Manchester Piccadilly Station Entrance, Fairfield Street, North West England, UK, M1 2QF

Manchester Piccadilly is the principal railway station in Manchester, England. Opened as Store Street in 1842, it was renamed Manchester London Road in 1847 and Manchester Piccadilly in 1960. Located to the south-east of Manchester city centre, it hosts long-distance intercity and cross-country services to national destinations including London, Birmingham, Glasgow, Edinburgh, Cardiff, Bristol and Southampton; regional services to destinations in Northern England including Liverpool, Leeds, Sheffield, Newcastle and York; and local commuter services around Greater Manchester. It is one of 19 major stations managed by Network Rail. The station has 14 platforms, twelve terminal and two through platforms. Piccadilly is also a major interchange with the Metrolink light rail system with two tram platforms in its undercroft. Piccadilly is the busiest station in the Manchester station group with nearly 28 million passenger entries and exits between April 2017 and March 2018, (the other major stations in Manchester are Oxford Road and Victoria). It is the fourth busiest station in the United Kingdom outside London. The station hosts services from six train operating companies. It is the second busiest interchange station outside London, with almost 3.8 million passengers changing trains annually. Between the late 1990s and early 2000s, Piccadilly Station was refurbished, taking five years and costing £100 million (in 2002), it was the most expensive improvement on the UK rail network at the time. Further improvements and expansion plans have been mooted. In October 2016, a Transport and Works Act application was submitted for the construction of two platforms as part of the Manchester Piccadilly and Manchester Oxford Road Capacity Scheme. As of 2018, this application has not been approved by the government. To allow the station to accommodate high speed services under High Speed 2 proposals, five platforms would be required and the Metrolink station would be reconfigured.