Friday, July 8, 2011

Walking through the Wuxi Train Station 2011

Friday, I had to put money on my bus card, so I went to the recently expanded Wuxi Train Station.
 
It used to be that the Wuxi train station was just on the south side of the main tracks running through the city.  Now, because of the fast train construction that has been done, the train station is on both sides of the tracks with tunnels running underground and above the tracks.

The north train station, the new one, recently opened.  It is not quite finished yet as construction goes on -- shops and hotels have been to be set up.  One part of the station, that must have recently been completed, is a tunnel connecting the North and South train station squares.  The #25 bus I take to work recently changed its route and now runs through the North square instead of the South.

The #25 bus route change has meant some changes for me.  I often transfer to buses at the south square.  It seemed that I wouldn't be able to do this because of the bus route change, but I thought I would explore the north square to see.  Friday was my chance as I needed to get to the South Square to the place where I can put money on my bus card.

It turned out that I was easily able to find the tunnels to get me from the north side of the tracks to the south.  But I have no problems with keeping my bearings in Wuxi -- I would imagine that those not familiar with Wuxi would have been confused.  To go from one side of the tracks to the other involved going up and down three flights of stairs, and walking through two long tunnels.  The end of the second tunnel was familiar enough to me, but again probably confusing to others.   As well, the signs, try hard as they might, couldn't help but be confusing.

After my visit to the train station, I later happened to talk to a student who had just come to Wuxi, via train, from Changzhou which is close to Wuxi.  The student, who always makes the short train trip, indicated by his limited vocabulary and shaking of his head that he found the expanded train station to be a confusing place.

No comments: