Bailey Gate railway station

Bailey Gate railway station was on the Somerset & Dorset Joint Railway in the English county of Dorset. The station served the United Dairies Cheese Factory and the village of Sturminster Marshall but was named after a local farm to avoid confusion with another station on the same railway at Sturminster Newton.

The station had extensive sidings and was one of the largest depots for transporting milk on the UK railway system. Milk was carried in tanker wagons from Bailey Gate to London and was a major source of revenue for the railway. Sugar Beet was also loaded onto wagons for transportation to refineries.

The station consisted of three buildings, a Waiting Room/Ticket Office, a small shed for the lamps on the downside and a signalbox on the upside, behind the station were the sidings for transhipment. Access to the station from the west was via a small path the ran down from the slope of the bridge, which took the user to the up platform where, to gain access to the station buildings, one had to cross the railway lines via a small wooden crossing next to the bridge. Access from the east was via the main entrance to the goods sidings down the slope and around the side of the station via a gateway. The station closed with the railway under the Beeching Axe in March 1966. Track was finally lifted in 1969, as the railway remained open until the closure of the goods terminal at Blandford that year.

There is now an industrial estate off the A350 road called "Bailie Gate" at the site.

References

• 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. 
• Jowett, Alan (2000). Jowett's Nationalised Railway Atlas (1st ed.). Penryn, Cornwall: Atlantic Transport Publishers. ISBN 0-9068-9999-0. OCLC 228266687. 
• Jowett, Alan (March 1989). Jowett's Railway Atlas of Great Britain and Ireland: From Pre-Grouping to the Present Day (1st ed.). Sparkford: Patrick Stephens Ltd. ISBN 1-8526-0086-1. OCLC 22311137. 

External links

• Station on navigable O.S. map