Greenock Central railway station
Greenock Central 
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| Scottish Gaelic: Grianaig Mheadhain | |
Looking east along the concourse which has lost its glazed roof, as passengers leave an eastbound train. Note the steel ramp down to Platform 2.
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| Location | |
| Place | Greenock |
| Local authority | Inverclyde |
| Coordinates | 55°56′42″N 4°45′05″W / 55.9450°N 4.7515°WCoordinates: 55°56′42″N 4°45′05″W / 55.9450°N 4.7515°W |
| Grid reference | NS282758 |
| Operations | |
| Station code | GKC |
| Managed by | Abellio ScotRail |
| Number of platforms | 2 |
| Live arrivals/departures, station information and onward connections from National Rail Enquiries |
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| Annual rail passenger usage* | |
| 2011/12 |
 0.391 million |
| 2012/13 |
 0.398 million |
| 2013/14 |
0.379 million |
| 2014/15 |
0.391 million |
| 2015/16 |
0.392 million |
| History | |
| 31 March 1841 | Opened |
| National Rail – UK railway stations | |
| * Annual estimated passenger usage based on sales of tickets in stated financial year(s) which end or originate at Greenock Central from Office of Rail and Road statistics. Methodology may vary year on year. | |
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Greenock Central station is one of eight railway stations serving the town of Greenock in western Scotland, and is the nearest to the town centre. This station, which is staffed, is on the Inverclyde Line, 37 km (23 mi) west of Glasgow Central towards Gourock. It has three platforms, two of which are in use, with one disused bay platform. This disused platform is still connected to the main line.
It was originally the terminus before the railway was extended to Gourock and at that time was known as Greenock Cathcart station, as the access road to the station leads off the town's Cathcart Street.
The station was opened by the Glasgow, Paisley and Greenock Railway on 31 March 1841 as the terminus of its line from Bridge Street railway station, which had a shared section between Glasgow, and Paisley Gilmour Street being run by the Glasgow and Paisley Joint Railway. Greenock was already a major seaport and a branch near the station provided a goods service, but it was the passenger service which proved a major success. Clyde steamers took a couple of hours to get from Glasgow down the River Clyde as far as Greenock, and now for the first time a railway took only an hour to get to the coast. The terminus with its short driveway sloping down to Cathcart Street was around 300 yards (280 m) from Custom House Quay, Greenock, where steamers took wealthy commuters in summer to their villas around the shores of the Firth of Clyde as well as huge numbers of holidaymakers visiting resorts down the firth at "trades holidays", particularly the annual Glasgow Fair.
When the railway merged with the Caledonian Railway on 9 July 1847, Greenock Cathcart was the main access to the coast. However, in 1869 their dominance of this traffic ended when the Glasgow and South Western Railway opened its station on the waterfront at Princes Pier, Greenock. Greenock's growth had led to increasing overcrowding of tenement houses, and passengers were glad to avoid the walk through these streets. Attempts by the Caledonian to extend their railway to Gourock had met with difficulties in getting through a built up area, but now, spurred by competition, they gained Parliamentary approval in 1884. The route took the railway in a tunnel from the station under the town's Well Park (which provides a level area atop a high rocky crag), then in further cuttings and tunnels westwards through the hillside clear of the expensive properties on the coast. After three years in construction the Gourock Extension Railway opened on 1 June 1889.
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