Pilning railway station
Pilning Great Western Railway Class 158 train passes Pilning in 2018. | |
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General information | |
Location | Pilning, South Gloucestershire England |
Coordinates | 51°33′23″N 2°37′35″W / 51.5563°N 2.6265°W |
Grid reference | ST566844 |
Managed by | Great Western Railway |
Platforms | 1 |
Other information | |
Station code | PIL |
Classification | DfT category F2 |
History | |
Original company | Great Western Railway |
Pre-grouping | Great Western Railway |
Post-grouping | Great Western Railway |
Key dates | |
8 September 1863 | Opened |
1 December 1886 | Resited |
9 July 1928 | Low Level station opened |
23 November 1964 | Low Level station closed |
29 November 1965 | Closed to goods |
5 November 2016 | Westbound platform closed |
Passengers | |
2018/19 | 458 |
2019/20 | 710 |
2020/21 | 210 |
2021/22 | 418 |
2022/23 | 338 |
Notes | |
Passenger statistics from the Office of Rail and Road |
Pilning railway station is a minor station on the
The station was opened by the
The station's footbridge was removed in 2016 as part of
Description
Pilning railway station is located in the
The railway through Pilning has three tracks: from north to south these are the Up Tunnel towards Bristol; the Down Tunnel towards Wales; and then the Down Pilning Loop, also towards Wales. A fourth track, the Up Pilning Loop, ends just west of the station. All three tracks through the station are unidirectional. The two Tunnel lines have a 90 miles per hour (140 km/h) speed limit, while the loop has a speed limit of 40 miles per hour (64 km/h).[6] The line is electrified using overhead wires.[7] Despite there being three tracks, Pilning only has a single platform in use, Platform 1, on the north side of the line. This is 120 metres (130 yd) long and serves trains towards Bristol. The old down platform, Platform 2, sits between the Down Tunnel and Down Pilning Loop, but is no longer accessible to the public. It is 121 metres (132 yd) long.[6][8] There is an old brick station building on Platform 1 but it is not in railway use.[9] Infrastructure owner Network Rail has a compound at the station.[10]
Facilities at Pilning are extremely basic: the platform, which is covered by CCTV, has a bus stop-style shelter on it but no seats.[8][9]: 113 Customer help points on the platform and timetable boards provide service information, but there are no facilities for buying tickets. There is a free car park with 10 spaces and four bicycle stands, and also a payphone.[8] Access is via a long ramp from the main road.[11]
Pilning is consistently one of the least-used stations in Britain, recording fewer than 50 annual passengers several times between 1997 and 2015. Numbers have since increased by a factor of ten, thanks in part to campaigns by the Pilning Station Group; however as of 2017/18 it is still the 35th least used station of the 2,559 in Britain.[12][13][note 2]
Service
Pilning is managed by
Great Western Railway services between
Preceding station | National Rail | Following station | ||
---|---|---|---|---|
Severn Tunnel Junction | Great Western Railway Taunton - Cardiff Central (Saturdays only, Eastbound only, limited service) |
Patchway |
History
Bristol and South Wales Union Railway
Pilning railway station first opened on 8 September 1863 when services began on the
In 1868 the BSWUR was amalgamated with the
Preceding station | Historical railways | Following station | ||
---|---|---|---|---|
Patchway | Bristol and South Wales Union Railway (1863–1868) |
New Passage
| ||
Great Western Railway Bristol and South Wales Union Railway (1868–1886) |
High Level station
Although the BSWUR made travel from Bristol to Wales easier, the change from train to ferry to train was inconvenient, and so plans to build a tunnel under the Severn were considered even before the railway opened.[21]: 59 [28] Parliamentary permission was gained in 1872, with construction beginning in 1873.[29] GWR chairman Daniel Gooch and other directors visited Pilning in 1884 as part of an inspection tour of the works.[30] The route to the tunnel diverged from the New Passage line 35 chains (0.70 km) east of Pilning, necessitating the building of a replacement station on the new line, approximately 100 yards (90 m) south of the original.[9]: 112–114 [22][26] The new station opened with the first passenger services through the tunnel on 1 December 1886. The New Passage branch, including the original station, was closed to passengers the same day, despite requests from local residents that a reduced service continue to operate.[9]: 112–114 [31] The route remained in goods use to allow trains to deliver coal to the Severn Tunnel pumping station, which was on a spur off the New Passage route.[32][note 4]
The new station was built on an embankment, and would eventually become known as Pilning High Level. The railway crossed the road via a bridge east of the original station's level crossing, and the new station entrance adjacent to that level crossing. To the west the line went into a cutting descending towards the Severn Tunnel. The station embankment also crossed a small irrigation channel at Gumhurn Bridge.
