Normanton railway station
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Normanton | |||
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|---|---|---|---|
| Location | |||
| Place | Normanton | ||
| Local authority | City of Wakefield | ||
| Operations | |||
| Station code | NOR | ||
| Managed by | Northern Rail | ||
| Platforms in use | 2 | ||
| Live departures and station information from National Rail | |||
| Annual Rail Passenger Usage | |||
| 2004/05 * | 0.113 million | ||
| 2005/06 * | 0.129 million | ||
| Passenger Transport Executive | |||
| PTE | West Yorkshire (Metro) | ||
| Zone | 3 | ||
| History | |||
| Key dates | Opened 1840 | ||
| National Rail - UK railway stations | |||
| * Annual passenger usage based on sales of tickets in stated financial year(s) which end or originate at Normanton from Office of Rail Regulation statistics. | |||
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Normanton railway station serves the town of Normanton in West Yorkshire, England. It lies 17.5 km (11 miles) south-east of Leeds railway station on the Hallam Line, which is operated by Northern Rail.
The original station was opened by the North Midland Railway in 1840 and provided a junction with the York and North Midland Railway and the Manchester and Leeds Railway.
It became the focus of several railway lines in the mid-19th century. Construction began in 1837 under the supervision of George Stephenson and the lines were incorporated into the Derby and Leeds Railway. This was soon followed by an addition from the York and Midland Railway and then by the Manchester and Leeds lines which all extended to Normanton thereby giving the town access to much of the country. The Leeds and Manchester lines crossed a 51 mile stretch across The Pennines and at the time boasted the world's longest railway station platform at Normanton - a quarter of a mile long. The station was, for the next ten years or so, the most important in England, employing over 700 people who looked after the station's 700,000 passengers a year.
In Victorian times Normanton station was one of the most important stations in northern England and can boast that Queen Victoria stopped over in The Station Hotel. The town also served as an important part of the transport infrastructure for national and local industries including coal and bricks, although most of this was lost during the 1950s and 1960s with the last remaining operational brickworks eventually closing in the mid-nineties. There were three brickworks in town and were all built within the small area known as Newland, taking advantage of the abundance of clay from the area. A fourth works was founded in the 1890s by a man named Thomas Kirk from Nottingham who had heard rumours that Normanton was rapidly turning into an important junction on the railways. Both Kirk and his sons used their life savings and formed the Normanton Brick Company at nearby Altofts which is still in operation today. Normanton is an example of an island platform station.
[edit] Services
On Mondays to Saturdays the station enjoys an hourly service to Leeds and to Sheffield via Wakefield Kirkgate. On Sundays there is a two-hourly service each way.
[edit] External links
- Train times and station information for Normanton railway station from National Rail
| Preceding station | National Rail | Following station | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Wakefield Kirkgate | Northern Rail Hallam Line |
Castleford | ||
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This article on a railway station in Yorkshire and the Humber is a stub. You can help by expanding it. |
