Marden railway station is on the

South Eastern Main Line The South Eastern Main Line is a major long-distance railway route in South East England, UK, one of the three main routes crossing the county of Kent, going via Sevenoaks, Tonbridge, Ashford and Folkestone to Dover. The other routes are the C ...

in England, serving the village of Marden in the

borough of Maidstone The Borough of Maidstone is a local government district with borough status in Kent, England. Its administrative centre is Maidstone, the county town of Kent. The borough was formed on 1 April 1974 by the merger of the Municipal Borough of Maid ...

, Kent. It is down the line from London Charing Cross . The station and all trains that serve the station are operated by

Southeastern The points of the compass are a set of horizontal, radially arrayed compass directions (or azimuths) used in navigation and cartography. A compass rose is primarily composed of four cardinal directions—north, east, south, and west—each se ...

. The station is often referred to as Marden (Kent), to distinguish itself between similarly-named villages across England.

History

The station was opened by the South Eastern Railway on 31 August 1842, when the line was extended from to . It was built to serve local goods traffic, particularly the transport of fruit from the orchards surrounding Marden. The goods shed was designed so that wagons could not pass through it. The yard was expanded in 1908, adding an additional siding. The station was completely revamped in 1961 in preparation for the electrification of the South East Main line, including an additional footbridge.

Facilities

Along with similar sized stations along the South East Main Line, the ticket office is only staffed part-time. A ticket machine is available for other times.

Accidents and incidents

At 20:42 on 4 January 1969 there was a collision between a down electric passenger train (formed of 2 x 4CEP units) and a down parcels train to the west of Marden station. Four people were killed. The cause was the driver of the passenger train missing a signal in

fog Fog is a visible aerosol consisting of tiny water droplets or ice crystals suspended in the air at or near the Earth's surface. Reprint from Fog can be considered a type of low-lying cloud usually resembling stratus, and is heavily influ ...

and passing it at

danger Danger is a lack of safety and may refer to: Places * Danger Cave, an archaeological site in Utah * Danger Island, Great Chagos Bank, Indian Ocean * Danger Island, alternate name of Pukapuka Atoll in the Cook Islands, Pacific Ocean * Danger Isla ...

. Local farmer David Winch of Brook Farm, along with his employees, worked for fourteen hours assisting in the rescue operation. They used their tractors and trailers to ferry the injured across muddy fields from the crash site to waiting ambulances. The ambulance officer in charge at the time, Stanley Skinner, was awarded a

British Empire Medal The British Empire Medal (BEM; formerly British Empire Medal for Meritorious Service) is a British and Commonwealth award for meritorious civil or military service worthy of recognition by the Crown. The current honour was created in 1922 to ...

in recognition of his role. On 5 September 2012, an up passenger train caught fire at Marden. The blaze was under control within half an hour. Passengers were evacuated and services between Tonbridge and Ashford were disrupted.

Services

All services at Marden are operated by

using

EMUs Emus may refer to: * Emu The emu () (''Dromaius novaehollandiae'') is the second-tallest living bird after its ratite relative the ostrich. It is endemic to Australia where it is the largest native bird and the only extant member of the g ...

. The typical off-peak service in trains per hour is: * 2 tph to London Charing Cross * 1 tph to * 1 tph to via During the peak hours, there are additional services to and from

London Cannon Street Cannon Street station, also known as London Cannon Street, is a central London railway terminus and connected London Underground station in Travelcard zone 1 located on Cannon Street in the City of London and managed by Network Rail. It is ...

and the service to Dover Priory is extended to and from Ramsgate via .

References

Citations Sources * * * *

External links

Eyewitness account
of the 1969 train crash.

{{TSGN and SE Stations, Staplehurst=y, FCC None=y, SN None=y Borough of Maidstone Railway stations in Kent DfT Category E stations Former South Eastern Railway (UK) stations Railway stations in Great Britain opened in 1842 Railway stations served by Southeastern 1842 establishments in England