Mutley railway station

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Mutley railway station was located in Plymouth, Devon in England. It was opened by the South Devon Railway on 1 August 1871.

The station was situated to the west of the tunnel beneath Mutley Plain and was financed by local people in return for a promise of railway shares once it was attracting a profitable level of business. It became a joint station used also by the London and South Western Railway trains when they arrived in the area by running over the railway from Tavistock, which they did from 18 May 1876. In the meantime, the South Devon Railway had been amalgamated into the Great Western Railway on 1 February 1876.

A new joint North Road railway station was built in 1877, just a few yards to the west of Mutley and this became the main station for the city. The London and South Western trains entered Plymouth from the west after 2 June 1890 and for a while terminated at North Road, but they returned to Mutley on 1 July 1891 when their new terminus at Friary station was opened, but now they ran in the opposite direction to before. Trains from Plymouth Friary to Exeter St Davids stopping on the south side, those from Plymouth Millbay to Exeter St Davids stopping on the north side.

Mutley was closed from 2 March 1939 to allow for track alterations in association with the rebuilding of North Road station.

[edit] Further reading

• The Great Western in South Devon by Keith Beck and John Copsey, Wild Swan Publications 1990, ISBN 0-906867-90-8
• An Illustrated History of Plymouth's Railways by Martin Smith, Irwell Press 1995, ISBN 1871608414
• The South Devon Railway by R H Gregory, Oakwood Press1982, ISBN 0-85361-286-2
• The records of the South Devon Railway and other railways can be consulted at The National Archives