Ashton-in-Makerfield railway station

Ashton-in-Makerfield
Location
Place	Haydock
Area	St Helens
Coordinates	53°28′47″N 2°38′21″W / 53.47975°N 2.63915°WCoordinates: 53°28′47″N 2°38′21″W / 53.47975°N 2.63915°W
Grid reference	SJ577983
Operations
Original company	Liverpool, St Helens and South Lancashire Railway
Pre-grouping	Great Central Railway
Post-grouping	London and North Eastern Railway
Platforms	2[1][2]
History
1 July 1895[3]	Station opened for goods
3 January 1900[4]	Station opened for passengers
3 March 1952[5]	Closed to regular traffic
After 4 October 1975	Closed to racecourse traffic[6]
Disused railway stations in the United Kingdom
Closed railway stations in Britain A B C D–F G H–J K–L M–O P–R S T–V W–Z
UK Railways portal

GCR Lines to St Helens and Wigan
Legend
Wigan Central Wigan Darlington Street Springs Branch Ince Lower Ince Hindley Southport to M'cr Pemberton, avoiding Wigan Springs Branch Jct "The Whelley Loop" (Lancashire Union Rly) Strangeways West Jct Hindley South Strangeways East Jct Platt Bridge Manchester & Wigan Rly Bickershaw and Abram Park Lane Halt West Leigh and Bedford St Helens Central (GCR) St Helens Central Liverpool to Wigan Line Haydock Haydock Colliery Tunnel Ashton-in-Makerfield Haydock Park Golborne South WCML Golborne North LSH&SLR WJR Lowton St Mary's Jct Lowton St Mary's Kenyon Junction Chat Moss Line Culcheth Newchurch Halt Glazebrook Liverpool-M'cr CLC

Ashton-in-Makerfield railway station was a railway station serving that town, although, technically, it was located in neighbouring Haydock, formerly in Lancashire (now Merseyside), England.^[7]

The station was located where Lodge Lane (now the A49) crossed the Liverpool, St Helens and South Lancashire Railway line from Lowton St Mary's to the original St Helens Central railway station. ^[8][9]

History

Opened by the Liverpool, St Helens and South Lancashire Railway, as part of the Great Central Railway, it became part of the London and North Eastern Railway at the Grouping of 1923. The line and station passed to the Eastern Region of British Railways on nationalisation in 1948, but was transferred to the London Midland Region later that year.

Services

In 1922 five "down" (towards St Helens) trains called at the station, on Mondays to Saturdays. These called at all stations from Manchester Central to St Helens via Glazebrook and Culcheth. No trains called on Sundays.^[10]

By 1948 four trains plied between St Helens Central and Manchester Central, calling at all stations, Monday to Friday, reduced to three on Saturdays. No trains called on Sundays.^[11]

A fuller selection of public and working timetables has now been published. Among other things this suggests that Sunday services ran until 1914, but had ceased by 1922, never to return.^[12]

Closure and afterlife

The station was closed to passengers by the British Railways Board in 1952.

From 1952 until 5 October 1963 some race day specials to Haydock Park had deposited their passengers at the racecourse then travelled to St Helens for servicing, turning and to await their turn to return in the evening.^[13] Others did the same at Ashton-in-Makerfield.^[14][15][16] A more recent source states that the last such trains ran on 4 January 1965.^[17]

Enthusiasts' railtours travelled the line on 29 September 1956^[18][19] and 21 September 1963.^[20][21]

The final such tour visited the station on 24 August 1968.^[22][23][24] Although a last, this tour was also a first, being the first passenger train over a new connection between the line to Ashton and the WCML at the new "Haydock Branch Junction" north of Golborne, which had opened on 22 April 1968.^[25][26] By providing this connection the line between Edge Green and Lowton St Mary's could be abandoned and, in particular, its bridge over the to-be-electrified WCML could be removed. This occurred in 1971.^[27]

Services to and through Ashton finally ended in 1988, but its last years were not mere decline. Two services used the station and one passed through it. In 1963 Lowton Metals started to use the station's goods yard as a rail-served base for its scrap metal business. This traffic ended in 1987.^[28][29] In July 1968 the line west through Ashton was reopened to serve a new oil distribution depot at Haydock. This traffic continued until 1983.^[27] In 1975 an experiment was conducted in reviving race traffic, using Ashton station instead of Haydock Park. Special trains were run to at least five meetings, but the experiment was not continued.^[30]

Preceding station	Disused railways			Following station
Haydock Park Line and station closed		Great Central Railway Liverpool, St Helens and South Lancashire Railway		Haydock Line and station closed

The site today

The station site has been landscaped as part of a business park.

