Manningtree railway station

Manningtree
Location
Place	Lawford
Local authority	Tendring
Grid reference	TM093322
Operations
Station code	MNG
Managed by	Abellio Greater Anglia
Number of platforms	3
DfT category	C2
Live arrivals/departures, station information and onward connections from National Rail Enquiries
Annual rail passenger usage*
2010/11	0.891 million
2011/12	0.983 million
2012/13	1.093 million
2013/14	1.154 million
2014/15	1.169 million
History
Key dates	Opened 1846
National Rail – UK railway stations
* Annual estimated passenger usage based on sales of tickets in stated financial year(s) which end or originate at Manningtree from Office of Rail and Road statistics. Methodology may vary year on year.
UK Railways portal

Manningtree railway station is on the Great Eastern Main Line (GEML) in the East of England, serving the town of Manningtree, Essex. It is 59 miles 35 chains (95.7 km) down-line from London Liverpool Street and is situated between Colchester to the west and Ipswich to the east.^[1] It is also the western terminus of the Mayflower Line, where the branch joins the GEML. The following station on the branch is Mistley.

Manningtree's three-letter station code is MNG. The station is currently operated by Abellio Greater Anglia, which also runs all trains serving the station.

History

The station was opened by the Eastern Union Railway in 1846^[2] but rebuilt by the Great Eastern Railway in 1899–1901; this building survives. It was designed by W. N. Ashbee.

Description

A train approaching platform 2 in 2013

Immediately east of the station there is a triangle of junctions, known as the Manningtree South, North and East junctions and originally each double-track junction was controlled by an individual signal box. In 1926 the London and North Eastern Railway installed a new power box at Manningtree South which controlled all three junctions.^[3] Today, the north to east curve connecting Ipswich with Harwich Town is a single track, having been reduced from double-track.^[4] All three sides of the triangle are electrified.

A second peculiar feature just east of the station is a combination of a road underpass and a level crossing. The underpass has limited height and the parallel level crossing is needed to permit higher vehicles to cross the railway.

There is a fourth platform on the outer side of the "down" (country-bound) platform which is electrified, but its use would be confined to emergency situations. It can only be used to access the Ipswich main line, whereas the end bay at the country end of the "up" (London-bound) platform can only be accessed from the Mayflower Line.^[5]

The station has (on the country-bound platform) a manned booking office and a self-service ticket machine. There is a side-gate west of the station building for use outside of office hours and a self-service ticket machine is also available here. There is a station buffet at the eastern end of the building.

The installation of lifts started in December 2015 and they are due to be in operation in Autumn 2016.^[6][7]

Accidents

• On 20 August 1898, five people were slightly injured in a collision between a train and two carriages it was moving to attach to at Manningtree. The stationary carriages contained around 50 passengers and had just been detached from a main line train; they were due to be attached to the branch line train for Harwich Town but it reversed back to them at too great a speed and shunted into them with sufficient force to propel them backward by five or six yards. A Board of Trade investigation reported the driver misjudged the position of the carriages and the speed of his train, and the shunter failed to timely signal to the driver that he was too close to the coaches and moving too fast.^[8]

Services

The following services typically call at Manningtree:^[9]

Operator	Route	Rolling stock	Frequency
Abellio Greater Anglia	London Liverpool Street - Colchester - Manningtree - Ipswich - Diss - Norwich	Class 90 + Mark 3 Coaching Stock	1x per hour
Abellio Greater Anglia	London Liverpool Street - Stratford - Chelmsford - Colchester - Manningtree - Ipswich - Stowmarket - Diss - Norwich	Class 90 + Mark 3 Coaching Stock	1x per hour
Abellio Greater Anglia	London Liverpool Street - Stratford - Shenfield - Chelmsford - Hatfield Peverel - Witham - Kelvedon - Marks Tey - Colchester - Manningtree - Ipswich	Class 321, Class 360	1x per hour
Abellio Greater Anglia	Manningtree - Mistley - Wrabness - Harwich International - Dovercourt - Harwich Town	Class 321, Class 360	1x per hour

Two trains at Manningtree station

References

1. Yonge, John (September 2006) [1994]. Jacobs, Gerald, ed. Railway Track Diagrams 2: Eastern (3rd ed.). Bradford on Avon: Trackmaps. map 5C. ISBN 0-9549866-2-8.
2. Moffat, Hugh (1987). East Anglia's First Railways. Lavenham: Terence Dalton. ISBN 0-86138-038-X.
3. Bonavia, Michael R. (1985) [1982]. A History of the LNER, Vol. 1, The First Years 1923-33. London: Guild Publishing. p. 60. CN 4143.
4. Mitchell, Vic (June 2011). Branch lines to Harwich and Hadleigh. Midhurst: Middleton Press. plates 3 and 4. ISBN 978-1-908174-02-4.
5. Mitchell 2011, plate 10
6. End of Year 2015
7. Manningtree station update
8. http://www.railwaysarchive.co.uk/documents/BoT_Manningtree1898.pdf
9. Table 11 National Rail timetable, May 2016

External links

• Manningtree Rail Users Association

Coordinates: 51°56′56″N 1°02′42″E / 51.949°N 1.045°E