Brize Norton and Bampton railway station was a railway station south of the village of

Brize Norton Brize Norton is a village and civil parish east of Carterton in West Oxfordshire. The 2011 Census recorded the parish population as 938. The original part of RAF Brize Norton is in the parish. Toponym Around the time of the Domesday Book ...

on the

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 . The station had two stone-built platforms, a station building and a goods shed.

History

The station was opened on 15 January 1873 and was originally named Bampton, although it was north of that village. In August 1884 a similarly named station at

Bampton, Devon Bampton is a small town and parish in northeast Devon, England, on the River Batherm, a tributary of the River Exe. It is about north of Tiverton, 19 miles (31 km) north of Exeter and the parish borders Somerset on its north-east and nort ...

was opened. However, it was not until 2 July 1906 that the Oxfordshire station was distinguished by being renamed ''Bampton (Oxon)'', although certain records indicate that the station's name was in fact changed shortly after the opening of the Devon station. The station was one of two on the East Gloucestershire Railway with two platforms, and a stone-built

goods shed A goods shed is a railway building designed for storing goods before or after carriage in a train. A typical goods shed will have a track running through it to allow goods wagons to be unloaded under cover, although sometimes they were built ...

was also constructed, as at and . A small

goods yard A goods station (also known as a goods yard or goods depot) or freight station is, in the widest sense, a railway station where, either exclusively or predominantly, goods (or freight), such as merchandise, parcels, and manufactured items, are l ...

was served by two sidings. The

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

resulted in the construction of a new concrete loading bank between the goods shed and the station. The goods shed was smaller than those provided on the Witney Railway and could only accommodate a single vehicle. The signal box was of standard

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 ...

design with 18 levers and, as with other stations on the East Gloucestershire Railway with the exception of Carterton, it was situated on the platform adjacent to the station buildings. The station had 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 ...

which, for over 50 years, was the only one on the line. Until Brize Norton airfield was built, the station stood in a rather isolated position, to the north of Bampton village. Nevertheless, between 1903 and 1923, an average of 11,000 tickets were collected annually at the station, and around 9,000 tons of goods traffic was handled. There were a number of airfields in the vicinity of the station:

RAF Brize Norton Royal Air Force Brize Norton or RAF Brize Norton in Oxfordshire, about west north-west of London, is the largest station of the Royal Air Force. It is close to the village of Brize Norton, and the towns of Carterton and Witney. The station ...

opened in August 1937 and RAF Stanton Harcourt. A siding once ran from the station through the perimeter fence of Brize Norton and into the aerodrome but this was a temporary facility used during the airfield's construction. The airfields were attacked several times, notably in August 1940, but the railway escaped damage. On 1 May 1940, the Great Western Railway renamed the station as ''Brize Norton and Bampton'', which may have been due to the proximity of Brize Norton aerodrome. The position of the station in relation to the airfield meant that when its facilities were extended southwards, two essential

taxiway A taxiway is a path for aircraft at an airport connecting runways with aprons, hangars, terminals and other facilities. They mostly have a hard surface such as asphalt or concrete, although smaller general aviation airports sometimes use gravel ...

s crossed the railway line necessitating wide

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

gates to span the entire width. Special signalling was installed in the airfield's

control tower Air traffic control (ATC) is a service provided by ground-based air traffic controllers who direct aircraft on the ground and through a given section of controlled airspace, and can provide advisory services to aircraft in non-controlled airsp ...

and in the station's signal box (which was also linked to the control tower), which was presumably similar to the system used by the

Northern Counties Committee The Northern Counties Committee (NCC) was a railway that served the north-east of Ireland. It was built to Irish gauge () but later acquired a number of narrow gauge lines. It had its origins in the Belfast and Ballymena Railway that opened to ...

RAF Ballykelly Royal Air Force Ballykelly or more simply RAF Ballykelly is a former Royal Air Force station which opened in 1941 in Ballykelly, County Londonderry. It closed in 1971 when the site was handed over to the British Army as Shackleton Barracks. A s ...

where a main runway was crossed on the level by the Belfast–Derry railway line. After the war, the airfields continued to generate significant traffic until the early 1950s when Brize Norton became a

USAF The United States Air Force (USAF) is the air service branch of the United States Armed Forces, and is one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. Originally created on 1 August 1907, as a part of the United States Army Sign ...

base and traffic suddenly fell away. The station closed along with the East Gloucestershire Railway from Witney to Fairford on 18 June 1962.

Present day

The station site remained derelict for a number of years after closure. Several proposals were made for the site including for waste disposal but this was refused by the local council on the basis of the traffic that it would generate. Another proposal by the Witney Plastics Company was turned down because of the danger that it would pose to aircraft. Permission was later granted for an oil storage depot. The station building was demolished in the mid-1980s after having been partly restored. The goods shed, the last of three such surviving East Gloucestershire Railway structures, was also demolished. The station's site is now covered by a large warehouse complex.

Notes

References

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External links

Photos and details of the station
{{Closed stations Oxfordshire Former Great Western Railway stations Disused railway stations in Oxfordshire Railway stations in Great Britain opened in 1873 Railway stations in Great Britain closed in 1962 West Oxfordshire District