Market Drayton railway station

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Market Drayton
Location
Place Market Drayton
Area Shropshire
Coordinates Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
Grid reference SJ671348
Operations
Original company Nantwich and Market Drayton Railway
Pre-grouping Great Western Railway
Post-grouping Great Western Railway
History
20 October 1863 (1863-10-20) Station and line from Nantwich opened
16 October 1867 Line from Wellington opened
1 February 1870 Line from Silverdale opened
7 May 1956 Line from Silverdale closed
9 September 1963 (1963-09-09) Station closed
1 May 1967 Final closure
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

Market Drayton railway station served the English town of Market Drayton in Shropshire between 1863 and 1963. It was at the junction where three railway lines met: two of them, forming the Great Western Railway route between Wellington (Shropshire) and Crewe, were met by a line from Stoke-on-Trent on the North Staffordshire Railway.[1]

History

A 1903 Railway Clearing House Junction Diagram showing (left) railways in the vicinity of Market Drayton

The Nantwich and Market Drayton Railway (N&MDR), which ran southwards to Market Drayton from a junction with the London and North Western Railway (LNWR) at Nantwich, was opened on 20 October 1863.[2][3][4] The new line was 10 miles 65 chains (17.4 km) long.[5]

Four years later, on 16 October 1867, the Wellington and Drayton Railway (W&DR) opened, which connected the N&MDR at Market Drayton to the Great Western Railway (GWR) at Wellington. The W&DR, which was 16 miles 12 chains (26.0 km) in length, had been absorbed by the GWR in 1866, the N&MDR had been worked by the GWR since opening (it was fully absorbed in 1897); and so the connection permitted GWR trains from Wolverhampton and the south to reach Crewe and Manchester (London Road) via the LNWR.[6]

On 1 February 1870, the North Staffordshire Railway (NSR) opened a line to Market Drayton from Silverdale. With the arrival of the NSR, the station had to be enlarged and was rebuilt in a French Renaissance style with ornamental iron features and square-topped pavilions at each end.[7]

The opening of the NSR line was also accompanied by reciprocal running powers. The NSR gained running powers to Wellington (for goods traffic) and Hodnet (passengers and cattle) and the GWR had running powers for freight traffic to Stoke on Trent.[8] The NSR also built its own small engine shed at Market Drayton which lasted until 1931.[9]

The line from Silverdale closed on 7 May 1956, and the station closed when the line between Wellington and Nantwich closed on 9 September 1963.[10][11][12][13] The line had been listed in Section 6 of the Beeching report as a line whose passenger services were under consideration for withdrawal before the formulation of the report, and Market Drayton station was listed in Section 7 as a passenger station already under consideration for closure before the formulation of the report.[14] Freight services continued to use the route for a further four years until 1 May 1967.[11][15]

The station site was sold in 1984 for a supermarket, but some of the buildings and artefacts were dismantled by the Nantwich and Market Drayton Railway Society and are now stored for future reuse.[16] The station site, which was situated to the east on the A529 Adderley Road, near the present site of Morrisons supermarket, is now covered by a factory complex.[17] The idea of converting the trackbed of the Wellington to Nantwich line into a footpath was rejected by Cheshire County Council which considered it not "particularly attractive for walkers".[11]

Preceding station Disused railways Following station
Adderley
Line and station closed
  Great Western Railway
Nantwich and Market Drayton Railway
  Little Drayton Halt
Line and station closed
Terminus   North Staffordshire Railway
Stoke to Market Drayton Line
  Norton-in-Hales
Line and station closed

References

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  5. MacDermot 1931, p. 595
  6. MacDermot 1931, pp. 7, 43, 596
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  10. Oppitz 2006, p. 147
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Further reading

  • Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  • Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.

External links