The oldest terminal station in the world was Crown Street railway station in Liverpool in 1830, on the locomotive-hauled Liverpool to Manchester line. Since then, over 2,500 train stations have been built across the UK, not including those in undergrounds or heritage railways.
Further afield, there are more than 36,000 train stations in, and adjacent to, Europe.
The US has the largest railway network in the world, with a total length of 137,000 miles.
Despite these impressive figures, not every country in the world has train stations or railway lines due to a variety of reasons, including poverty or population density.
Below are the 10 biggest countries in the world that do not have a single train station.
Chad
Infrastructure across the landlocked African country of Chad is generally poor, especially in the northeast, with river transport limited to the southwest.
Several plans or proposals to build railways emerged during the French colonial period in Chad, with the aim of connecting the country to other African networks in Cameroon, Nigeria, and others.
There were also plans in 2012 for a railway, but nothing has materialised since then.
(Image: Getty)
Niger
There is currently one railway in Niger, built between 2014 and 2016 between Niamey and Dosso by the French Bollore conglomerate, with the goal to connect Niamey to the rail network in Benin and to the coast. However, competing commercial interests by several parties resulted in endless litigation and the connection to Benin never materialised.
As a result, the 90-mile Niamey-Dosso stretch now lies abandoned, with the tracks ending in the middle of nowhere. After years of neglect the tracks are already damaged to such an extent that they have become unusable.
At the Niamey Terminus station, the rails are bent to such an extent by the summer heat that a train would not be able to leave the station.
(Image: Getty)
Central African Republic
The Central African Republic had a rail line proposed in 2002, connecting Cameroon to the capital of the CAR, but there are no railways in the country at present.
There are remnants of a former railway line, the Zinga-Mongo railway, a 4.7-mile line built in the 1920s and operated until the 1960s. It was built to bypass rapids on the Ubangi river by allowing passengers and goods to board smaller steamers upstream.
The railway was destroyed during the country’s struggle for independence. In 2006, the remnants, including buildings, warehouses and some rolling stock, were added to the UNESCO World Heritage Tentative List.
(Image: Getty)
