Aspatria railway station is a railway station serving the town of

Aspatria Aspatria is a town and civil parish in the non-metropolitan district of Allerdale, and is currently embraced in the Parliamentary constituency of Workington, Cumbria, England. Historically within Cumberland the town rests on the north side of ...

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. ...

, England. It is 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 ...

, which runs between and . 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 len ...

and managed by

Northern Trains Northern Trains, branded as Northern, (legally Northern Trains Limited) is a publicly owned train operating company in England. It is owned by DfT OLR Holdings for the Department for Transport (DfT), after the previous operator Arriva Rail N ...

History

The station was opened by the

Maryport and Carlisle Railway The Maryport & Carlisle Railway (M&CR) was an English railway company formed in 1836 which built and operated a small but eventually highly profitable railway to connect Maryport and Carlisle in Cumbria, England. There were many small collierie ...

on 12 April 1841, although the line heading north-east to Wigton was not completed until 1845. The station was once the junction for the branch line to

Mealsgate Mealsgate is a village in Cumbria, England, historically within Cumberland. Location Mealsgate is situated on the old Roman Road between Carlisle and the Roman fort of Derventio at Papcastle . This road is now known as the A595. Mealsgate i ...

. Passenger trains on this line began on 2 April 1866, but ceased on 22 September 1930. Complete closure of the line followed on 1 December 1952. The station became part of the

London, Midland and Scottish Railway The London, Midland and Scottish Railway (LMSIt has been argued that the initials LMSR should be used to be consistent with LNER, GWR and SR. The London, Midland and Scottish Railway's corporate image used LMS, and this is what is generally ...

during the

Grouping Grouping may refer to: * Muenchian grouping * Principles of grouping * Railways Act 1921, also known as Grouping Act, a reorganisation of the British railway system * Grouping (firearms), the pattern of multiple shots from a sidearm See also ...

of 1923, and then passed on to the

London Midland Region of British Railways The London Midland Region (LMR) was one of the six regions created on the formation of the nationalised British Railways (BR), and initially consisted of ex-London, Midland and Scottish Railway (LMS) lines in England, Wales and Northern Irelan ...

nationalisation Nationalization (nationalisation in British English) is the process of transforming privately-owned assets into public assets by bringing them under the public ownership of a national government or state. Nationalization usually refers to p ...

in 1948. When sectorisation was introduced in the 1980s, the station was served by

Regional Railways Regional Railways was one of the three passenger sectors of British Rail created in 1982 that existed until 1997, two years after privatisation. The sector was originally called ''Provincial''. Regional Railways was the most subsidised (per pas ...

until the

privatisation of British Rail The privatisation of British Rail was the process by which ownership and operation of the railways of Great Britain passed from government control into private hands. Begun in 1994, it had been completed by 1997. The deregulation of the indust ...

ways. The station

signal box In signal processing, a signal is a function that conveys information about a phenomenon. Any quantity that can vary over space or time can be used as a signal to share messages between observers. The '' IEEE Transactions on Signal Processing' ...

was the last surviving example built by the Maryport and Carlisle company, prior to its closure and demolition in 1998.

Facilities

The station is unstaffed and has no ticket machine (though one is to be installed during 2019), so tickets must be purchased prior to travel or on the train (the main buildings are now in private residential use). Shelters are located on both platforms. Timetable posters, digital information screens and a telephone are provided to give train running information, whilst there is also public wifi access on offer. The platforms are linked by footbridge and there is step-free access to each one.

Services

Following the May 2021 timetable change, the station is served by an hourly service between and , with some trains continuing to . During the evening, the station is served by an hourly service between Carlisle and Whitehaven. All services are operated by

. Rolling stock used: Class 153 Super ''Sprinter'', Class 156 ''Super Sprinter'' and Class 158 ''Express Sprinter'' In May 2018,

Northern Northern may refer to the following: Geography * North, a point in direction * Northern Europe, the northern part or region of Europe * Northern Highland, a region of Wisconsin, United States * Northern Province, Sri Lanka * Northern Range, a r ...

introduced a Sunday service between and Barrow-in-Furness, the first Sunday service to operate south of Whitehaven for over 40 years.

References

Sources

* * * *Marshall, J. (1981) ''Forgotten Railways North-West England'', David & Charles (Publishers) Ltd, Newton Abbott.
Station on navigable Ordnance Survey map

External links

* * {{Railway stations served by Northern Trains Railway stations in Cumbria DfT Category F2 stations Former Maryport and Carlisle Railway stations Railway stations in Great Britain opened in 1841 Northern franchise railway stations Aspatria