Check In Above the Ticket Hall: In Defence of the Station Hotel

There is a particular sound a station hotel makes at half six in the morning. A trolley rattling somewhere below. A tannoy clearing its throat. The low rumble of a diesel that has not quite decided to leave yet. I was lying in a bed roughly four metres above Platform 2, listening to all of it, and feeling quietly smug about the whole arrangement.

Outside, a man in a coat was standing on the concourse squinting at the departures board with the specific expression of someone who has been up since five. I had been up since ten past six, and my commute to the 07:04 was a staircase and a set of double doors.

This is the case for the station hotel. Not because it is glamorous, and not because I am the sort of person who gets excited about corridor carpet. Because it is, pound for pound, the most underrated booking in British travel — and almost nobody talks about it without pulling a face.

What you are actually buying

You are not buying luxury. You are buying minutes, and the absence of a certain kind of low-grade dread.

Think about the alternative. You book the boutique place with the nice lampshades and the instagrammable lobby, three-quarters of a mile from the station. It costs £40 more. You arrive at half nine at night with a rucksack, and you walk that three-quarters of a mile through a city you do not know, past a Wetherspoons and a shuttered Greggs, and you arrive mildly frayed. The next morning you need to be on the 07:04, which means leaving at half six, which means walking back the same three-quarters of a mile in the dark with your bag, arriving at the station sweaty and slightly panicked, and paying £4.20 for a coffee because there is no time for anything else.

The station hotel removes all of that. The walk is ninety seconds. The panic is optional. You can leave the room at 06:52 and still be early.

On a Tuesday in November I paid £62 for a room that would have cost me £105 in the city centre, and I got a bigger bed, a bath, and a view of a signal gantry. I am aware that last part is not everyone's idea of a view. But I slept well, and I made my train without once checking the time in a mild state of alarm, and I would do it again.

The noise question, answered honestly

Yes, you will hear things. Anyone who tells you otherwise is selling something.

What you hear depends enormously on which side of the building you are on. The platform side gets the tannoy, the doors, the announcements about the late-running service to Doncaster, and the freight trains that seem to run exclusively between two and four in the morning. The back side gets a car park, a bin lorry, and the occasional seagull.

Ask. When you book, ask for a room away from the platform. When you check in, ask again, pleasantly, and mention that you are an early riser and a light sleeper. It works more often than you would think. Top floor helps too — you get above the level of the concourse noise and the general clatter of a station waking up.

It is also worth being realistic about what you are comparing it to. A city-centre hotel in a British town on a Friday night comes with its own soundtrack: hen parties in the corridor, a bin lorry at five, a delivery van reversing at six. I have had far worse nights above a high street than I have ever had above a platform. The station noise is at least predictable. It follows a timetable.

Breakfast, and the 07:04 problem

The single most common way the station hotel lets people down is breakfast timing.

Hotels advertise breakfast from seven. Your train leaves at 07:04. Nobody has thought this through, and it is not their problem, but it becomes yours.

Do the arithmetic before you book. Look up the first departure you actually need, then look up the breakfast start time, then decide. Some station hotels open the dining room at half six precisely because they know who their guests are. Others start at half seven and will hand you a paper cup of coffee and a croissant if you ask nicely at reception the night before. A few will do a proper takeaway bag — ask.

The alternative is to book room-only. A station hotel's greatest asset is that the concourse is right there, and the concourse has a kiosk. A bacon roll eaten standing up while watching your train be announced is, in my view, one of the great British travel experiences. It is also about £4 and takes ninety seconds.

Where it goes wrong

I am not going to pretend this works everywhere.

When the name is a lie. Plenty of hotels called the Station Hotel are a fifteen-minute walk from the station, usually uphill, usually because the station moved or the hotel did not. Check the actual distance on a map before you book. Look at the satellite view and find the platform. If you cannot see the platform, it is not a station hotel.

When you are in town for the town. If your trip is about the city — the galleries, the restaurants, the evening out — then sleeping at the station puts you at the wrong end of everything. Every night ends with a walk back to a dead zone. Every morning starts with a walk in. The convenience only pays off if the train is the point.

When the station is a major terminus. The big London terminals are a different proposition entirely. You are paying a premium for the address, and you are getting crowds, taxi ranks, and a lot of noise. The maths works much better at a provincial station with four platforms and a café that closes at six.

When you cannot get in after hours. Some smaller stations lock their doors after the last service. If you are arriving late, check how the hotel is accessed at night. It is usually fine, but it is worth knowing before you are standing on a dark platform at half eleven pulling at a handle.

How to pick a good one

A short checklist, learned the hard way.

• Check the walk in minutes, not miles, and check it on a map rather than trusting the description.
• Read the reviews and search them for the word 'noise'. You will find out very quickly which side of the building to avoid.
• Look at the first departure board for the day you are travelling, not just the one you want. Engineering works change things.
• Ask for a high floor and a room away from the platform, in the booking notes and again at check-in.
• Confirm breakfast hours against your train, or book room-only and embrace the kiosk.
• Check whether the hotel has luggage storage. Being able to dump a bag at half nine in the morning is the whole point of being there.

The verdict

If your trip is one night, an early train, and a bag you have to carry yourself, the hotel above the ticket hall is the best value in Britain. It is unfashionable, the carpet is usually a bit much, and the lift makes a noise like a filing cabinet being dragged across a floor. But you will sleep, you will eat something, and you will walk onto your train rather than run for it.

That is not a small thing. On a dark November morning, with the wind coming across the concourse and the departure board already flickering, it is very nearly everything.

Book it for the train, not for the romance. Then get up early, sit by the window with a cup of tea, and watch the first service of the day pull out without you having to be on it.