North Shields Metro Station

North Shields Metro station is a station on the Tyne and Wear Metro network's Yellow line. It is located in a cutting just prior to a tunnel which takes the line eastwards beneath North Shields town centre.

History

The original North Shields station (named Shields until 1874) opened in 1839 on the Newcastle & North Shields Railway. Although originally a terminus station, the line was extended to Tynemouth in 1847 by the digging of a tunnel under North Shields.

The original station buildings lasted for around 50 years until they were replaced by new booking offices constructed over the platforms by the North Eastern Railway in 1890; these survived until the mid-1960s when they were replaced with a prefabricated structure by British Rail. This work also removed the overall roof from the platforms, replacing it with individual canopies over each platform.

The station was closed in August 1980 for conversion to Metro use, reopening in November 1982. During this work the platform-level canopies and ramps from the entrance to the platform were retained, but the 1960s station entrance was replaced by a new structure.

2010 Refurbishment

By the 2010s this structure too was becoming dated, and Nexus drew up plans to replace it with facilities which would provide "a visually striking new gateway to the town centre". The new station was fully completed by September 2012; changes included the addition of a new travel shop, passenger lifts, wave-shaped canopies for each platform and a new black, white and blue colour scheme. The ramps that had formerly provided access to the platforms were replaced with stairs. Ticket barriers were also installed in an attempt to cut down on ticketless travel through the station. The refurbishment cost £3 million and was part of the £385m Metro: all change programme.

Services

Trains on the Yellow line towards St James (westbound) and South Shields via Tynemouth and Newcastle city centre (eastbound) serve the station roughly every 12 minutes throughout the day, and every 15 minutes on Sundays. The station was the terminus of the now defunct Blue line from St James, which used a bay platform at the south-west corner of the station; this service was withdrawn prior to the opening of the Metro's extension to South Hylton in 2002.

The 333 bus service links the station with the nearby North Shields Ferry Landing for connections to South Shields via the Shields Ferry. Other buses also stop outside the station for destinations throughout North Tyneside and Newcastle upon Tyne.