Selby railway station

It was opened in 1834 by the Leeds and Selby Railway. The original station at Selby consisted of a shed by the waterside in which passengers would alight the train and walk across the road to the connecting boat on the river. This site was just behind the current station site. Selby station was the first railway station to be built in Yorkshire, a fact commemorated by a plaque on the original building.

In 1840 an extension known as the Hull and Selby Railway was opened. The original terminus station of the Leeds & Selby railway was converted to goods use only and the current station was built. In order to cross the River Ouse a swing bridge was installed to the East of the station. Ships had (and still have) priority over railway traffic.

The Cawood, Wistow and Selby Light Railway (CW&SLR) was opened in 1898 linking the Leeds & Selby Railway to the village of Cawood. This line was predominantly used for agricultural traffic but also carried passengers until its closure in 1960.

Another branch was built to link Selby to the nearby port town of Goole. This branch ran via the villages of Barlow, Drax and Rawcliffe.

[edit] The Selby Diversion

Until the early 1980s Selby was on the main East Coast Main Line. When British Coal began to exploit the Selby coalfield, a diversionary route for the ECML had to be built to avoid subsidence to the railway. This diversion (the “Selby Diversion”) took the ECML away from Selby, leaving it a much quieter station. The new route leaves the old at Temple Hirst to the south of Selby and rejoins it at Colton Junction several miles to the north of the town where the York-Leeds line meets the ECML. The diversion, which was financed by the Coal Board, had major advantages to the railway in that it removed a bottleneck from the ECML by avoiding the Selby Swing Bridge over the River Ouse.

[edit] External links

Train times and station information for Selby railway station from National Rail
Street map and aerial photo of Selby railway station from Multimap.com

Preceding station		Following station
South Milford	Northern Rail York & Selby Lines	Terminus
York or Sherburn-in-Elmet	Northern Rail Hull-York Line	Wressle
Brough	Northern Rail Hull-Sheffield Line	Doncaster
Garforth	TransPennine Express North TransPennine	Howden
Doncaster	GNER East Coast Main Line	Howden
Doncaster	Hull Trains London-Hull	Howden