Trivia: Large towns in UK with no railway station

[radamfi]

I'm surprised no one's yet mentioned Leigh, Lancs

Maybe because there is continuous urban area between Leigh, Atherton and Wigan. Since 1974, Leigh has been in Greater Manchester, not Lancs.

 

[tom73]

In Yorkshire Cleckheaton, Heckmondwike , Holmfirth, Tadcaster and Wath-upon-Dearne are all without a rail station

Heckmondwike and Holmfirth had railways stations but these were closed to passengers in the 1950's. I can confirm that bus links to Huddersfield and Wakefield are adequate for today's needs.

 

[chris_in_salop]

It's interesting that several of those towns are in the West Midlands conurbation, mainly in the Black Country. I have wondered why so many lines around the Black Country were shut down - they're not obvious basket case lines, although I suppose that competition from the Midland Red and others in the 1960s took away many potential passengers. But is does seem an under-served area compared to, say, the Rughgebiet, a similar old urban/industrial sprawl.

 

[8stewartt]

Coalville, Ashby, Swadlincote, Shepshed.

 

[matacaster]

Otley?

 

[Alan2603]

Surprised no one has mentioned Ripon.

That may, however be because it is City without a railway station.

 

[urbophile]

Surprised no one has mentioned Ripon.

That may, however be because it is City without a railway station.

And if it wasn't, it would be a small town not a large one.

 

[xotGD]

Gateshead does not have a mainline station serving the town centre.

 

[Llama]

Oldham?

 

[70014IronDuke]

Coalville, Ashby, Swadlincote, Shepshed.

If this thread were titled "Largest, most deserving but most unlucky town/city not to have a railway station", then Coalville would surely win it?

Near 35,000 population - Coalville HAS a working railway running through it of course (as most in here know) - but some clot ordered someone to sell the small bit of land needed to put in a direct link to Leicester at Knighton Jcn. Not as big or as deserving as Corby was c 2000, but that's now been sorted out.

 

[EM2]

Dunstable, 36000 people
Daventry, 25000 people

 

[Urban Gateline]

Dunstable, 36000 people
Daventry, 25000 people

Yes, I was going to say Dunstable as I am familiar with the area, but it is only just over 3 miles to Leagrave station and 5 miles to Luton station and many people use the fast bus link via the busway to get from Dunstable to Luton station!

 

[Chris M]

Surprised no one has mentioned Ripon.

That may, however be because it is City without a railway station.

And if it wasn't, it would be a small town not a large one.

The same reason why nobody has mentioned Wells (which at one point had three stations!).

 

[Aictos]

Yes, I was going to say Dunstable as I am familiar with the area, but it is only just over 3 miles to Leagrave station and 5 miles to Luton station and many people use the fast bus link via the busway to get from Dunstable to Luton station!

But that's only because they don't have a choice in the matter, there are no direct buses between Dunstable and Leagrave only Dunstable to Luton or Leagrave to Luton.

 

[DavidGrain]

Halesowen and the Black Country has been mentioned as having lost its rail services. I am interested because I live in Halesowen and use Rowley Regis station. Last year I led a guided walk around that area so I did some research on the history of Rowley Regis station (which by the way is in Blackheath not Rowley Regis). I found that the station when built was in Halesowen but now only the western end of platform 2 is in Halesowen.

Yes the Black Country has lost a lot of lines in spite of being a continuous urban area but rail passenger transport does exist in the West Midlands Metro on former railway lines both in the existing line to Wolverhampton and in the proposed Wednesbury to Brierley Hill line.

 

[Bwlch y Groes]

It's interesting that several of those towns are in the West Midlands conurbation, mainly in the Black Country. I have wondered why so many lines around the Black Country were shut down - they're not obvious basket case lines, although I suppose that competition from the Midland Red and others in the 1960s took away many potential passengers. But is does seem an under-served area compared to, say, the Rughgebiet, a similar old urban/industrial sprawl.

