Sandton station visit

It's hard to get too enthusiastic about a building site, or a station, but I decided to take advantage of having a friend who works for Bombardier to go take a look.

The first thing that strikes you is how much more like a building site than a station it looks. Seriously, this is supposed to be up and running by May, and it seems quite a long way off.

Secondly, it's very deep. Something like 11 floors, if I recall correctly. There are 3 platforms on 2 levels, down a LOT of stairs. Well, there are escalators, but they're still covered in dustsheets and haven't been switched on yet. As I said, it's a building site.

On the way down we encountered the typical rooms full of miscellaneous piping, workers busy welding unidentifiable structures, and generally plenty of hustle and bustle, people walking past carrying large and improbably shaped items, etc.

So most of the station is below ground.  At ground level there's an enormous car park (very glamorous) and they're leaving some kind of platform to build future stuff on top of.

Trains started running into and out of the station about a week or so after our visit.