Shrewsbury railway station
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Shrewsbury | |||
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|---|---|---|---|
| Location | |||
| Place | Shrewsbury | ||
| Local authority | Shrewsbury and Atcham Shropshire |
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| Operations | |||
| Managed by | Arriva Trains Wales | ||
| Platforms in use | 5 | ||
| Annual Passenger Usage | |||
| 2004/05 ** | 1.295 million | ||
| History | |||
| 1848 | Opened | ||
| National Rail - UK railway stations | |||
| Annual passenger usage based on sales of tickets in stated financial year(s) which end or originate at Shrewsbury. | |||
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Shrewsbury railway station formerly known as Shrewsbury General is Shrewsbury's only remaining railway station (Shrewsbury Abbey, as well as other small stations around the town, having long closed). The station was originally built in October 1848 for the county's first railway - the Shrewsbury to Chester Line. It is unusual in that the station was later extended in 1901 by the construction of a new floor underneath the original station building. The station's platforms also extend over the River Severn.
Today, the station is operated by Arriva Trains Wales as one of their key network hubs. It has five platforms, numbered 3 to 7 (1 and 2 have no track), with a public ticket office, public enquiry office, British Transport Police offices, a platform cafe (between platforms 4 and 7) and offices for some of the railway companies that use the station. Platform 3 is little used, because of its remoteness from the other platforms, which together form a single island, and because trains from it can only depart towards Chester. Platforms 4 and 7 are through platforms, usually used for trains between Holyhead (via Chester) and Cardiff and between Manchester (via Crewe) and Cardiff, Carmarthen, and Milford Haven and also for trains between Chester and Birmingham. Platforms 5 and 6 are bay platforms, used mainly for trains to and from Aberystwyth and Birmingham (via Wolverhampton and Telford). The platforms are connected by a tunnel running underneath the station, rather than an overhead bridge, which is more usual for a British railway station.
There is an overhead bridge, which forms part of the town's "The Dana" route, but it is not directly connected to the station.
The station is currently served by Arriva Trains Wales (who operate trains to South Wales, Aberystwyth, Chester and Holyhead, Manchester Piccadilly and Birmingham New Street) and Central Trains (who operate an hourly service from Shrewsbury to Birmingham New Street). However, Shrewsbury may soon be served by an open access operator, the Wrexham, Shropshire and Marylebone Railway Company (WSMR). It is a joint venture between Hull Trains, Laing Rail (owners of Chiltern Railways) and Renaissance Trains. The new service, expected to start by 2007, could connect Wrexham in North Wales and Shrewsbury, among other intermediate stations in the West Midlands, with London Marylebone station.
It has been proposed that Shrewsbury should have a Parkway railway station built on the Wolverhampton to Shrewsbury Line, east of the town at either Preston or Emstrey, adjacent to the A5 road. This new station would act as a fourth Park & Ride site to simultaneously serve shoppers and commuters from Telford and the West Midlands as well as provide parking for commuters on their way from the county town to the West Midlands and beyond. Reasons cited for this project include the poor provision of car parking at Shrewsbury's current only railway station and the lack of a park and ride site to serve visitors to the town from the east, who presently need to use Meole Brace in the south or Harlescott in the north of the town.
Severn Bridge Junction signal box, at the London end of the station and built by the LNWR, is the largest surviving mechanical signal box in Britain, with a frame accommodating 180 levers, and is a listed building. Whilst the line to Wolverhampton has been updated to electronic signaling, Shrewsbury itself is set to remain lever operated for the foreseeable future - BBC News. As a result of Shrewsbury's joint (GWR/LNWR) history, and having been transferred at different times between the Western and London Midland regions of BR and more recently Network Rail - it is now in the Great Western territory again - the signalling is a diverse mixture of lower-quadrant and upper-quadrant semaphore signals, with a few colour lights too.
At Shrewsbury in steam days, the GWR regularly turned its locomotives by running round the triangle formed by using the Abbey Foregate loop, which links the Wellington line with the Welsh Marches Line and enables through running for freight trains, Summer Saturday specials and formerly for trains like the Cambrian Coast Express.
In the SRA's 2002/03 financial year 632,653 people joined the railway system at Shrewsbury station, and 625,593 left it there (tickets sold at Shrewsbury, and tickets sold to Shrewsbury; figure does not include passengers interchanging between one rail service and another). [1]
[edit] External links
- Train times and station information for Shrewsbury railway station from National Rail
- Map and aerial photo of Shrewsbury railway station from Multimap.com
| Preceding station | National Rail | Following station | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Church Stretton | Arriva Trains Wales Welsh Marches Line |
Yorton | ||
| Church Stretton | Arriva Trains Wales South-North Wales |
Gobowen | ||
| Church Stretton | Arriva Trains Wales Heart of Wales Line |
Terminus | ||
| Wellington | Arriva Trains Wales Cambrian Line |
Welshpool | ||
| Wellington | Arriva Trains Wales Holyhead to Birmingham |
Gobowen | ||
| Wellington | Central Trains Wolverhampton-Shrewsbury |
Terminus | ||
| Wellington | Wrexham & Shropshire Proposed |
Gobowen | ||
[edit] Notes and references
- ^ The usage information (Station Entries and Station Exits) is based on ticket sales in the financial year 2002/03 and covers all National Rail stations. It does not include those stations that are owned by TfL. The calculation of station usage levels uses sales recorded in the railway ticketing system prior to their allocation to individual operators. It does not take into account any changes of train during the course of a journey. The ticketing system does not record certain journeys made using TfL bought travelcards, TfL Freedom Passes, staff travel passes and certain other PTE specific products. Continued usage notes, and Excel format table for all stations available.
