If you come to Strasbourg by rail, then the main station of the city can pretty surprise you. In the capital of Alsace you expect to see on this place a classical building in the Baroque or Renaissance style, at the worst - a nobly restrained modern building. But not a streamlined glass flying saucer stuffed with people and amazes with its size and futuristic design.

Until 1974 . the main city station was the one that stood on Place des Halles . Then a shopping center was built on the square, and the first station (working since 1854 .) was closed . The second - the new one - the railway station started to be erected at the time when Alsace-Lorraine was subordinate to Germany . For him it was chosen The place where previously there were fortifications, designed by the famous Vauban (author of at least one key sights Strasbourg - dam near Little France) . The railway station was opened already in 1883 ., but then another 15 years were completed . This building is the same, the classical one, which you imagine when you go to Strasbourg - you can see here and until now . Only now it is hidden inside a powerful sphere of glass and metal .

Changes have burst when in 2006-2007, The railway station was connected to a large French railway grid TGV. On the dome, which, like a cap, covered the old building, it was, according to various estimates, from six to nine hundred tons of glass. And yet - the work of three hundred workers and one and a half hundred million EUR. The floor of the station was equipped with central heating, and the computerized central control panel became the largest in the country.

Today the main station of Strasbourg is the most important transport hub of the whole of western France, and it belongs to the SNCF state office (although the station is used by German Deutche Bahn and regional company). Its daily load is about 60 thousand passengers. The parking lot near the station is designed for 850 bicycles. And on the square in front of it with ray-shaped divergent alleys it's completely pointless to appoint meetings: it's so big that you can not find each other here.

To get to the historic center of the city from the station, it will take 10-15 minutes of leisurely walk . That is, the station is actually in the heart of Strasbourg, some kilometer from the old Little France . Many citizens before it is believed that the shape of the station greatly spoils the authentic atmosphere and the spirit of the city . But the location on a circular square bending along the railway station facade with a central entrance boasts several very popular hotels: Bristol, Grand Hotel, Mercure "," Ibis ". Here is also the office of Thomas Cook .

Central Station Strasbourg

Central Station Strasbourg in 1997

Inside Strasbourg Central Station