'' Waterloo Road'' is a British school-based television drama series that was originally broadcast in the United Kingdom between 9 March 2006 and 9 March 2015, and later revived in a new series that began airing on 3 January 2023.

Transmissions

The show is set in a failing

comprehensive school A comprehensive school typically describes a secondary school for pupils aged approximately 11–18, that does not select its intake on the basis of academic achievement or aptitude, in contrast to a selective school system where admission is res ...

of the same name and focuses on both the professional and personal lives of the students and staff. The show was initially filmed on a former primary school site in Kirkholt,

Rochdale Rochdale ( ) is a large town in Greater Manchester, England, at the foothills of the South Pennines in the dale on the River Roch, northwest of Oldham and northeast of Manchester. It is the administrative centre of the Metropolitan Borough ...

, before moving production to a former secondary school site in

Greenock Greenock (; sco, Greenock; gd, Grianaig, ) is a town and administrative centre in the Inverclyde council areas of Scotland, council area in Scotland, United Kingdom and a former burgh of barony, burgh within the Counties of Scotland, historic ...

, Scotland for series eight to ten. The revival series returned to

Greater Manchester Greater Manchester is a metropolitan county and combined authority, combined authority area in North West England, with a population of 2.8 million; comprising ten metropolitan boroughs: City of Manchester, Manchester, City of Salford, Salford ...

, with filming at the former

St Ambrose Barlow Roman Catholic High School St Ambrose Barlow RC High School is a secondary school located in Wardley, Greater Manchester, England. The school is named after St Ambrose Barlow, one of the Forty Martyrs of England and Wales. The school serves a wide range of parishes inc ...

in Swinton.

Original show

The show ran for ten series with 200 hour-long episodes in its initial run. The

first series First or 1st is the ordinal form of the number one (#1). First or 1st may also refer to: *World record, specifically the first instance of a particular achievement Arts and media Music * 1$T, American rapper, singer-songwriter, DJ, and reco ...

contained eight episodes, which was increased to twelve for the

second series The second (symbol: s) is the unit of time in the International System of Units (SI), historically defined as of a day – this factor derived from the division of the day first into 24 hours, then to 60 minutes and finally to 60 seconds eac ...

. The

third series Third or 3rd may refer to: Numbers * 3rd, the ordinal form of the cardinal number 3 * , a fraction of one third * 1⁄60 of a ''second'', or 1⁄3600 of a ''minute'' Places * 3rd Street (disambiguation) * Third Avenue (disambiguation) * Hig ...

saw an increase to twenty episodes, which continued until series seven when the show increased its output to thirty episodes. The show's move to Scotland established a commitment to making fifty episodes of the drama, which aired over series eight and nine. A further twenty episodes were then commissioned as part of the show's tenth series. The majority of the drama was first broadcast on

BBC One BBC One is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network owned and operated by the BBC. It is the corporation's flagship network and is known for broadcasting mainstream programming, which includes BBC News television bulletins, p ...

in a primetime 8pm timeslot, originally on a Thursday night before later moving to a Wednesday night. However, the final ten episodes of the show were premiered on BBC Three in an 8.30 pm timeslot, with a repeat airing later that evening, at 10.35 pm, on BBC One. The decision was made to allow new programming to air in the timeslot. ''Waterloo Road'' was cancelled in 2014 after BBC executives decided it had reached "the end of its lifecycle". The show's initial run ended at the conclusion of its tenth series in March 2015.

''Waterloo Road Reunited''

A short online spin-off series, ''

Waterloo Road Reunited On Friday 19 November 2010, the BBC announced '' Waterloo Road'' would have an online spin-off mini-series, ''Waterloo Road Reunited''. The series followed former characters of the main show, and their lives after leaving Waterloo Road. The s ...

'', was commissioned in 2010 and ran for six episodes the following year. It focuses on the lives of six school leavers who previously appeared in the main show.

Return

In September 2021, a new series was announced as part of the BBC's intentions to represent all areas of Britain in its programming. On 6 December 2022, the BBC confirmed that the new series would premiere on 3 January 2023, replacing ''

Holby City ''Holby City'' (stylised on-screen as HOLBY CIY) is a British medical drama television series that aired weekly on BBC One. It was created by Tony McHale and Mal Young as a spin-off from the established BBC medical drama ''Casualty'', and pr ...

'' in the Tuesday 8pm timeslot, after the show's cancellation in June 2021. It was confirmed that all episodes from the series would release on BBC iPlayer as a boxset on the same day.

Series overview

Episodes

Series 1 (2006)

Series 2 (2007)

Series 3 (2007–2008)

Series 4 (2009)

Series 5 (2009–2010)

Series 6 (2010–2011)

Series 7 (2011–2012)

Series 8 (2012–2013)

Series 9 (2013–2014)

Series 10 (2014–2015)

Series 11 (2023)

Specials

''Waterloo Road Reunited''

Footnotes

References

External links

List of ''Waterloo Road'' episodes
at

BBC Online BBC Online, formerly known as BBCi, is the BBC's online service. It is a large network of websites including such high-profile sites as BBC News and BBC Sport, Sport, the on-demand video and radio services branded BBC iPlayer and BBC Sounds, t ...

* {{DEFAULTSORT:List of Waterloo Road episodes Waterloo Road Waterloo Road (TV series)