Ferryhill railway station | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 Former site of Ferryhill station and goods yard, July 2007 | |||||
| General information | |||||
| Location | Ferryhill,County Durham England | ||||
| Grid reference | NZ304319 | ||||
| Platforms | 6 | ||||
| Other information | |||||
| Status | Disused | ||||
| History | |||||
| Original company | Clarence Railway | ||||
| Pre-grouping | North Eastern Railway | ||||
| Post-grouping | London and North Eastern Railway | ||||
| Key dates | |||||
| 16 January 1834 | Opened to freight | ||||
| 19 June 1844[1] | Opened to passengers | ||||
| October 1846 | Services start toHartlepool | ||||
| June 1887 | Rebuilt by NER as island platform | ||||
| 6 March 1967 | Closes to passengers | ||||
| 1967 | Closes to freight | ||||
| 1969 | Burnt down, subsequently demolished | ||||
| |||||
Ferryhill railway station was located inFerryhill,County Durham,Northeast England. It was located on what became theEast Coast Main Line betweenDarlington andDurham, close to the junctions with several former branches, including the extant freight-onlyStillington Line toNorton-on-Tees andStockton.
TheClarence Railway reached the town of Ferryhill when its main line from Stockton andPort Clarence opened to mineral traffic on 16 January 1834, and was first served by passenger trains on 11 July 1835. The first station was developed by the Clarence on the current site in 1840, serving a town population of 850.[2] The position was chosen as it lay close to both natural deposits ofcoal andlimestone.[3] TheClarence Railway Act 1829 (10 Geo. 4. c. cvi) gave the Clarence powers to construct branches toWingate for theCity of Durham,Sherburn andByers Green although only the latter of these ever reached its intended destinations. The Sherburn Branch was only opened as far asCoxhoe whilst the City of Durham Branch made it no further thanThrislington.[4]
The Clarence Railway Byers Green Branch was opened to mineral traffic on 31 March 1837, despite construction not being officially completed for a further 4 years, due to a clause in the railway's Act requiring the line to be opened no later than 1837.[4] This line saw an intermittent passenger service until it was extended toBishop Auckland by theNorth Eastern Railway (NER) in 1885.[5]
The Clarence also developed a goods yard on the site, which would later become one of the busiest inEurope between the 1920s and the 1950s. DuringWorld War II, the goods yard became the main alternative for all freight toYork,[2] mainly due to volume of traffic but also occasionalNaziLuftwaffe bombing.
On 11 July 1839 theGreat North of England, Clarence & Hartlepool Junction Railway (GNEC&HJR) reached Thrislington, having constructed its line from theHartlepool Dock & Railway (HD&R) atWingate and attempted to complete its link to the Clarence and the proposedGreat North of England Railway (GNER) trunk line. Whilst the railway had obtained powers to cross and join the GNER, it had failed to do the same for its crossing and joining of the Clarence. The completion of the GNEC&HJR would have provided a shorter route to the coast than the Clarence and thus have a serious impact on its profitability.[4] Because of this oversight by the GNEC&HJR, the Clarence was able to delay the line's completion by 7 years by which point the GNEC&HJR had been leased by the HD&R before both companies were leased by theYork & Newcastle Railway. A passenger service over the GNEC&HJR was finally introduced on 13 October 1846 though this required a reversal at Thinford Junction until the NER opened a south to west curve in 1873.[6]
In 1844, theNewcastle and Darlington Junction Railway completed their line fromDarlington toGateshead which ran parallel to the Clarence through Ferryhill whilst the Clarence was taken over by the West Hartlepool Harbour & Railway Company.[3]
After the two competing lines were amalgamated within theNorth Eastern Railway, the final additions to the network around Ferryhill were completed with the opening of a link to theTeam Valley line atDurham to goods traffic in September 1872 and express and stopping passenger traffic on 15 January 1872 and 1 March 1872 respectively.[4] To allow the NER to make the station a stop for trains to and fromEdinburgh to LondonKing's Cross that company rebuilt the station as an island platform at a cost of £13,612 in June 1887. These services were continued when the station became part of theLondon and North Eastern Railway in 1923.[2]
To allow for better servicing of locomotives in the area, the NER built an adjacent engine shed in 1871, which as the coal mines in the area declined was closed from 1938.[2]
In 1902Bolckow Vaughan sank the Dean and Chapter Colliery just south of the station, which until its closure in 1969 provided much of the station's traffic. The development included acoking coal works, which closed in 1930. In 1946 both Dean and Chapter and the localMainsforth Colliery were nationalised and taken over by theNational Coal Board.[2]
Ferryhill railway station was once one of the busiest goods yards in Europe.[7]
The service to Coxhoe along the truncated Sherburn branch was withdrawn by the NER as early as 1902 though the line remained open to goods traffic until 1966.[8] Passenger services on the Byers Green branch were withdrawn beyondSpennymoor on 4 December 1939 and ended completely on 31 March 1952. The other branch lines radiating from Ferryhill were progressively closed between the 1940s and 1950s[5] with theLeamside Line closing to local traffic on 28 July 1941,[8] the former Clarence Railway main line toStockton losing passenger services on 31 March 1952 and passenger services on the former GNEC&HJR route toHartlepool being withdrawn on 9 June of the same year.[5]
In 1963 as part of theBeeching Axe, it was recommended that the station close. However, strong local opposition resulted in the station remaining open for passengers until 6 March 1967.[9][8] It remained open as a goods-only station, but after the closure of Dean and Chapter in 1969, the station burnt down.[2] The demolition contractors for the colliery in the 1970s also demolished the residual station building structures.[2]
Nothing remains of the former station, although freight trains still service theLafarge cement works at Thrislington Quarry to the north, which is scheduled to be redeveloped as a landfill site.[10] The junction between the ECML and line to Stockton & Middlesbrough remains in use, though the latter route is only open for freight traffic and occasional diversions.
After theMP forSedgefield,Paul Howell, raised the issue in theHouse of Commons in June 2020,[11] a petition was launched to request the reopening of the station in August of that year[12] and, in the November, theDepartment for Transport awarded up to £50,000 from theRestoring Your Railway Fund for an initial study[13] to investigate the feasibility of the proposal.[14][15]
| Preceding station | Historical railways | Following station | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Bradbury Line open, station closed | London and North Eastern Railway East Coast Main Line | Croxdale Line open, station closed | ||
| Terminus | London and North Eastern Railway Leamside Line | Shincliffe Line and station closed | ||
| Terminus | London and North Eastern Railway Great North of England, Clarence & Hartlepool Junction Railway | West Cornforth Line and station closed | ||
| Sedgefield Line and station closed | London and North Eastern Railway Clarence Railway | Terminus | ||
| Terminus | London and North Eastern Railway Clarence Railway (Byers Green Branch) | Spennymoor Line and station closed | ||
| Terminus | North Eastern Railway Clarence Railway (Coxhoe Branch) | Coxhoe Line and station closed | ||
54°40′51.65″N1°31′51″W / 54.6810139°N 1.53083°W /54.6810139; -1.53083
