrian paths, connects to the station and its cycle parking facilities.

The station square itself is a favourite site for skateboarding and freestyle BMX and as a result the granite facings of the planting surrounds have suffered from the continuous bumping and grinding. This has lessened somewhat since the opening of a dedicated skateboarding park (Sk8 MK) close to the central bus station. The Borough Council has plans for a comprehensive redevelopment of the square.

Services

Milton Keynes Central is a principal stop on London Midland's services from Birmingham New Street to London and from Crewe to London. All London-bound trains run to London Euston, with some only stopping at Watford Junction and others stopping at every single station to Euston (a total of eleven intermediate stops). Northbound, London Midland's services operate to Northampton, Rugby and Coventry whilst the Crewe trains serve Nuneaton, Tamworth, Stafford and Stoke-on-Trent. There are four departures per hour to London Euston on a weekday, and three departures to Northampton per hour.

Virgin Trains stop many of their inter-city trains here to and from Birmingham, Manchester, Liverpool,Holyhead and Glasgow.

Since 2009 Milton Keynes has also been served by Southern, who provide an hourly service to East Croydon, running via west London and connecting with services to Brighton.

In film

The station and its plaza was used in the movie Superman IV as a substitute for the United Nations building. Other scenes were shot in the Central Milton Keynes area.

References

1. More delays to Bedford-Milton Keynes [Central rail link] Luton Today 27 August 2009
2. East-West Rail Consortium: Western Section: Final Report 5.1 p38
3. sk8m8 : Sk8MK Skate Plaza - Milton Keynes
4. STATION SQUARE: MULTI-MODAL TRANSPORT INTERCHANGE - Milton Keynes Council.

External links

• High resolution aerial photograph from MKWEB