Westleigh
General information
Location	Leigh,Wigan England
Coordinates	53°29′55″N2°31′36″W / 53.4985°N 2.5268°W /53.4985; -2.5268
Grid reference	SD651003
Platforms	2
Other information
Status	Disused
History
Original company	Bolton and Leigh Railway
Pre-grouping	London and North Western Railway
Post-grouping	London Midland and Scottish Railway
Key dates
13 June 1831	Station opened as "Leigh"
1 August 1876	Renamed "West Leigh" or "Westleigh"
29 March 1954	Station closed
Location

v t e LNWR lines to Bolton
Legend
Bolton Deansgate Goods Bolton Crook Street Goods Bolton Great Moor Street Original alignment shown in grey Daubhill ( original and incline ) Rumworth and Daubhill Plodder Lane Shed Plodder Lane Chequerbent Chequerbent ( original and incline ) Little Hulton Manchester–Southport line (LYR) toWigan Wallgate Walkden High Level Atherton Bag Lane Walkden Low Level Hindley Green Howe Bridge Manchester & Wigan Rly toWigan North Western Plank Lane Tyldesley Loopline Atherleigh Tyldesley Westleigh Ellenbrook Leigh Bolton and Leigh Railway Kenyon & Leigh Junction Rly Worsley Leeds & Liverpool Canal Bridgewater Canal Monton Green Pennington junctions toBury Pennington East Lancashire Road Eccles Liverpool–Manchester lines Kenyon Junction Bridgewater Canal Liverpool–Manchester lines Some stations omitted in dotted sections

Westleigh orWest Leigh was a station inLeigh,Greater Manchester, England on theBolton and Leigh Railway line.Westleigh was situated within thehistoric county ofLancashire. Its station opened in 1831 and closed in 1954.^[1][2]

TheBolton and Leigh Railway reached Leigh in 1830 and was extended by the construction of theKenyon and Leigh Junction Railway, which received Royal Assent in 1829, toKenyon Junction by 1831 creating a junction with theLiverpool and Manchester Railway. The station atWestleigh was namedLeigh when it opened for passengers in 1831 and its name changed in 1876.^[1] Following amalgamations, from 1846 it was owned by theLondon & North Western Railway.

The station was certainly popular, Sweeney reports that 3,393 tickets were issued at Leigh during the holiday week of 1852. Special trains were run to Newton races and in 1859 fast excursion trains picked up passengers at Leigh on the way to Holyhead to see Brunel'sGreat Eastern steamship.^[3]

West Leigh had both passenger and a goods stations. The passenger station had two platforms. The goods station was on the west side of the line and had a 2 ton capacity crane.^[4] Sweeney reports the goods yard closed in 1864 when the yard atBedford Leigh station opened but it is still listed in by the Railway Clearing House in 1904.^[3][5]

In the 1930s up to 20 trains per day operated between Kenyon Junction andBolton via Westleigh.^[6] Stations on the line became part of theLondon Midland and Scottish Railway in 1923 and theLondon Midland Region of British Railways onnationalisation in 1948. They were closed by theBritish Transport Commission six years later in 1954 when the line to Bolton Great Moor Street closed.^[7]

Holiday excursion trains and Rugby League specials called at the station up to 1958.^[2]

• Holland, Bert (2001),Plodder Lane for Farnworth, Leigh: Triangle Publishing,ISBN 0-9529333-6-5
• Smith, Paul; Turner, Keith (2012),Railway Atlas Then and Now,Ian Allan Publishing,ISBN 978-0-7110-3695-6

• The station on a 1948 OS map vianpe maps
• The station on an 1888 OS map overlay viaNational Library of Scotland
• The station and line viarailwaycodes

• Disused railway stations in the Metropolitan Borough of Wigan
• Former London and North Western Railway stations
• Railway stations in Great Britain opened in 1831
• Railway stations in Great Britain closed in 1954
• History of the Metropolitan Borough of Wigan
• Buildings and structures in Leigh, Greater Manchester

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