Leyburn railway station

Leyburn
Location
Place	Leyburn
Area	Richmondshire
Coordinates	54°18′29″N 1°49′19″W / 54.3080°N 1.8220°WCoordinates: 54°18′29″N 1°49′19″W / 54.3080°N 1.8220°W
Grid reference	SE116902
Operations
Original company	Bedale and Leyburn Railway
Managed by	Wensleydale Railway
Pre-grouping	North Eastern Railway
Post-grouping	London and North Eastern Railway
Platforms	1
History
19 May 1856	Opened
26 April 1954	Closed
May 2003	Reopened
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Leyburn station entrance

Leyburn railway station is on the Wensleydale Railway and serves the town of Leyburn in North Yorkshire, England. During the summer months it is served by at least three trains per day; at other times of the year the service is mainly at weekends and public holidays.^[1]

The Leyburn branch of the Wensleydale Railway Association (which incorporates the Friends of Leyburn Station-FOLS) meets monthly at the station.^[2]

The station postal address is Leyburn Station, Harmby Road, Leyburn, North Yorkshire, DL8 5ET.^[2]

History

The railway first reached Leyburn in November 1855, when the Bedale & Leyburn Railway opened its line from Leeming (where it made an end-on junction with the York, Newcastle and Berwick Railway branch from Northallerton). Passenger services commenced six months later,^[3] with a further extension westwards to Hawes being built by the North Eastern Railway in 1877/8 (the NER having also absorbed the B&L in 1857). At Hawes, another end-on junction was made with the Midland Railway branch from Hawes Junction that gave the NER access to the Settle-Carlisle Railway by means of running powers (which it made use of for passenger trains).

The branch became part of the LNER under the terms of the 1923 Grouping. For most of its life, the route had a basic service of five passenger trains each day along its entire length with one or two extras reaching Leyburn from Northallerton, along with a small number of parcels, milk and goods trains. Nationalisation followed at the end of 1947, but less than a decade later the station was closed when the Northallerton to Hawes route fell victim to road competition, services being withdrawn on 26 April 1954.^[4]

The line beyond Redmire closed completely in April 1964, but aggregate traffic from the quarry there kept the rest of the line open. Leyburn also retained its status as a goods depot until 1982^[5] (and a passing loop and signal box), but latterly the entire route operated as a 'one train' single line. The limestone traffic to and from Teesside ended in December 1992 but after a spell of disuse, traffic resumed in the form of Ministry of Defence military equipment trains to Redmire (where they were transferred for onward movement to/from Catterick Garrison).

Preservation

The Wensleydale Railway reopened the station at Leyburn in May 2003 after leasing the line from Railtrack. The station buildings had survived after closure, which made the re-instatement of passenger facilities there straightforward.

Passenger trains initially ran eastwards from Leyburn to Leeming Bar, but these were extended on to Redmire in August 2004. The company plans to relay/re-instate a run-round loop trackbed (for heritage locos to run-round), but hopes to one day eventually rebuild and reopen the abandoned line westwards to Hawes and eventually to Garsdale and run trains along the full length of the entire Yorkshire dale from Northallerton to Garsdale — a trip of almost 40 miles (64 km) in length (which would nearly make the railway itself the longest heritage line in the UK).

References

1. "Wensleydale Railway Train Service: 2008" (PDF). Wensleydale Railway. Archived from the original (PDF) on 7 August 2008. Retrieved 26 September 2008.
2. WRA (2008). "Local Branches". Wensleydale Railway Association. Retrieved 26 September 2008.
3. "The Wensleydale Railway". Railways of Britain. Retrieved 11 June 2008.
4. Body, G. (1988), PSL Field Guides - Railways of the Eastern Region Volume 2, Patrick Stephens Ltd, Wellingborough, ISBN 1-85260-072-1; p.136
5. Photo of Closure Notice for Leyburn as a Public Delivery Siding from 1982 www.railbrit.co.uk; Retrieved 25 February 2010

Preceding station	Heritage railways			Following station
Redmire		Wensleydale Railway		Finghall
	Historical railways
Wensley Line open, station closed		North Eastern Railway Bedale and Leyburn Railway		Spennithorne Line open, station closed