Blythe Bridge railway station in

Blythe Bridge Blythe Bridge is a village in Staffordshire, England, south-east of Stoke-on-Trent. Etymology Blythe Bridge is so called as it is built around the site of a bridge over the River Blithe (spelt differently from the name of the village itself), a ...

, Staffordshire, England, is served by trains on the

Crewe to Derby Line Crewe () is a railway town and civil parish in the unitary authority of Cheshire East in Cheshire, England. The Crewe built-up area had a total population of 75,556 in 2011, which also covers parts of the adjacent civil parishes of Willaston, ...

; it is also a Community rail line known as the North Staffordshire line. The station is owned by

Network Rail Network Rail Limited is the owner (via its subsidiary Network Rail Infrastructure Limited, which was known as Railtrack plc before 2002) and infrastructure manager of most of the railway network in Great Britain. Network Rail is an "arm's leng ...

and managed by East Midlands Railway. The full range of tickets for travel are purchased from the

guard Guard or guards may refer to: Professional occupations * Bodyguard, who protects an individual from personal assault * Crossing guard, who stops traffic so pedestrians can cross the street * Lifeguard, who rescues people from drowning * Prison ...

on the train at no extra cost. The station was opened on 7 August 1848 by the

North Staffordshire Railway The North Staffordshire Railway (NSR) was a British railway company formed in 1845 to promote a number of lines in the Staffordshire Potteries and surrounding areas in Staffordshire, Cheshire, Derbyshire and Shropshire. The company was based ...

(NSR). Until 1907 the spelling of the station name was Blyth Bridge. The station buildings were demolished in the early 1990s and today it is unstaffed. In 2010 it won East Midlands Trains' Best Small Station award.

Signalling

Blythe Bridge had at one time two signal boxes, Blythe Bridge and Stallington, both of which controlled

level crossing A level crossing is an intersection where a railway line crosses a road, path, or (in rare situations) airport runway, at the same level, as opposed to the railway line crossing over or under using an overpass or tunnel. The term a ...

s, which was a common feature across the former NSR. Blythe Bridge signal box was opened by the NSR in 1884 on their Derby to Stoke line. The box was built to a standard McKenzie & Holland design and under the S.R.S. designation system is referred to as a MKH Type1. The signal box was equipped with a standard McKenzie & Holland

lever 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 ...

and a gate wheel for operating the level crossing gates which controlled traffic on the busy former A50. These gates were later replaced by a barrier crossing when traffic got too heavy for the signalman. Blythe Bridge signal box finally closed in 1980 and the level crossing was converted to CCTV control with the barriers supervised by Caverswall signal box. Blythe Bridge railway station

Services

All services at Blythe Bridge are operated by East Midlands Railway. On weekdays and Saturdays, the station is generally served by an hourly service westbound to via and eastbound to via and . During the late evenings, services terminate at Nottingham instead of Newark Castle. On Sundays, the station is served by an hourly service between Crewe and Derby only although no trains operate before 14:00.

Foxfield Railway

The station is situated south of Caverswall Road railway station, the current southern terminus of the

Foxfield Railway The Foxfield Railway is a preserved standard gauge line located south east of Stoke-on-Trent. The line was built in 1893 to serve the colliery at Dilhorne on the Cheadle Coalfield. It joined the North Staffordshire Railway line near Blythe Bri ...

References

External links

Page with more info on the station

Photographs of the old station buildingsPhotograph of Blythe Bridge Signal Box
{{coord, 52.968, N, 2.067, W, type:railwaystation_region:GB, display=title Staffordshire Moorlands Railway stations in Staffordshire DfT Category F2 stations Former North Staffordshire Railway stations Railway stations in Great Britain opened in 1848 Railway stations served by East Midlands Railway

Signalling

Services

Foxfield Railway

References

Further reading

External links