Request/Two General HP-Related Questions...

[joym999 at aol.com]

No: HPFGUIDX 21999

--- In HPforGrownups at y..., "Ebony AKA AngieJ" <ebonyink at h...> wrote:

> 1)  Is the Hogwarts Express the only way that kids get to 
> Hogwarts?  [snip] Why in 
> the world would wizard kids from Manchester or Liverpool or
> Aberdeen 
> come all the way to London? [snip] It'd be stupid for Scottish or 
> Northern English 
> parents to drive all the way down here so their kids could catch a 
> train back in the direction they just came from. [snip] Or are the
> vast majority of the kids from 
> the south of England, and the few that aren't find some other way 
> into the school? Or is the Hogwarts Express the *only* way into the
> school?

This has been discussed a few times.  IIRC, the possibile 
explanations people have come up with are:

1.  Students from the north of England and Scotland do not take the 
Hogwarts Express.  Instead, they take alternative types of 
transportation (possibly other trains) which also arrive at Hogsmeade 
Station at about the same time at the Hogwarts Express.  (A lot of 
Hogwarts students must come from families who live in Hogsmeade, and 
they can just walk to the station.) This possibility is supported by 
the fact that the way JKR talks about the train seems to indicate 
that it is not really big enough for 300 students (let alone 1000), 
since it seems to take very little time to walk from the front to the 
back of the train.  Also, there may be regular train service to 
Hogsmeade from all over Great Britain which is sufficient for 
students from most locations, but because so many students come from 
the London area on September 1st it requires a separate train.

2.  The Hogwarts Express makes stops along the route which JKR doesnt 
mention.  The evidence against this is that the train is usually 
already pretty full by the time Harry gets on it.  Although it is 
possible that additional cars are added enroute.  Maybe trains come 
from various parts of Great Britain and are hooked together at 
various stations -- I think that this is actually a somewhat common 
practice in Europe.

3.  Platform 9 3/4 is not actually at Kings Cross Station in London, 
but in some magical location, so that it may connect not only to 
Kings Cross but also to train stations in Dublin, Edinborough, etc.  
The evidence against this is that it takes all day to get to 
Hogsmeade on the Hogwarts Express -- you would think they could 
locate this magical platform a little more conveniently.

4.  Everyone has to go to London to catch the Hogwarts Express, even 
if they live in Hogsmeade.  That is just the way it is -- stupid, 
inefficient.  Too bad.

5.  JKR did not really think about it.  She just wrote the train 
sequence in SS/PS as a way for Harry and Ron to get to know each 
other and continued it as a nice transistional device between the 
wizard and muggle worlds, without really thinking about the logic or 
logistics of the whole thing.  Note that this implies that the HP 
books are works of fiction and that the wizarding world does NOT 
exist -- an implication many HP4GU members are loathe to admit.

--Joywitch