English: Reading station, near to Reading, Great Britain.

This photograph is one of a series depicting Reading station as it is in early 2009. Network Rail and Reading Borough Council have announced plans for a major redevelopment of the station and surrounding track network between 2010 and 2012 with the aim of tackling the bottlenecks of the area. The current station and junction capacities only allow for 30 trains per hour, whilst the surrounding rail network would otherwise accommodate 60 trains per hour. There will be significant changes to the station layout, including new platforms, and to the junctions, particularly Reading triangle to the west of the station.

Further information is available here <a title="http://www.networkrail.co.uk/aspx/4664.aspx" rel="nofollow" href="http://www.networkrail.co.uk/aspx/4664.aspx">Link</a><img style="padding-left:2px;" alt="External link" title="External link - shift click to open in new window" src="http://s0.geograph.org.uk/img/external.png" width="10" height="10"/>

This picture is taken from towards the eastern end of platform 5, looking west. To the right is platform 5. To the immediate right is bay platform 6, one of two (along with platform 10) used for terminating stopping services from Paddington. Beyond is platform 8, the westbound through platform on the slow lines, although also often used for reversing Cross Country services and for late running fast Paddington bound services as an alternative to platform 5. Beyond is platform 9, where a London bound High Speed Train (HST) is departing. It is unusual for such services to be on the slow lines.