Raised platform at Aberdyfi station - geograph

The Harrington Hump is a modular and easy-to-install system by which the height of a railway platform can be increased at relatively low cost. The system takes its name from

Harrington railway station Harrington is a railway station on the Cumbrian Coast Line, which runs between and . The station, situated south-west of Carlisle, serves the villages of Harrington and Salterbeck in Cumbria. It is owned by Network Rail and managed by Nort ...

Cumbria Cumbria ( ) is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in North West England, bordering Scotland. The county and Cumbria County Council, its local government, came into existence in 1974 after the passage of the Local Government Act 1972. C ...

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

, which is the location of the first production version. From 2011, Harrington Humps have been installed slowly at other railway stations in the UK.

Background

Platform height across the UK rail network is not standardised; at the time of the construction of the network, different railway companies settled on different platform heights. Platforms sited low (compared to the level of the train carriage floor) present entry and exit problems to mobility-impaired train users, including wheelchair users. Raising the level of a complete platform is relatively costly and in many instances beyond the means of

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 local authorities. The impetus for the hump, it is claimed, was a complaint by the chairman of the Copeland Rail Users' Group about low platforms on the

Cumbrian Coast Line The Cumbrian Coast line is a rail route in North West England, running from Carlisle railway station, Carlisle to Barrow-in-Furness via Workington and Whitehaven. The line forms part of Network Rail route NW 4033, which continues (as the Furnes ...

causing users difficulty in alighting from trains, made at Allerdale Area Transport Advisory Group, a sub-committee of Cumbria County Council's Local Committee. A suggestion of a partial raising of platforms was made to parry a Network Rail assertion that remedial work would cost a "six-figure sum" per station.

The Hump

The Harrington Hump is a partial solution to this long-standing problem of user access to railway carriages from relatively low station platforms. The Hump is a pair of ramps and a short flat top, built from a glass-reinforced polymer; it is capable of being designed to meet the width and height requirements of particular stations, and to be installed in a few days. Installing a Harrington Hump is also much cheaper than raising the entire length of the platform – on the order of 1/10th of the typical £250,000 cost. The Hump was devised by Network Rail and

Cumbria County Council Cumbria County Council is the county council for the non-metropolitan county of Cumbria in the North West of England. Established in April 1974, following its first elections held the previous year, it is an elected local government body respon ...

, in conjunction with Pipex Structural Composites, and was installed first at

in December 2008. Harrington was chosen as the pilot site, it is claimed, because it has the greatest drop from train floor to platform and, as a coastal station, it offered the harshest of environments in which to test the hump. Otherwise known as an "Easy Access Area", Network Rail has conceded that the structure will be known henceforth by its nickname, ''Harrington Hump''. The Hump is positioned to meet a particular door on a train, usually one designed for wheelchair access. As such, the Hump is less suited to platforms served by different configurations of trains, such as at

Dalton railway station Dalton is a railway station on the Furness Line, which runs between and . The station, situated north-east of Barrow-in-Furness, serves the town of Dalton-in-Furness in Cumbria. It is owned by Network Rail and managed by Northern Trains. H ...

, where wheelchair accommodation doors are often located in different positions. The second Hump was installed at St Albans Abbey railway station and the third at

Aberdovey railway station , symbol_location = gb , symbol = rail , image = Aberdovey railway station building (geograph 5399718).jpg , borough = Aberdyfi, Gwynedd , country = Wales , coordinates = , gr ...

. Other stations to receive Humps include Northwich, Flixton,

Whaley Bridge Whaley Bridge () is a town and civil parish in the High Peak district of Derbyshire, England. It is situated on the River Goyt, south-east of Manchester, north of Buxton, north-east of Macclesfield and west of Sheffield. It had a population ...

, Eccles,

Kents Bank Kents Bank is a small village in Cumbria, England, so named for its proximity to the River Kent estuary. Part of the historic County Palatine of Lancashire, it is located south-west of Grange-over-Sands. History Kents Bank takes its name fro ...

and Hadfield. The Hump system won a Delivery of Customer Service Award at the 2009 ''Civil Service Diversity and Equality Awards''. In February 2019, a Hump was proposed for

Marsden railway station Marsden railway station serves the village of Marsden near Huddersfield in West Yorkshire, England. The station is on the Huddersfield Line, operated by Northern and is about west of Huddersfield station. It was opened in 1849 by the Lond ...

in West Yorkshire; this would alleviate the issue of a 45 cm drop from train to platform

Innovative aspects

According to the Association of Community Rail Partnerships, innovative aspects of the Hump are that it is: *Cheap *Not requiring possession to install *Capable of local hand assembly without large power tools *Capable of being used across the network *Good design life (50 years) *Safe and providing standard height access to train *Meet Network standards or provide reason for variation *Preferably capable of installation by four persons *Capable of installation in 3 days

Other UK station humps

Similar humps have been installed on the

London Underground The London Underground (also known simply as the Underground or by its nickname the Tube) is a rapid transit system serving Greater London and some parts of the adjacent counties of Buckinghamshire, Essex and Hertfordshire in England. The ...

, such as between 2010 and 2011, all of the

Victoria line The Victoria line is a London Underground line that runs between in south London and in the north-east, via the West End. It is printed in light blue on the Tube map and is one of the only two lines on the network to run completely underg ...

stations except Pimlico; in this case the humps are of a masonry construction and thus are not Harringtons. The impetus for their installation are the Rail Vehicle Accessibility (Non Interoperable Rail System) Regulations 2010 and the

Disability Discrimination Act 1995 The Disability Discrimination Act 1995 (c. 50) (informally, and hereafter, the DDA) is an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom which has now been repealed and replaced by the Equality Act 2010, except in Northern Ireland where the Act ...

References

{{reflist Accessible transportation Railway platforms Rail transport in Cumbria Assistive technology