Warszawa Gdańska station
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Warsaw Gdańska station (Warszawa Gdańska or Dworzec Gdański in Polish) is a railway station in the northern part of the city of Warsaw.
It is located on the so-called Northern Line, a railway running between the Warsaw's central area and the borough of Żoliborz. It serves as a transportation hub with regional trains departing from the station. It connects with the Dworzec Gdański stop of the Warsaw Metro, located below the railway station, and with a number of tram and bus stops located nearby.
The railway station is located outside of the main railway crossing the city through a tunnel linking Warszawa Wschodnia, Warszawa Centralna and Warszawa Zachodnia railway stations and as such is sometimes used as a reserve station, used by long distance trains during refurbishment of the main line. The Warsaw Metro has received EU funding to build a pedestrian tunnel linking the metro station to the railway station.
[edit] History
The original station was built around 1880 under the name of Vistulan Main Train Station (Polish: Główny Dworzec Kolei Nadwiślańskiej) and served a local line running along the Vistula river northwards. In early 20th century, with the opening of a railway bridge over the river south of Warsaw Citadel (directly to the east of the station; the bridge was constructed around 1870, but was initially used by the Russian Army exclusively), it was renamed Warszawa Kowelska (Warsaw Kowel train station) and started serving as a junction between the Warszawa Główna and Warszawa Wileńska stations located in downtown Warsaw and downtown Praga (respectively). Until then the passengers travelling from St. Petersburg to Vienna had to leave the train station at Warszawa Wileńska, take a tramway to the city centre and take another train of narrow gauge running from there. The Warszawa Kowelska station also served as the main supply station for the Russian garrison stationed in the citadel.
During the withdrawal of Russian troops from Warsaw in August of 1915 the station was demolished, along with the bridge it led to. After the World War I both were rebuilt and the station was renamed to Warszawa Gdańska (Warsaw Gdańsk station), the name coined after the city of Gdańsk.
Since 1933, when the Diametral Tunnel running directly beneath the city centre and linking three main train stations in Warsaw was opened, the Warszawa Gdańska station lost its meaning as a transit station and started serving as a station for local and suburban trains. During the Warsaw Uprising the German troops stationed there prevented the Polish forces from Żoliborz from linking with the Old Town. After the World War II, due to the complete destruction of Warsaw's railway stations (including the representative Warszawa Główna opened in 1939), the Warszawa Gdańska was used as a temporary station for long distance trains. Until 1970s it served as the main station for transit trains merely passing through Warsaw from the USSR to the west. Among the notable trains to stop there was the Ost-West Express from Moscow to Ostend, Hoek van Holland and Paris, Chopin to Vienna and Praha to Prague. As such, it was the main station from where the people expelled in the effect of the Polish 1968 political crisis left Poland. The events of 1968 are now commemorated by a stone tablet on the station's platform.
In the 1970s the station was completely replaced by the newly-built Warszawa Centralna and continued as a minor station for suburban trains towards Tłuszcz and Ciechanów. In the 1990s the Legionowo-Nieporęt-Tłuszcz line had been liquidated and currently the Warszawa Gdańska serves only the trains towards Ciechanów. At times it is also used as a replacement station used during the refurbishment of the centrally-located stations.
