Liverpool Central railway station in Liverpool, England, forms a central hub of the Merseyrail network, being on both the Northern Line and the Wirral Line. The station is located underground on two levels, below the site of a former mainline terminus. It is the busiest station in Liverpool, though considerably smaller than Lime Street station, the mainline terminus, and the busiest station to operate fully the Merseyrail network. The station is the busiest underground station outside London serving 40,000 people daily. The station in passengers per platform is the busiest underground railway station in the United Kingdom at 5,217,547 per platform per annum and laying third in all stations, underground or overground. Liverpool Central is one of nine stations on the Merseyrail network to incorporate automatic ticket gates. The main concourse is part of a shopping centre, and includes a closed subway link to the former Lewis's department store. History High Level terminal station The original station, which was a large, above-ground terminal station, opened on 2 March 1874, at the end of the Cheshire Lines Committee (CLC) line to Manchester Central. It replaced Brunswick station as the CLC's Liverpool terminus, becoming the headquarters of the committee. The three-storey building fronted Ranelagh Street in the city centre, with a high, arched iron and glass train shed behind. There were six platforms within the station, offering journeys to Manchester Central (in 45 minutes, making the route the quickest and most direct between Liverpool and Manchester), London St. Pancras, Hull, Harwich, , and an alternative London route to that of the Midland Railway, terminating at London Marylebone. Until the nationalisation of Britain's railways, the station was always busy, but as with many other stations in the UK, it was closed under the Beeching Axe, as the routes served could be taken from nearby . In 1966, most services on the CLC route were diverted to Lime Street via the Hunts Cross chord, leaving only a dozen urban commuter trains per day to and from . These final services were withdrawn on 17 April 1972, with a promise to reinstate the Gateacre route when the Merseyrail network was completed in 1978. The High Level station was demolished in 1973, having served a short time as a car park, although some former station buildings remained while work was in progress on rebuilding the underground station in the mid-1970s. The area of the train shed