The station had a large goods yard to the south and east of the station, including a cattle pen and loading bay at the east end of the northern platform.[9]: 112 A siding between the platforms and the junction was converted to a goods loop in 1904, a westbound goods loop south of the station was laid in 1905, and a further eastbound loop just west of the station in 1906.[35][36]: 70 The station had two signal boxes: Station Box was sited at the western end of the southern platform and had 54 levers; Junction Box was 0.25 miles (0.40 km) east at the eastern end of the goods yard and had 68 levers.[35][26] As the final station before the Severn Tunnel, the yard was used to inspect wagons before they entered the tunnel, and also to house an emergency rescue locomotive.[9]: 112 [38] Heavier trains had a special brake van added, as the standard Great Western brake van had an open veranda and thus exposed the guards to choking fumes while in the tunnel.[21]: 73–76 Banking locomotives were also kept at Pilning to help trains with the steep slopes between the Severn Tunnel and Patchway.[36]: 149–151
In 1910, the GWR introduced a
Preceding station | Historical railways | Following station | ||
---|---|---|---|---|
Patchway | Great Western Railway Bristol and South Wales Union Railway (1886-1948) |
Severn Tunnel Junction |
Pilning Low Level
In 1900, the GWR built a new branch from the route to New Passage, running along the banks of the Severn to the docks at
In the early 1900s the nearby village of Severn Beach became a popular seaside resort, with a station opening there in 1922 for trains via Avonmouth. This spurred the upgrading of the line from Pilning to Avonmouth to passenger traffic: inspections occurred in 1927, approval was granted on 24 April 1928, and the first passenger services ran on 23 June 1928.[9][40][41] The station at Pilning on this line opened on 9 July 1928, referred to variously as Pilning Halt, Pilning Low Level Halt and Pilning Low Level, although the latter was the most common.[34][41] The station on the route via the Severn Tunnel was renamed Pilning High Level, with the station boards noting "Junction for Severn Beach and Avonmouth".[34][9] The total cost of construction of the new stations at Pilning, Cross Hands Halt and New Passage Halt was estimated at £502.[41]
The new Low Level station was on the site of the original station, 9 miles 39 chains (15.3 km) from Bristol Temple Meads. Patchway was the next station east, 3 miles 43 chains (5.7 km) away, while to the west Cross Hands Halt was 73 chains (1.5 km) distant.[22][3] The station had a single 150 feet (46 m)-long wooden platform on the north side of the line, with no facilities or lighting.[38][41][42] The shortness of the platform meant that only two carriages could be accommodated, and so passengers were required to travel in the correct part of the train in order to alight. Tickets were sold from the High Level station, whose stationmaster oversaw the Low Level also. The Low Level station handled parcels traffic, unlike other halts on the route.[9] The station had no water tower, and so locomotives were required to travel to High Level to use the facilities there.[36]: 75 A small shelter and platform lighting were added by 1959.[42] The initial service along this loop was nine trains per day on weekdays and four on Sundays, mostly running circular trips to and from Bristol Temple Meads via Clifton Down and Patchway.[32]
Preceding station | Historical railways | Following station | ||
---|---|---|---|---|
Patchway | Severn Beach Line (1928-1948) |
Cross Hands Halt |
British Rail
When the railways were
