Improving Railway Stations.

Although Manchester, in common with London, can boast of a really commodious passenger station, there are few really imposing railway stations on the Home railways. Compared with the enormous termini found in the United States and on the mainland of Europe, the Home passenger stations are on very unpretentious lines. Utility, rather than architectural magnificence, has been the aim of the British station designer, and it is only in recent years that the pulling power of a really imposing railway station has come to be realised at Home. Among Europe's most beautiful city railway stations may be named the central depot at Leipzig, in Germany; the Amsterdam terminal of the State Railways of Holland; Bergen station on the Norwegian State Railways; the Orleans terminal in Paris; and the central station at Helsingfors, the capital of Finland. Helsingfors station has been styled the most beautiful railway depot in the world. It stands alone in one of the central squares of the city. Built of granite and having as one of its most striking features a massive tower roofed by a copper cupola, the structure may be classed as a true architectural masterpiece. The spacious entrance hall, containing booking, luggage, parcels and telegraph offices, is flanked on either side by magnificent waiting and refreshment rooms. In the latter rooms a woman cook, dressed in spotless white, presides at an electric stove, and in front of her are the cooked dishes, with glistening electro-plate covers which can be raised or lowered by mechanical means to display their contents.

The ticket offices in the main hall at Helsingfors station are in sets of three. Each booking-clerk has sole control of his own series of tickets. When he goes off duty he closes the window and locks up his office, the adjoining window being opened by the clerk who relieves him. Book stalls and other amenities are much in evidence, and throughout the depot there is displayed the sincere desire of the Finnish railway authorities to please the traveller and attract him to the rail route.