Alvescot railway station was a

railway station Rail transport (also known as train transport) is a means of transport that transfers passengers and goods on wheeled vehicles running on rails, which are incorporated in tracks. In contrast to road transport, where the vehicles run on a pre ...

between the

Oxfordshire Oxfordshire is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in the north west of South East England. It is a mainly rural county, with its largest settlement being the city of Oxford. The county is a centre of research and development, primarily ...

villages of

Alvescot Alvescot is a village and civil parish about south of Carterton, Oxfordshire, England. The 2011 Census recorded the parish's population as 472. Archaeology A Neolithic stone hand axe was found at Alvescot. Petrological analysis in 1940 identi ...

and

Black Bourton Black Bourton is a village and civil parish about south of Carterton, Oxfordshire. The village is on Black Bourton Brook, a tributary of the River Thames. The 2011 Census recorded the parish population as 266. RAF Brize Norton adjoins the par ...

, in England. It was

Oxford, Witney and Fairford Railway The Oxford, Witney and Fairford Railway was a single track railway branch line, long, in Oxfordshire and Gloucestershire. It was opened in succession by two companies, the first in 1861 to connect the important woollen town of Witney to the ma ...

between and .

History

The station was opened by the

East Gloucestershire Railway The Oxford, Witney and Fairford Railway was a single track railway branch line, long, in Oxfordshire and Gloucestershire. It was opened in succession by two companies, the first in 1861 to connect the important woollen town of Witney to the ma ...

on 15 January 1873 as part of its extension of the Witney Railway from to . Situated on the

- Clanfield road, the station served the village of Alvescot, situated less than half a mile to the north, and also the neighbouring village of

. A small single-platform station was provided without a

passing loop A passing loop (UK usage) or passing siding (North America) (also called a crossing loop, crossing place, refuge loop or, colloquially, a hole) is a place on a single line railway or tramway, often located at or near a station, where trains or ...

signal box In signal processing, a signal is a function that conveys information about a phenomenon. Any quantity that can vary over space or time can be used as a signal to share messages between observers. The ''IEEE Transactions on Signal Processing'' ...

Ground frame Mechanical railway signalling installations rely on lever frames for their operation to interlock the signals, track locks and points to allow the safe operation of trains in the area the signals control. Usually located in the signal box, the ...

s controlled the access to the two goods sidings which trailed off the single track line at the western end of the platform to serve coal staithes, cattle pens and a goods shed. A single

refuge siding A refuge siding is a single-ended, or dead-end, siding off a running line, which may be used to temporarily accommodate a train so that another one can pass it. For example, a refuge siding might be used by a slow goods train to allow a fast passen ...

on the Down side lay just beyond the western end of the station. Next to the station building was a

Great Western Railway The Great Western Railway (GWR) was a British railway company that linked London with the southwest, west and West Midlands of England and most of Wales. It was founded in 1833, received its enabling Act of Parliament on 31 August 1835 and ran ...

-type Pagoda shed and to the rear of the building, adjacent to the station forecourt, was a goods lock-up and a brick

weigh house A weighhouse or weighing house is a public building at or within which goods are weighed. Most of these buildings were built before 1800, prior to the establishment of international standards for weights, and were often a large and representative ...

. Unlike the

Cotswold stone The Cotswolds (, ) is a region in central-southwest England, along a range of rolling hills that rise from the meadows of the upper Thames to an escarpment above the Severn Valley and Evesham Vale. The area is defined by the bedrock of Jur ...

stations at , Bampton, Fairford and Witney, the station building at Alvescot was constructed of red brick. In 1923, the station issued 9,046 tickets and handled 424 parcels and 9,616 tons of goods. In 1944, Carterton station was opened to the east of Alverscot. During the "Arctic" winter of 1946-7, the line was severed at Alvescot when a large snow drift blocked the line. An emergency service was maintained with services running from either end of the snow-filled cutting. During the final years before closure, a

British Railways British Railways (BR), which from 1965 traded as British Rail, was a state-owned company that operated most of the overground rail transport in Great Britain from 1948 to 1997. It was formed from the nationalisation of the Big Four British rai ...

employee at Alvescot made a proposal for the line's operation using diesel railcars that, he claimed, would save at least £20,000. This was to no avail as the station was closed along with the East Gloucestershire Railway on 18 June 1962.

Present day

The goods yard remains occupied by G.F. Luckett,

coal merchant Coal is a combustible black or brownish-black sedimentary rock, formed as rock strata called coal seams. Coal is mostly carbon with variable amounts of other elements, chiefly hydrogen, sulfur, oxygen, and nitrogen. Coal is formed when dead ...

, now supplied by road. All the station buildings have been demolished and the remainder of the site is a light industrial area. The station house still stands and is called "Station Bungalow". Large sections of trackbed between Alvescot and remain intact.

References

Notes

Sources

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External links

Photos and details about the station
{{DEFAULTSORT:Alvescot Railway Station Disused railway stations in Oxfordshire Former Great Western Railway stations Railway stations in Great Britain opened in 1873 Railway stations in Great Britain closed in 1962 West Oxfordshire District