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Stewartby railway station

Coordinates: 52°04′08″N 0°31′16″W / 52.069°N 0.521°W / 52.069; -0.521
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Stewartby
National Rail
Looking north-east with three of the four surviving and listed brickworks chimneys in view
General information
LocationStewartby, Bedford
England
Coordinates52°04′08″N 0°31′16″W / 52.069°N 0.521°W / 52.069; -0.521
Grid referenceTL014422
Managed byLondon Northwestern Railway
Platforms2
Other information
Station codeSWR
ClassificationDfT category F2
Key dates
1905Opened as Wootton Pillinge Halt
1 January 1917Temporarily closed
5 May 1919Reopened
1 January 1928Renamed Wootton Pillinge
8 July 1935Renamed Stewartby[1]
15 July 1968Became unstaffed[2]
Passengers
2018/19Increase 61,542
2019/20Increase 72,748
2020/21Decrease 45,770
2021/22Increase 76,872
2022/23Decrease 72,444
Location
Map
Notes
Passenger statistics from the Office of Rail and Road

Stewartby railway station is a station on the Marston Vale line, which serves the Bedfordshire village of Stewartby in England. It is the nearest station to the Marston Vale Millennium Country Park.

Services

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All services at Stewartby are operated by London Northwestern Railway.

The typical off-peak service is one train per hour in each direction between Bletchley and Bedford which runs on weekdays and Saturdays only using Class 150 DMUs. There is no Sunday service.[3][4][5]

Preceding station National Rail National Rail Following station
Millbrook   London Northwestern Railway
  Kempston Hardwick

History

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When first opened in 1905 by the London and North Western Railway, the station was a halt serving the small village of Wootton Pillinge, a largely rural community that, in 1897, had become the site of B.J.H. Forder's brickworks. The plant was served by sidings close to and alongside the halt which were controlled by a signal box;[6] the halt was simply constructed with a platform at ground level constructed out of sleepers.[7] By 1910, the Wootton Pillinge Brick Company was selling 48 million bricks per year and in 1923, it merged with the London Brick Company (LBC). The brickworks developed virtually across the railway line and as the wagon capacity of the old sidings was exceeded, they became an extension for a larger group of sidings developing at Wootton Broadmead. The Wootton Pillinge signal box was closed and a new box was opened called "Forder's Sidings" which controlled heavy movements from the works.[8]

In 1926 the LBC began to build a "garden village" for its employees at Wootton Pillinge; the village was to be named "Stewartby" after Sir Halley Stewart, the former Liberal Parliamentary candidate for Peterborough and first chairman of the Wootton Pillinge Brick Company. Following the building of the village, the London, Midland and Scottish Railway renamed the station (which ceased to be a halt in 1928) to Stewartby.[9] The Stewartby brickworks was connected to the Marston Vale Line via a 2 ft 11 in (889 mm) narrow gauge railway operating on overhead electrification. This is believed to have been installed in the 1930s and lasted until 1960.[10] After reaching a peak production level of 738 million bricks in 1973, demand for bricks declined and the LBC (trading as Easidispose) signed an agreement the following year to re-use its empty clay pits as landfill transported from London. One or two daily container trains began transporting 1,000 tons of waste from Hendon to handling facilities at Stewartby.[11]


Preceding station   Disused railways   Following station
Millbrook   British Railways
Varsity Line
  Wootton Broadmead Halt

References

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  1. ^ Butt, R.V.J. (1995). The Directory of Railway Stations. Sparkford: Patrick Stephens Ltd. p. 255. ISBN 1-85260-508-1.
  2. ^ Clinker, C.R. (1978). Clinker's Register of Closed Passenger Stations and Goods Depots in England, Scotland and Wales 1830-1977. Bristol: Avon-AngliA Publications & Services. p. 164. ISBN 0-905466-19-5.
  3. ^ "Bletchley to Bedford | Timetable from Monday 19 February 2024". London Northwestern Railway. Retrieved 20 February 2024.
  4. ^ "Train timetables and schedules | Stewartby". London Northwestern Railway.
  5. ^ "Marston Vale Line: Hourly timetable has now resumed". London Northwestern Railway. 20 February 2024.
  6. ^ Simpson 1981, p. 65.
  7. ^ Simpson 2000, p. 77.
  8. ^ Simpson 2000, p. 74.
  9. ^ Simpson 1981, p. 69.
  10. ^ Simpson 1981, p. 62.
  11. ^ Simpson 1981, p. 66.

Sources

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