Gleneagles railway station

Gleneagles
Scottish Gaelic: Gleann Eagas
Location
Place	Auchterarder
Local authority	Perth and Kinross
Coordinates	56°16′30″N 3°43′52″W / 56.2750°N 3.7310°WCoordinates: 56°16′30″N 3°43′52″W / 56.2750°N 3.7310°W
Grid reference	NN929105
Operations
Station code	GLE
Managed by	Abellio ScotRail
Number of platforms	2
Live arrivals/departures, station information and onward connections from National Rail Enquiries
Annual rail passenger usage*
2004/05	21,828
2005/06	24,636
2006/07	26,547
2007/08	27,432
2008/09	31,062
2009/10	31,934
2010/11	36,782
2011/12	39,570
2012/13	43,602
2013/14	49,728
History
Original company	Scottish Central Railway
Pre-grouping	Caledonian Railway
Post-grouping	LMSR
14 March 1856	Opened as Crieff Junction
1 April 1912	Renamed Gleneagles
National Rail – UK railway stations
* Annual estimated passenger usage based on sales of tickets in stated financial year(s) which end or originate at Gleneagles from Office of Rail and Road statistics. Methodology may vary year on year.
UK Railways portal

Gleneagles railway station serves the town of Auchterarder in Perth and Kinross, Scotland.

History

The station was opened by the Scottish Central Railway on 14 March 1856 and was originally named Crieff Junction.^[1] There was another station with the name of Crieff Junction to the north of this station which was only short-lived. The branch northwestward to Crieff was opened (by the Crieff Junction Railway company) on the same day. On 1 April 1912 it was renamed Gleneagles.^[2]

The station was rebuilt and the junction remodelled by the Caledonian Railway in 1919 following their takeover of the Scottish Central Railway. The Caledonian Railway built the nearby Gleneagles Hotel, which opened in 1925. The hotel served as the location for the G8 summit in 2005 and is a well known golf resort; Gleneagles hosted the 2014 Ryder Cup.

The branch line to Crieff closed on 6 July 1964 due to the Beeching Axe.

Services

On weekdays & Saturdays there are 14 services to Glasgow Queen Street & 2 to Edinburgh Waverley southbound and 15 to Perth northbound; most of these continue to either Dundee or Aberdeen, though there are also a limited number of trains to/from Inverness via the Highland Main Line.^[3] The service frequency is however somewhat irregular, with large gaps in the timetable at certain times of day.

Gleneagles is also served by the daily Highland Chieftain through service between Inverness and London King's Cross and the Caledonian Sleeper to London Euston each evening except Saturdays.

From 2018, services from the station will be increased as part of a timetable upgrade package backed by Transport Scotland. A regular hourly-interval each way service between Glasgow, Perth, & Dundee will be introduced that will stop here.^[4]

References

1. Butt 1995, p. 71
2. Butt 1995, pp. 71,104
3. GB National Rail Timetable May-December 2016, Table 229 (Network Rail)
4. "‘Rail revolution’ means 200 more services and 20,000 more seats for Scots passengers"Transport Scotland press release 15 March 2016; Retrieved 18 August 2016

Sources

• Butt, R. V. J. (1995). The Directory of Railway Stations: details every public and private passenger station, halt, platform and stopping place, past and present (1st ed.). Sparkford: Patrick Stephens Ltd. ISBN 1-8526-0508-1. OCLC 60251199.
• Jowett, Alan (March 1989). Jowett's Railway Atlas of Great Britain and Ireland: From Pre-Grouping to the Present Day (1st ed.). Sparkford: Patrick Stephens Ltd. ISBN 1-8526-0086-1. OCLC 22311137.
• Marshall, Peter (1998). The Scottish Central Railway : Perth to Stirling. Usk, Monmouthshire: Oakwood Press. ISBN 0-8536-1522-5.

• RAILSCOT on Scottish Central Railway
• RAILSCOT on Crieff Junction Railway

External links

• Video footage of Gleneagles Railway station