References

1. Pixton 1996, p. 122
2. Fields, Gilbert & Knight 1980, Photo 123
3. Dow 1965, p. 10
4. Dow 1965, pp. 9-12
5. James 2004, p. 24.
6. Sweeney 2014, p. 71
7. The station on a 1948 OS Map via npe Maps
8. Smith & Turner 2012, Map 45
9. Station and line SOH via railwaycodes
10. Bradshaw 1922, pp. 714-5
11. The station via Disused Stations UK
12. Sweeney 2014, pp. 105–115.
13. The station via Disused Stations UK
14. Tolson 1982, p. 123.
15. Sweeney 2014, p. 61.
16. The station via Disused Stations UK
17. Sweeney 2014, p. 70.
18. Railtours via sixbellsjunction
19. Sweeney 2014, p. 98.
20. Railtours via sixbellsjunction
21. Sweeney 2014, p. 31.
22. Makerfield Miner railtour via sixbellsjunction
23. The station via Disused Stations UK
24. Sweeney 2014, p. 91.
25. The new connection HOB2 via railwaycodes
26. Yonge, Padgett & Szwenk 2013, map 26C
27. Sweeney 2014, p. 80.
28. Shannon & Hillmer 2003, p. 103
29. Haydock Park traffic via Disused Stations
30. Sweeney 2014, p. 71.

Sources

• Bradshaw (1986), Bradshaw's July 1922 Railway Guide (reprint), Guild Publishing London
• Butt, R. V. J. (1995). The Directory of Railway Stations: details every public and private passenger station, halt, platform and stopping place, past and present (1st ed.). Sparkford: Patrick Stephens Ltd. ISBN 1-8526-0508-1. OCLC 60251199.
• Dow, George (1965). Great Central, Volume Three: Fay Sets the Pace, 1900-1922. Shepperton: Ian Allan. ISBN 0-7110-0263-0.
• Fields, N; Gilbert, A C; Knight, N R (1980), Liverpool to Manchester into the Second Century, Manchester Transport Museum Society, ISBN 0 900857 19 6
• James, David (2004), Lancashire's Lost Railways, Stenlake Publishing, ISBN 1 84033 288 3
• Jowett, Alan (2000). Jowett's Nationalised Railway Atlas (1st ed.). Penryn, Cornwall: Atlantic Transport Publishers. ISBN 0-9068-9999-0. OCLC 228266687.
• Pixton, Bob (1996), The Archive Photographs Series Widnes and St Helens Railways, The Chalford Publishing Company, ISBN 0 7524 0751 1
• Shannon, Paul; Hillmer, John (2003). British Railways Past and Present, Manchester and South Lancashire No 41. Kettering: Past & Present Publishing Ltd. ISBN 1 85895 197 6.
• Smith, Paul; Turner, Keith (2012), Railway Atlas Then and Now, Ian Allan Publishing, ISBN 978 0 7110 3695 6
• Sweeney, Dennis J (2014). The St. Helens and Wigan Junction Railway. Leigh: Triangle Publishing. ISBN 0-85361-292-7.
• Yonge, John; Padgett, David; Szwenk, John (August 2013) [1990]. Bridge, Mike, ed. Railway Track Diagrams 4: Midlands & North West (3rd ed.). Bradford on Avon: Trackmaps. ISBN 978-0-9549866-7-4.

External links

• Ashton in Makerfield at Disused Stations
• The station on a 1888-1913 Overlay OS Map via National Library of Scotland
• Station and line SOH via railwaycodes
• The new connection HOB2 via railwaycodes
• The station on a 1948 OS Map via npe Maps