Fenny Stratford is 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 ...

that serves the

Fenny Stratford Fenny Stratford is a constituent town of Milton Keynes, Buckinghamshire, England and in the Civil Parish of Bletchley and Fenny Stratford. Originally an independent town, it was included in the Milton Keynes " designated area" in 1967. From 1895 ...

area of

Milton Keynes Milton Keynes ( ) is a city and the largest settlement in Buckinghamshire, England, about north-west of London. At the 2021 Census, the population of its urban area was over . The River Great Ouse forms its northern boundary; a tributary ...

Buckinghamshire Buckinghamshire (), abbreviated Bucks, is a ceremonial county in South East England that borders Greater London to the south-east, Berkshire to the south, Oxfordshire to the west, Northamptonshire to the north, Bedfordshire to the north-ea ...

. It is on the Marston Vale Line that links

Bletchley Bletchley is a constituent town of Milton Keynes, Buckinghamshire, England. It is situated in the south-west of Milton Keynes, and is split between the civil parishes of Bletchley and Fenny Stratford and West Bletchley. Bletchley is best known ...

and

Bedford Bedford is a market town in Bedfordshire, England. At the 2011 Census, the population of the Bedford built-up area (including Biddenham and Kempston) was 106,940, making it the second-largest settlement in Bedfordshire, behind Luton, whilst ...

, about one mile (1.7 km) east of

Bletchley railway station Bletchley is a railway station that serves the southern parts of Milton Keynes, England (especially Bletchley itself), and the north-eastern parts of Aylesbury Vale. It is 47 miles (75 km) northwest of , about 32 miles (51 km) east of ...

. This station is one of seven serving the

Milton Keynes urban area The Milton Keynes urban area or Milton Keynes Built-up Area is a designation established by the United Kingdom's Office for National Statistics. Milton Keynes has no statutory boundary: the 1967 designated area only determined the area assi ...

. The others are , , Bletchley, , and .

Services

The station is served by

London Northwestern Railway West Midlands Trains (WMT) is a train operating company in the United Kingdom. It operates passenger trains on the West Midlands franchise between London and the English Midlands under two trade names: West Midlands Railway (WMR) (within the ...

's BletchleyBedford local services, calling hourly in each direction Mon-Sat (no Sunday service) Services are run with Class 230 multiple units. The station can be accessed from both

Watling Street Watling Street is a historic route in England that crosses the River Thames at London and which was used in Classical Antiquity, Late Antiquity, and throughout the Middle Ages. It was used by the ancient Britons and paved as one of the main R ...

(via steps at Stag bridge) and Simpson Road (which is at grade), to the east and west of the station respectively,

History

Opened in 1846 by the Bedford Railway,"Disused Stations - Fenny Stratford"
'Disused Stations Site Record''; Retrieved 11 January 2017 Fenny Stratford station is just over from . The station buildings are in a

half-timbered Timber framing (german: Holzfachwerk) and "post-and-beam" construction are traditional methods of building with heavy timbers, creating structures using squared-off and carefully fitted and joined timbers with joints secured by large wooden ...

Gothic Revival style Gothic Revival (also referred to as Victorian Gothic, neo-Gothic, or Gothick) is an architectural movement that began in the late 1740s in England. The movement gained momentum and expanded in the first half of the 19th century, as increasingly ...

that had been insisted upon by the 7th Duke of Bedford for stations close to the Woburn Estate. The buildings are now residential and

Grade II listed In the United Kingdom, a listed building or listed structure is one that has been placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Historic Environment Scotland in Scotland, in Wales, and the Northern Irel ...

. West of the station is

, which was raised by some to allow the railway to pass beneath; immediately west of Stag bridge in the direction of Bletchley are points leading onto the disused freight-only railway line toward via the

Bletchley Flyover The Bletchley Flyover was originally a reinforced concrete railway viaduct that carried the former Varsity line between and over the West Coast Main Line (WCML) at Bletchley railway station in Milton Keynes, England. It was retained but la ...

. The passenger line and station are protected here by

trap point Catch points and trap points are types of turnout which act as railway safety devices. Both work by guiding railway carriages and trucks from a dangerous route onto a separate, safer track. Catch points are used to derail vehicles which are ou ...

s, but they are sited such that any runaway train caught by it would subsequently crash into the bridge. Fenny Stratford signalbox and station geograph-3515699-by-Ben-Brooksbank

Fenny Stratford signalbox and station geograph-3515699-by-Ben-Brooksbank

The station was originally built with staggered platforms, a wedge-shaped down platform being near the Simpson Road

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 ...

to the east. The platforms were rebuilt in 1948 so that they faced each other in the conventional

side platform A side platform (also known as a marginal platform or a single-face platform) is a platform positioned to the side of one or more railway tracks or guideways at a railway station, tram stop, or transitway. A station having dual side platforms ...

arrangement. One platform was taken out of service in the 1960s, as were a number of sidings. Fenny Stratford was reduced to an unstaffed halt in 1968, freight facilities having been withdrawn the previous year. , the station remains unstaffed. All that now remains is one platform and an area of wasteland east of the station, before Simpson Road crossing, which was controlled by a now demolished

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'' ...

that was taken out of service in 2004.

Accidents and incidents

There was an accident here on 7 December 1925 at 8.43 pm when a bus crashed through the closed crossing gates on Simpson Road and collided with the 6.30 pm train from to Bletchley. Six people in the bus, including the driver, were killed instantly, and four others were seriously injured. The train, however, was undamaged.

Marston Vale line

Fenny Stratford station, in common with others on the Marston Vale Line, is covered by the Marston Vale

Community Rail Community rail in Britain is the support of railway lines and stations by local organisations, usually through community rail partnerships (CRPs) comprising railway operators, local councils, and other community organisations, and rail user group ...

Partnership, which aims to increase use of the line by involving local people and the train companies. , the line through the station is single track (from Bletchley to just east of the A5, from whence it is double track until just short of ).

Location

The station is on

near its junction with Aylesbury Street. The nearest post-code is MK2 2XE.Streetmap.co.uk
/ref> In the

chainage The chain is a unit of length equal to 66 feet (22 yards). It is subdivided into 100 links (PDF) or 4 rods. There are 10 chains in a furlong, and 80 chains in one statute mile. In metric terms, it is 20.1168 m long. By extension, chainage ( ...

notation traditionally used on the railway, it is from Bletchley station on the line to Bedford.Engineer's Line References: Bletchley south junction to Bedford
RailwayCodes.org

References

Sources

External links

* {{Railway stations served by West Midlands Trains Railway stations in Buckinghamshire DfT Category F2 stations Railway stations in Milton Keynes Grade II listed buildings in Buckinghamshire Grade II listed railway stations Former London and North Western Railway stations Railway stations in Great Britain opened in 1846 Railway stations served by West Midlands Trains 1846 establishments in England 1925 disasters in the United Kingdom Buildings_and_structures_in_Milton_Keynes East West Rail