I've spent years pouring over old railway maps, and the penny dropped a couple of years ago why some towns lost their railways. The way to think about it is that Beeching and other BRB bods before/after him weren't closing lines per se - they were withdrawing services. The way services were mapped out across the network often dated back to pre-grouping days, and weren't the most efficient uses of the network

Brecon's the classic example. It's quite shocking to think such an important centre for Mid Wales lost its rail connections - it's very isolated from the network now (a shade under 20 miles to the nearest station at Builth Road, and around the same to Llandovery). But the reason is the services that served Brecon were really poor - from Neath Riverside via one of the more isolated South Wales valleys and open moorland; from Newport via winding route up another isolated valley and a steep climb over the Beacons; from Hereford via a very rural part of Herefordshire; and from Moat Lane Junction, an isolated junction on the Cambrian Main Line, via some small towns and villages in Mid Wales. That was all the legacy of relatively tinpot early companies like the Neath & Brecon and Brecon & Merthyr Railways, which the GWR and BR just continued in the years after

Taken at face value with lines on a map, yes, it's possible to trace what would have been a better route for a service. And undoubtedly the two routes over the Brecon Beacons (and possibly even the one through Mid Wales) would have been massive tourist draws today as the scenery is stunning. But the truth is those services were withdrawn and lines closed because the GWR and BR never thought outside the box to try and improve it. If there's one thing the rail industry today is much better at, it's in making the most of the network we have - that sort of approach in the 1950s and 1960s would have saved a lot more lines through some of these big towns we're talking about in this thread

 

[cheese]

Newcastle-under-Lyme. I know it's near Stoke, but it's still a town of 70k+ people with zero rail transport.

 

[yorksrob]

In my area Hailsham, Sussex. 21000 people with no station. Of course there used to be one on the Cuckoo Line, but long gone. Town undergoing a rapid housing expansion too.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_largest_towns_in_England_without_a_railway_station

Add to that another 7,000 on the same line at Heathfield.

Seaton in Devon has about 12,700 pop, according to the county council.

Tavistock, 11,000

Wadebridge, pop 9,000

Wellington, Somerset, pop 14,500

Dereham, pop 18,000, Swaffham, pop 7,000

 

[Welshman]

The same reason why nobody has mentioned Wells (which at one point had three stations!).

The same reason why nobody has mentioned St Asaph
[which is a city, but if it wasn't it would be a small town, and once had a railway station on the Vale of Clwyd line.

 

[ian1944]

Wantage and Grove, near-contiguous, population c. 20,000, inconvenient distance from Didcot.

 

[Merthyr Imp]

Brecon's the classic example. It's quite shocking to think such an important centre for Mid Wales lost its rail connections - it's very isolated from the network now (a shade under 20 miles to the nearest station at Builth Road, and around the same to Llandovery).

And just under 20 miles to Merthyr Tydfil?

 

[AlastairFraser]

Wantage and Grove, near-contiguous, population c. 20,000, inconvenient distance from Didcot.

And,as with Steventon down the road, it would be so easy to put a new station in.

 

[Glenn1969]

Oxfordshire Council website mentions a plan for a new station for Wantage and Grove with a BCR of 2.46 and a possible opening date of 2025. Does anyone who lives down there think it will actually happen? The link is available with a Google search for Wantage Station which is how I found it

 

[Mark J]

Oldham has a population over 100,000 but no heavy rail stations in the town since the conversion to trams.

What a stupid decision that was. I don;t agree with converting heavy rail to light rail.

Great if you want to travel locally, rubbish if you want to travel further afield.

 

[ac6000cw]

It's interesting that several of those towns are in the West Midlands conurbation, mainly in the Black Country. I have wondered why so many lines around the Black Country were shut down - they're not obvious basket case lines, although I suppose that competition from the Midland Red and others in the 1960s took away many potential passengers. But is does seem an under-served area compared to, say, the Rughgebiet, a similar old urban/industrial sprawl.

