Europe‘s railway system serves a huge number of destinations, from the largest and most popular cities to villages in the middle of nowhere.
But, with convenience comes crowds, and some of Europe’s train stations draw in a staggering number of passengers.
The top ten busiest stations in Europe, three of which are found in the UK, get more than 30 million passengers per year.
The list aims to include station footfall from all modes of heavy rail transport, such as with U-Bahn systems in Germany. With other stations, however, there may be multiple agencies involved, meaning that for the purpose of comparability, they have been compiled into just a single statistic, including London and Paris stations.
The number of platforms does not include rapid transit systems, referring exclusively to mainline or commuter rail platforms.
Some big stations did not make the list, including Madrid Atocha in Spain and Berlin Hbf, the main station in Germany’s capital. Surprisingly, Spain has no stations in the top ten even though it is one of the top tourist destinations and has among the highest rail transport performance.
Securing the tenth spot is London Liverpool Street, a major central railway terminus in the north-eastern corner of the City of London, in the ward of Bishopsgate Without. It is the terminus of the West Anglia Main Line to Cambridge, the Great Eastern Main Line to Norwich, commuter trains serving east London and destinations in the East of England. The Stansted Express serves the airport of the same name.
According to the data, on all modes of transport, Liverpool Street welcomes 136.7 million passengers. Specifically, 69.5 million are commuters, while 67.2 are via rapid transit.
It also has 18 platforms, the second lowest on the list.
(Image: Getty)
Roma Termini, the main railway station of Rome is ninth. It is Italy’s busiest railway station, with an average of 850 trains in transit per day. It has regular services to all major Italian cities, including Pisa, Florence and Naples, as well as daily international services to Munich, Geneva and Vienna.
It is also the main hub for public transports inside Rome, with two metro lines – A and B – intersecting at the Termini metro station.
It welcomes 150 million passengers per year and has a staggering 32 platforms, the most on the list, tied with two others.
(Image: Getty)
Zürich Hauptbahnhof, often shortened to Zürich HB, is the largest railway station in Switzerland, claiming sixth place on the list. Zürich is a major railway hub, with services across Switzerland and to and from neighbouring countries including Germany, Italy, Austria and France. The station can be found at the northern end of the old town, Altstadt.
The station is on several levels, with platforms both at ground and below-ground level, and tied together by underground passages and the ShopVille shopping mall. Serving up to 2,915 trains per day, Zürich HB is one of the busiest railway stations in the world. It was ranked as the second-best European railway station in 2020.
Zürich HB welcomes 150.7 million passengers a year and has 26 platforms.
(Image: Getty)