Ravenscar was a railway station on the

Scarborough & Whitby Railway The Scarborough & Whitby Railway was a railway line from Scarborough to Whitby in North Yorkshire, England. The line followed a difficult but scenic route along the North Yorkshire coast. The line opened in 1885 and closed in 1965 as part of ...

and served the village of

Ravenscar, North Yorkshire Ravenscar is a coastal village in the Scarborough district of North Yorkshire, England. It is within the civil parish of Staintondale and the North York Moors National Park, and is north of Scarborough. A National Trail, the Cleveland Way, ...

, England.

History

The station, located north of Scarborough Central and south of , was opened on 16 July 1885 and was originally named ''Peak'' as it was situated at the highest point on the line at above sea level. It was renamed Ravenscar on 1 October 1897, after a company had been formed to market the area for investors in property. Up until that point, the area was known as ''Peak'' (or ''Old Peak''), but the Scarborough & Whitby Railway Company agreed to change the name of the station to one taken from the name of the local hall (Raven Hall) and the Yorkshire suffix for a cliff, ''Scar''. The planned building boom never materialised and just before the

First World War 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 ...

, the company went bankrupt and the scheme was abandoned. Ravenscar station was at the top of a steep climb from both north and south directions; the 1-in-39 climb south from

Fyling Hall Fyling Hall is an independent, co-educational day and boarding school situated near the small village of Fylingthorpe, near Robin Hood's Bay, south east of Whitby, North Yorkshire, England. Founded in 1923 by Mab Bradley, the school was then r ...

being long) while from the other direction there was a climb of over at a gradient of 1-in-41. There was also a tunnel immediately north of the station that curved sharply away to the west. The tunnel was problematic for drivers ascending from Fyling Hall as it was open to the sea and trains often stalled inside it. When the Scarborough & Whitby Railway Company failed to have a station house built, as requested by the

NER NER may refer to: * New European Recordings, a record label * ISO 3166-1 three letter code for Niger * Named entity recognition, a text processing task that identifies certain words as belonging to one class or another * Northeast Regional, an Amt ...

, the latter had the station closed on 2 March 1895, although some excursion trains still stopped there. After a station house was built, the station was reopened on 1 April 1896. Originally there was only a single platform and a siding, but a second platform was added in 1908. Ravenscar was the smallest equipped passing loop on the line, being able to pass trains consisting of 14 wagons, a brake van and the engine. The 1956 Handbook of Stations listed Ravenscar as being able to handle general goods only, and there was no crane at the yard. The station was host to a

LNER LNER may refer to: * London and North Eastern Railway, a railway company in the United Kingdom from 1923 until 1947 * London North Eastern Railway, a train operating company in the United Kingdom since 2018 * Liquid neutral earthing resistor, a typ ...

camping coach Camping coaches were holiday accommodation offered by many railway companies in the United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland from the 1930s. The coaches were old passenger vehicles no longer suitable for use in trains, which were converted to ...

in 1935 and two coaches from 1936 to 1939. Two

es were positioned here by the North Eastern Region from 1954 to 1964 Freight traffic ended on 4 May 1964 and the station closed completely on 8 March 1965. All buildings except the ''up'' platform have been removed since.

References

External links

Ravenscar station on navigable 1947 O. S. map
Disused railway stations in the Borough of Scarborough Former North Eastern Railway (UK) stations Beeching closures in England Railway stations in Great Britain opened in 1885 Railway stations in Great Britain closed in 1965 1885 establishments in England 1965 disestablishments in England {{Yorkshire-Humber-railstation-stub