Walkden railway station

Walkden railway station is one of the principal stations that lie on the Manchester to Southport Line in England. The station is located 8 1⁄4 miles (13.3 km) north-west of Manchester with regular Northern Trains services to these towns as well as Salford, Swinton and Hindley. It was opened by the Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway

Walkden
Location
PlaceWalkden
Local authoritySalford
Grid referenceSD738026
Operations
Station codeWKD
Managed byNorthern Trains
Number of platforms2
DfT categoryE
Live arrivals/departures, station information and onward connections
from National Rail Enquiries
Annual rail passenger usage*
2014/15 0.306 million
2015/16 0.340 million
2016/17 0.301 million
2017/18 0.284 million
2018/19 0.302 million
Passenger Transport Executive
PTEGreater Manchester
History
1888Opened
National Rail – UK railway stations
  • Annual estimated passenger usage based on sales of tickets in stated financial year(s) which end or originate at Walkden from Office of Rail and Road statistics. Methodology may vary year on year.

One of the busier stations on the line, the station used to be known as Walkden High Level to differentiate it from the London and North Western Railway's Walkden Low Level railway station (on the line from Manchester Exchange to Bolton Great Moor Street, which was closed to passengers in 1954).[1] It controlled a junction for the goods line to Ellesmere Colliery.[2] Latest figures indicate that over 300,000 passengers use the station annually.[3]

First opened in 1888 with the line, it has only ever had two platform faces - when the line was quadrupled at the turn of the century, the two additional tracks were laid to the south and were not provided with platforms. The fast lines were subsequently decommissioned in November 1965 and lifted.

In February 2007 the Friends of Walkden Station community volunteer group was founded to campaign for improvements to the station's facilities and services.

One of the line's two remaining signal boxes was formerly located here (it acted as the 'fringe' box to Manchester Piccadilly signalling centre), but it and neighbouring Atherton Goods Yard box were both closed in the spring of 2013 and their semaphore signals replaced by colour lights worked from Piccadilly SCC.[4]

Facilities

The station has a staffed ticket office, though this is only staffed part-time (06:10 to 12:40 weekdays, 07:10 to 13:40 Saturdays, closed Sundays). A ticket machine is also available. Train running information is provided by digital display screens, automated announcements and timetable posters. No step-free access is possible, as the station is above street level and is reached via two flights of stairs.[5]

Service
The entrance to Walkden railway station

Monday to Saturday daytimes, three trains per hour go southbound to Manchester Victoria and three per hour towards Wigan Wallgate (hourly extensions to Kirkby) northbound. Only a few trains now extend beyond Wigan through to Southport since the start of the winter 2019 timetable, whilst certain peak hour trains run to/from Wigan North Western rather than Wallgate.

Certain Manchester departures continue along the Caldervale Line to Todmorden, Burnley Manchester Road and Blackburn or to Leeds via Brighouse.[6]

In the evenings there is a half-hourly service in each direction to Manchester Victoria and Wigan.

A normal Saturday service or modified Monday to Friday service operates on most Bank Holidays

On 18 December 2009 the Greater Manchester Passenger Transport Executive (GMPTE) voted to approve funding for a one-year trial of Sunday trains from Walkden, starting on 23 May 2010.[7] This proved successful and now runs twice per hour in each direction (one Blackburn to Southport train and a second between Wigan and Manchester Victoria).

References
  1. Walkden Low Level Station, Subterranea Britannica, retrieved 20 January 2010
  2. Davies, A. (2013). Walkden Yard: The Lancashire Central Coalfield Workshops. Stroud: Amberley. p. 23. ISBN 978-1-44561-705-3.
  3. Walkden Rail Users, Rail Regulator, retrieved 20 January 2010
  4. Old Walkden station signal box in 2012 Whatley, Peter Geograph.org; Retrieved 20 December 2016
  5. Walkden station facilities National Rail Enquiries; Retrieved 20 December 2016
  6. Table 82 National Rail timetable, December 2019
  7. "New Sunday services for rail line", BBC News, 20 December 2009, retrieved 13 January 2010
Preceding station National Rail Following station
Atherton   Northern Trains
Manchester-Southport Line or
Manchester-Kirkby		   Swinton or
Moorside

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