Leominster railway station

Leominster
Location
Place	Leominster
Local authority	Herefordshire
Grid reference	SO501588
Operations
Station code	LEO
Managed by	Arriva Trains Wales
Number of platforms	2
DfT category	E
Live arrivals/departures, station information and onward connections from National Rail Enquiries
Annual rail passenger usage*
2012/13	0.264 million
2013/14	0.249 million
2014/15	0.274 million
2015/16	0.277 million
2016/17	0.260 million
National Rail – UK railway stations
* Annual estimated passenger usage based on sales of tickets in stated financial year(s) which end or originate at Leominster from Office of Rail and Road statistics. Methodology may vary year on year.
UK Railways portal

GW 0-4-2T in the Goods yard in 1963

Leominster railway station lies on the Welsh Marches Line serving the Herefordshire town of Leominster in England. It is situated 11 ¹⁄₄ miles (18.1 km) north of Hereford.

Leominster has 2 operational platforms for north (Ludlow) and south (Hereford) bound trains respectively, though in the past it had three more to the east of the ones now in use.

History

Developed jointly by the Great Western Railway and the LNWR, it was originally a through station on their joint Shrewsbury and Hereford Railway. The GWR then took over two independently financed and developed branch lines, creating a busy junction station:

• Leominster and Kington Railway to Kington and Presteigne (Platforms 3/4)
• Worcester, Bromyard and Leominster Railway to Worcester (Platforms 4/5)

Both branches were however closed to passenger traffic by British Railways in the 1950s – services to Worcester ended in 1952 and to Kington in 1955.

Facilities

The station has a ticket office on platform 1, that is manned on a part-time basis on weekdays only (06:55 – 13:25). There is a self-service ticket machine provided for use outside of these times and for collecting pre-paid tickets. Platform 2 has a shelter only, whilst there are customer help points, digital information displays and automatic announcements provided to offer train running details on both sides.. Though the footbridge linking the platforms has stairs, level access is provided to each platform^[1].

Service today

Leominster now sees a regular service to important cities. The Monday-Saturday off-peak service is:

• 1 train per hour (tph) to Manchester Piccadilly, calling at Ludlow, Craven Arms, Church Stretton, Shrewsbury, Crewe, Wilmslow and Stockport.^[2] (certain trains also call at Whitchurch and Nantwich).
• 1 tph to Carmarthen, calling at Hereford, Abergavenny, Cwmbran, Newport, Cardiff Central, Bridgend, Port Talbot Parkway, Neath, Swansea, Llanelli and Pembrey and Burry Port.
  • This journey is extended to Milford Haven every two hours, calling at Whitland, Clunderwen (request stop), Clarbeston Road (request stop), Haverfordwest and Johnston (request stop).

On Sundays there is also an hourly service each way, though trains do not start running until mid-morning. This include a departure northbound to Chester and Holyhead in the late afternoon.

References

Further reading

• Mitchell, Vic; Smith, Keith (2004). Worcester to Hereford. West Sussex: Middleton Press. figs. 40–42. ISBN 9781904474388. OCLC 862604858.
• Mitchell, Vic; Smith, Keith (2007). Ludlow to Hereford. Middleton Press. pp. 25–34. ISBN 9781906008147. OCLC 258060509.

External links

• Train times and station information for Leominster railway station from National Rail

Preceding station	National Rail			Following station
Hereford		Arriva Trains Wales Welsh Marches Line		Ludlow
	Disused railways
Kingsland Line and station closed		Great Western Railway Leominster and Kington Railway		Terminus
Terminus		Great Western Railway Worcester, Bromyard and Leominster Railway		Stoke Prior Halt Line and station closed

Coordinates: 52°13′30″N 2°43′48″W / 52.225°N 2.730°W / 52.225; -2.730