Mirfield  | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 The view from platform 3 in July 2006 | |||||
| General information | |||||
| Location | Mirfield,Kirklees England | ||||
| Coordinates | 53°40′18″N1°41′36″W / 53.6716°N 1.6933°W /53.6716; -1.6933 | ||||
| Grid reference | SE203195 | ||||
| Managed by | Northern | ||||
| Transit authority | West Yorkshire Metro | ||||
| Platforms | 3 | ||||
| Other information | |||||
| Station code | MIR | ||||
| Fare zone | 3 | ||||
| Classification | DfT category F1 | ||||
| History | |||||
| Original company | Manchester and Leeds Railway | ||||
| Pre-grouping | Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway | ||||
| Post-grouping | London, Midland and Scottish Railway | ||||
| Key dates | |||||
| April 1845 | First station opened | ||||
| 5 March 1866 | Station resited | ||||
| Passengers | |||||
| 2019/20 |  0.447 million | ||||
| 2020/21 | 0.102 million | ||||
| 2021/22 |  0.323 million | ||||
| Interchange | 24,263 | ||||
| 2022/23 | 0.375 million | ||||
| Interchange | 20,168 | ||||
| 2023/24 | 0.357 million | ||||
| Interchange | 22,330 | ||||
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Mirfield railway station serves the town ofMirfield inWest Yorkshire,England. It lies on theHuddersfield Line and is managed byNorthern and also receives services byGrand Central and alsoTransPennine Express. The station is 4 miles (6 km) north east fromHuddersfield.
The platforms have an unusual configuration. Platforms 1 and 2 form an island platform on the western side of the bridge over Station Road/Hopton New Road. Trains from Platform 1 go toLeeds andWakefield Kirkgate (eastbound); Platform 2 has rarely been used for normal scheduled services since the 1990s and, as of January 2025, temporarily has no track serving it. Platform 3 is a side platform on the eastern side of the bridge; trains are towards Huddersfield,Halifax,Bradford Interchange andBrighouse (westbound). The train to Leeds takes around 25 minutes, and to reach Huddersfield takes around 10 minutes.
The town received its first railway in 1840, when theManchester and Leeds Railway opened the first section of its cross-Pennine main line betweenNormanton andHebden Bridge (completing it through toManchester on 1 March 1841). It did not actually get a station though until April 1845,[1] when the company opened one shortly before submitting plans to Parliament to build a branch line from the town along theSpen Valley toBradford viaCleckheaton. Approval was granted for the route the following year and it was opened as far asLow Moor on 12 July 1848 and through to Bradford two years later. By this time further lines had been opened from nearbyHeaton Lodge Junction toHuddersfield by theHuddersfield & Manchester Railway (opened on 3 August 1847) and fromThornhill toLeeds by theLeeds, Dewsbury & Manchester Railway (opened 18 September 1848).[2] TheLNWR (which had absorbed both the H&M and LD&M by 1849) had originally planned to build its own route through Mirfield, but after negotiations with theLancashire and Yorkshire Railway (successors to the M&L) agreed not to go ahead in return for the granting of running powers over the Thornhill to Heaton Lodge section (and also allowing the L&Y access to Huddersfield).This meant that the railway passing through the town soon became extremely congested, carrying as it did the traffic on two main trunk routes between Manchester and Leeds (the Huddersfield & Manchester company having completed its route throughStalybridge in August 1849) and it led to the station gaining a notorious reputation for delays. This persisted even after the Heaton Lodge - Thornhill section was quadrupled in 1884,[3] and it was not until the LNWR opened an alternative Huddersfield to Leeds route at the turn of the century that the situation began to improve. To facilitate interchange, a new station was built 202 yd (185 m) to the east of the original; the contract for the station (excluding roof) was placed on 25 May 1864, the roof contract being placed on 26 April 1865. The new station centred on a large island platform with overall roof, and facilities included a hotel, buffet and billiard room; it opened on 5 March 1866.[4][5]
Today the station remains busy, despite the loss of the Spen Valley service to Bradford from 14 June 1965[6] and the links to Normanton andYork on 5 January 1970 (the line viaBrighouse also closed at the same time, but this reopened in 2000 for peak hour services). It has also lost its buildings to demolition (in the mid-1980s) and one of its four tracks, but gained the aforementioned third platform as part of a set of capacity improvements in the late 1980s.
The station is unstaffed and has a ticket machine available on the platform. Digital display screens, timetable posters and automated announcements provide train running information. Shelters are provided on each platform, but only platform 3 has step-free access (from the station car park). Access to the older island platform is via a subway with stairs up to platform level.[7] Platform 3 is to be extended by December 2018 as part of a Network Rail plan to extend more than 100 platforms at 70 stations across the north of England.[8]
Eastbound from Mirfield, an hourly service to Leeds.[9] Services to Wakefield andCastleford no longer run - the regular service that once ran was suspended during the COVID-19 pandemic and was never properly reinstated[10] TransPennine Express now serves this route and stops here (see below) with a through service between York and Manchester Piccadilly.
Westbound - there is an hourly daytime service toManchester Victoria andWigan Wallgate viaBrighouse andHebden Bridge - this was introduced as part of the December 2008 timetable alterations on theCalder Valley Line.[11]
There are no Northern services on a Sunday.
Since the May 2018 timetable change, TransPennine Express services now call here twice each hour in each direction seven days per week. Eastbound there is an hourly stopping service calling at local stations to Leeds whilst westbound trains call at Deighton and Huddersfield; alternate services continue toStalybridge andManchester Piccadilly. There is now also a regular service to York viaWakefield Kirkgate, which replaces the now defunct Northern local service to Wakefield and was introduced at the December 2023 timetable change.[12]
The station sees a number of direct services to London Kings Cross viaWakefield Kirkgate,Pontefract andDoncaster, which commenced on 23 May 2010, however, Mirfield was not a calling point until the December 2011 timetable change. In January 2009, Grand Central Railway had their application for train paths to run aBradford Interchange (viaHalifax andBrighouse) toLondon service accepted by the Office of Rail Regulation. In the December 2017 timetable, four trains call in each direction throughout the week (including Sundays). This service temporarily stopped during the COVID-19 pandemic but resumed in December 2020.[13]
In February 2019, it was revealed that Mirfield was in line for a new station as part of the £3 billionTransPennine Route Upgrade.[14] The plans involve the reconstruction and lengthening of the current platforms 1 and 2 on what will become the 'slow' lines between Heaton Lodge and Thornhill LNW junctions, along with the restoration of the fourth line to complete the 'fast' lines between those two points. The existing platform 3 will be demolished under this scheme.
| Preceding station |  National Rail | Following station | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Deighton | TransPennine Express North TransPennine (Manchester - Leeds) | Ravensthorpe | ||
| Northern Huddersfield Line (Huddersfield -Wakefield Kirkgate) | Wakefield Kirkgate | |||
| Brighouse | Grand Central West Riding (Bradford Interchange -London Kings Cross) | |||
| Northern Calder Valley Line (Southport -Leeds) | Dewsbury | |||
| Disused railways | ||||
(Line and station closed) | LYR | Terminus | ||
