Nethertown is a railway station on the

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

, which runs between and . The station, situated north-west of Barrow-in-Furness, serves the village of

Nethertown Nethertown is a small village in Cumbria, England on the Irish Sea coast. The community is covered by the civil parish of "Lowside Quarter", and was created out of one of the old parochial townships of the parish of St Bees. History During W ...

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. Cumb ...

. It is owned by

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 managed by

Northern Trains Northern Trains, branded as Northern, (legally Northern Trains Limited) is a State-owned enterprises of the United Kingdom, publicly owned train operating company in England. It is owned by DfT OLR Holdings for the Department for Transport (DfT) ...

. Nethertown was the least-used station in Cumbria in 2020-21, with an estimated 254 passenger journeys made.

History

The station was opened on 19 July 1849 by the

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

when it opened the line between and . In 1914, the passing loop was expanded to cater for the increased length of trains due to

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

. In May 1916, the shunting neck was extended and an additional of sidings were provided. The station was host to six

LMS LMS may refer to: Science and technology * Labeled magnitude scale, a scaling technique * Learning management system, education software * Least mean squares filter, producing least mean square error * Leiomyosarcoma, a rare form of cancer * Lenz ...

caravan Caravan or caravans may refer to: Transport and travel *Caravan (travellers), a group of travellers journeying together **Caravanserai, a place where a caravan could stop *Camel train, a convoy using camels as pack animals *Convoy, a group of veh ...

s from 1937 to 1939. The station was particularly busy with passenger traffic in the 1940s–50s when it served the Nethertown military camp, which was training anti-aircraft gunners. After the war, it was reused for construction workers building the

Sellafield Sellafield is a large multi-function nuclear site close to Seascale on the coast of Cumbria, England. As of August 2022, primary activities are nuclear waste processing and storage and nuclear decommissioning. Former activities included nucle ...

Nuclear plant A nuclear power plant (NPP) is a thermal power station in which the heat source is a nuclear reactor. As is typical of thermal power stations, heat is used to generate steam that drives a steam turbine connected to a generator that produces elec ...

. During the 1970s, the passing loop was removed due to a decrease in traffic and train frequency. As of August 2019, the only facility at the station is a passenger shelter on the single platform, but up until the early 1970s, the station had more substantial buildings as well as a signal box.

Location

The station is directly on the coast in a spectacular and remote position overlooking the

Irish Sea The Irish Sea or , gv, Y Keayn Yernagh, sco, Erse Sie, gd, Muir Èireann , Ulster-Scots: ''Airish Sea'', cy, Môr Iwerddon . is an extensive body of water that separates the islands of Ireland and Great Britain. It is linked to the Ce ...

from a small cliff. Pearson's 1992 railway guide is moved to comment, "The tiny halts at Braystones and Nethertown are as remote as anything British Rail has to offer....Nethertown station seems suspended between the cliff face and the sands". There is a vehicle track from the public highway and a footpath shortcut to the village. Since 30 March 2021, the station has been on England's Coast Path with the opening of the St Bees to

Silecroft The village of Silecroft in Cumbria, England, is in the parish of Whicham. It is situated between the towns of Millom and Bootle, Cumbria, Bootle, and also neighbours the towns/villages of Haverigg, Kirksanton and Whitbeck, Cumbria, Whitbeck. T ...

section of the long-distance path. On the seaward side, the remains of the sea-filled swimming pool built by the contractors from the camp can be seen. A foot

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 ...

connects the platform to the station approach track, and though this offers step-free access, the platform is too low to allow level access from platform to the train. A

Harrington hump 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 in Cumbria, England, which is the location ...

has been installed to allow easier access on and off the train, the steps which were previously mounted on the platform have been removed. Timetable posters are available and there are electric lights during operating hours.

Services

As of the 15 December 2019 timetable, five trains call in each direction (on request) from Monday to Friday, with one additional departure each way on Saturdays. The timetable stated briefly in 2019 that some Saturday services do not treat the station as a request stop, this reverted to all services being request in December 2019 and may have been a printing error as all local timetables had all trains as request only. There is no late evening service, but a limited Sunday service was introduced at the May 2018 timetable change; the first to run over this section since 1976. Currently the Sunday service consists of 4 trains in each direction.

References

Sources

* 100 Years of St Bees, Douglas Sim, 1995.

External links

* * {{Railway stations served by Northern Trains Railway stations in Cumbria DfT Category F2 stations Former Furness Railway stations Railway stations in Great Britain opened in 1849 Northern franchise railway stations Railway request stops in Great Britain 1849 establishments in England