Since the 1970s, the main terminal building has also provided direct access to the underground Lime Street Wirral Line station on the Merseyrail network. Beginning in the 1960s, the Concourse House office tower block and several retailers stood outside the southern train shed, but they were demolished in 2010. Lime Street is the largest and oldest railway station in Liverpool, and is one of 18 stations managed by national infrastructure maintenance company Network Rail. During 2017, work commenced at Lime Street Station on a £340 million remodelling programme. In "Britain's 100 Best Railway Stations", written by columnist and editor Simon Jenkins, Lime Street Station was one of only ten stations to be awarded 5/5 stars. The original terminus of the 1830 Liverpool and Manchester Railway (L&MR) was located at Crown Street, in Edge Hill, to the east of and outside the city centre. However, even before Edge Hill had been opened, it was apparent that there was a pressing need for another station to be built, which would this time be closer to the city centre. Accordingly, during October 1833, the construction commenced on a purpose-built station at Lime Street in the city centre; the land was purchased from Liverpool Corporation for £9,000 (). The means of connecting the new station to L&MR's network came in the form of a twin-track tunnel, which had been constructed between Edge Hill and the site of the new Lime Street station a year prior to work being started on the station itself; during the construction effort, the tunnel was frequently used to transport building materials for the station onto the site. The station was designed by the architects John Cunningham, Arthur Holme, and John Foster Jr. During August 1836, Lime Street Station was officially opened to the public, although the construction process was not completed until the following year. This building was designed with four large gateways, two of which were intentionally nonfunctional. For its early operations, as a consequence of the steep incline uphill from Lime Street to Edge Hill, trains would be halted at Edge Hill and the locomotives detached from the trains; the practice of the era was for the passenger carriages to be taken down by gravity, during which the rate of descent would be controlled by brakemen located in a brake van. The return journey was achieved via the use of a stationary steam engine located at Edge Hill, which would be used to haul the carriages up to Edge Hill by rope. This system was constructed by the local engineering firm Mather, Dixon and Company, who worked under the direction of the engineer John Grantham.