The Old Peking Railway Station

The old railway station, just by Qianmen and handy for the southern end of the Legation Quarter after a glimpse of the Tartar Wall. From the outside classic railway station architecture and a stunning western-style clock tower. The towering Chienmen Gate your first sight as you exited the station. What an arrival courtesy of the Peking-Fengtian Railway.

The old station is being ‘refurbished’ at the moment (and we all know what terrors that can lead to!) with a jazzed up railway museum inside so they assured me when I poked my head under ‘Don’t Cross’ tape and asked. The big arched glass roof at the back that originally graced the station are gone but it’s still a fine building. And so, then and now: