Station building

A station building, also known as a head house, is the main building of a passenger railway station. It is typically used principally to provide services to passengers.

A station building is not to be confused with the station itself. Whereas the latter is the whole facility giving passenger access to trains at a particular location (and includes the tracks, platforms, and often also, e.g., a subway, train shed, etc.), a station building is a specific well-defined element of the station of which it forms part.

Normally, a station building will be of adequate size for the type of service that is to be performed. It may range from a simple single-storey building with limited services to passengers to a large building with many indoor spaces providing many services. Some station buildings are of monumental proportions and styles. Both in the past and in recent times, especially when constructed for a modern high-speed rail network, a station building may even be a true masterpiece of architecture.

A typical railway station building will have a side entrance hall off the road or square where the station is located. Near the entrance will be a ticket counter, ticket machines, or both. There will also be one or more waiting rooms, often divided by class, and equipped with seats and luggage stands. From the waiting rooms, there will usually be direct access to rail passenger services. Medium to large size station buildings will often also have offices for rail staff involved in the management and operation of trains. Smaller or more rural stations will have no station building at all.

Several decades were needed to find a formula for station building architecture that, like churches and town halls, would be easily recognizable in the urban space.

The first station buildings gave no special emphasis to their function, being essentially a variation on the house or office building. So, for example, it is difficult to identify the function of the station building in the original Manchester terminus of the Liverpool and Manchester Railway, or in the two railway stations in Vienna shown below, although they have been given the characteristics of a public building.

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