Gare du Sud  The Gare du Sud is a former French railway station located in the "Libération" quarter of the city of Nice in south-east France. The station was the terminus of the metre gauge railway of the Chemins de Fer de Provence rail company which links Nice to Digne-les-Bains in the department of Alpes-de-Haute-Provence. The station was closed in December 1991 when it was replaced by the Gare de Nice CP station. It remained derelict until 2013, when the station building was renovated and converted into a library. The station was designed by architect Prosper Bobin for the Compagnie des Chemins de fer du Sud de la France and construction lasted from 1890 until June 1892. The station building, set back from the Avenue Malausséna, was designed in an elegant neoclassical style, and built at reasonable cost using new industrial materials. It had a monumental and imposing facade with a central high section flanked by two side pavilions, decorated with ceramic tiles, painted designs and picturesque stonework. Above this was a pitched roof with terracotta tiles, parapets and finials. The interior floor was marble. Behind the station building and contrasting with it was a tall metal train shed, 23 meters wide, 18 meters high and 87 meters long, with a glass roof to cover the platforms for Grasse and Puget-Théniers. The train shed was originally designed by Gustave Eiffel for the Russian and Austro-Hungarian pavilion at the Paris Exposition Universelle (1889), and was added to the station in 1891. Although lines to Digne and Annot were opened in 1911, the line to Meyrargues was closed after World War II leaving only the Nice-Digne service. The Gare du Sud was itself closed in December 1991 by its then operator, the Chemins de Fer de Provence. Terminating services for the line were moved a short distance upline to a small new station, Nice CP. Ownership of the old station was transferred from the state to the city of Nice in 2000 and there were plans to demolish the metal train shed and glass roof, and to dismantle the facade. Following public outcry, the Minister of Culture, Renaud Donnedieu de Vabres blocked the plan in 2004. The facade of the old station building was listed as a historic monument in 2002 and the train shed was listed in 2005.