Bus competition started many years earlier - Midland Red was quite a large operator by the 1920s (and 50% owned by the GWR and LMS after 1930). The hilly nature of the Black Country meant that buses could serve it better than geographically-constrained railway lines were able to (Dudley is a perfect example of that - town centre on top of a hill, original railway station at the bottom combined with an indirect GWR route to Birmingham. Halesowen was even worse - railway station on a 'nowhere to nowhere' minor line, situated part way up the side of a valley on the opposite side of the town from most of the housing, versus direct bus services to useful places from bus stops within easy walking distance of home).

 

[DavidGrain]

I agree with the previous comments about the Black Country and stations not in town centres.
Midland Red was owned by BET 50%. LMS 25% GWR 25% and took over the GWR bus services in the Black Country.
Although no public services were advertised from Halesowen after 1927 passenger trains still ran to Longbridge for the Austin factory workers until 1959. I have mentioned in a previous post that I live in Halesowen and from my home to the former Halesowen station would be an easy bus ride for me, I cannot imagine where I would then go to from there if the railway were still in place as a previous post has said the line went from nowhere to nowhere yet in its day Halesowen was a joint station with both GWR and Midland Railway trains..
I use Rowley Regis station but there is only one bus an hour from my home to the station and that takes 25 minutes to do the one mile journey as the bus goes round several housing estates. Rowley Regis station is half a mile from Blackheath town centre (the town where the station is actually situated) as the railway then runs in tunnel under the town.
When I was very little we lived near Dudley and my mother used to take me shopping in Dudley. However our bus did not go up the hill to the town centre in those days but did pass the station so my mother and I used to have to walk up the steep hill into the town centre. That was my first contact with the railways as my mother used to lift me up to look over the bridge. Dudley was a shared station so the 'Dudley Dasher', in latter days a GWR railcar, used to reverse out of the GWR platforms and then run through the LMS platforms to take the South Staffs line to Swan Village where it rejoined the GWR lines to get into Birmingham.

 

[David57]

Three near me, Buckingham, Brackley, and as previously mentioned, Daventry.

 

[Alanko]

Carterton in West Oxfordshire are pushing 50,000, with no proper transport links, this area must be near the top.

It has an airport! I always assumed Carterton existed to serve Brize, rather than fulfill any other purpose?

 

[Dr_Paul]

Haverhill -- the local story goes that the GLC moved part of the bombed east end population to new estates in Haverhill, then got Dr Beeching to close the railways so they couldn't get back to London

That sounds like a tall tale to me, somebody having a laugh. Shutting a railway station as a new town gets going is daft, but the route through Haverhill was a single line that wandered from Cambridge to Marks Tey, with junctions at each end facing away from London; the line from Audley End through Saffron Waldren faced towards Cambridge at the junction at Barstow, thus not allowing direct travel from Haverhill towards London. An intriguing question is why Haverhill was chosen as a new town, seeing that it's in the middle of nowhere compared to many others.

Other new towns -- Hatfield, Crawley, Harlow -- did have rail connections to London; some had the existing stations rebuilt and enlarged. One new town that didn't have a station for ages was Basildon; I was told by an uncle who lived there that this was because the council didn't want it to become a dormitory town for London.

 

[NorthOxonian]

Oxfordshire Council website mentions a plan for a new station for Wantage and Grove with a BCR of 2.46 and a possible opening date of 2025. Does anyone who lives down there think it will actually happen? The link is available with a Google search for Wantage Station which is how I found it

A bit late but I'm very familiar with the plan - it came up as an issue in a council by-election there last year. I suspect it will happen eventually due to the rapid population growth (especially in Grove). However the new station would have patching issues and is inconvenient for Wantage in particular - the old station was called Wantage Road as you often found for stations a long way out of town. The town used to have a tramway for the connection between the centre and station, but now there is just a half hourly bus. Presumably though much of its use would be drivers from Faringdon, Shrivenham, and the like, who currently use Swindon or Didcot.