Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus (Victoria Terminus)

Imposing, exuberant and overflowing with people, the Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus (Victoria Terminus) is the city's most extravagant Gothic building, the beating heart of its railway network, and an aphorism for colonial India. Historian Christopher London uttered 'the Victoria Terminus is to the British Raj, what the Taj Mahal is to the Mughal Empire.'

It's a meringue of Victorian, Hindu and Islamic styles whipped into an imposing, Daliesque structure of buttresses, domes, turrets, spires and stained-glass windows. Be sure to get close to the jungle-themed façade, particularly around the reservation office: it's adorned with peacocks, gargoyles, cheeky monkeys and lions. Designed by Frederick Stevens, it was completed in 1887, 34 years after the first train in India left this site. Today it's the busiest railway station in Asia. Officially renamed Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus (CST) in 1998, it's still better known locally as VT. It was added to the Unesco World Heritage list in 2004.