The High Level station continued in use, but reverted to its original name, Pilning, on 6 May 1968.[34] During the 1950s a brick building was built on the northern platform, and around the same time the footbridge had its roof and walls removed, leaving users exposed to the elements.[9][21] The goods yard was closed on 29 November 1965, with the good loops westbound towards the tunnel cut short in February 1968 and the eastbound loop between the High Level station and the junction removed in May 1969.[9][36]: 185 The Motorail loading bay was used to store a fire service emergency train for the Severn Tunnel, however this had been relocated to Severn Tunnel Junction by 1991.[36]: 72 The Junction and Station signal boxes were closed on 15 March 1971, with control passed to Bristol Panel Signal Box at Bristol Temple Meads.[36]: 184 Passenger services had increased slightly by this point, with nine or ten trains each direction between Bristol and Cardiff from Monday to Saturday and two trains each way on Sundays, but this increase was short-lived, and by 1973 Pilning received only one train per day in each direction.[9][42][45] The station buildings had been boarded up by this point, and by 1982 had been demolished, with the exception of the 1950s brick building. Basic shelters were constructed on each platform as a replacement.[42] The few stopping trains had to be timed for daylight hours, as the station lighting had been disconnected.[16] British Rail was split into business-led sectors in the 1980s, at which time operations at Pilning passed to Regional Railways.[46]
Preceding station | Historical railways | Following station | ||
---|---|---|---|---|
Patchway | Severn Beach Line (1948–1964) |
Cross Hands Halt | ||
Western Region of British Railways South Wales Main Line (1948–1982) |
Severn Tunnel Junction | |||
Regional Railways South Wales Main Line (1982–1997) |
Post-privatisation
The British rail network was
Despite the low patronage, there was local interest in the station. The Pilning Station Group, founded by local resident Jonathan King in the 1980s, campaigned for an increase in services.[16] Upon King's death in 2014, a small plaque dedicated to him was added to the brick abutment of the footbridge.[60] The group devised challenges for people to travel from Pilning on the morning train, get as far as possible, and then return on the evening train.[16] The group also successfully campaigned for an extra train to call to support a local music festival.[61]
On 5 November 2016, the footbridge at Pilning was demolished by Network Rail as part of the
Preceding station | Historical railways | Following station | ||
---|---|---|---|---|
Patchway | Wales & West South Wales Main Line (1997–2001) |
Severn Tunnel Junction | ||
Wessex Trains South Wales Main Line (2001-2006) |
Incidents
Railway staff have suffered injuries or death at Pilning; in 1893, signalman George Hann sustained severe cuts to the neck and throat after being hit by shards of glass from an unwanted bottle of lemon squash, which had been thrown from a passing train and smashed against the signal box's woodwork.
Passengers have also been the victims of accidents. On 31 May 1874, a seven-year-old child, Arthur Edward Claypole, and a nurse, Maria Hall, fell from an express train. Claypole had been leaning on the door when it came open causing him to fall out, with Hall jumping out after him. Claypole died from the injuries sustained. An insufficient door fastening was cited as the cause of the incident.[82][83]
A major incident occurred in 1933, when a
Future
Service improvements at Pilning are supported by both the Pilning Station Group and Friends of Suburban Bristol Railways. While
There are expected to be increases in the number of trains passing through Pilning in the years to 2043, with a predicted service of ten passenger trains and up to two freight trains per hour in each direction. Network Rail estimate that 15 trains per hour in each direction could use the route if European Train Control System signalling was implemented.[20]: 30, 70, 76, 87
Notes
- ^ Railways in the United Kingdom are, for historical reasons, measured in miles and chains. There are 80 chains to the mile.
- ^ a b Annual estimated passenger usage based on sales of tickets in stated financial year(s) which end or originate at Patchway, from Office of Rail and Road statistics.[59] Methodology may vary year on year.
- ^ Oakley[9] states that the track was lifted, however Mitchell and Smith,[25] Rendall,[33]: 12 and Yorke[32] state that the branch remained in occasional use for coal traffic to the pumping station.
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