Walkden railway station serves the town of

Walkden Walkden is a town in the City of Salford in Greater Manchester, England, northwest of Salford, and of Manchester. Historically in the township of Worsley in Lancashire, Walkden was a centre for coal mining and textile manufacture. In 20 ...

in City of Salford,

Greater Manchester Greater Manchester is a metropolitan county and combined authority area in North West England, with a population of 2.8 million; comprising ten metropolitan boroughs: Manchester, Salford, Bolton, Bury, Oldham, Rochdale, Stockport, Tam ...

, England on the

Manchester to Southport Line Manchester () is a city in Greater Manchester, England. It had a population of 552,000 in 2021. It is bordered by the Cheshire Plain to the south, the Pennines to the north and east, and the neighbouring city of Salford to the west. The tw ...

. The station is located north-west of

Manchester Manchester () is a city in Greater Manchester, England. It had a population of 552,000 in 2021. It is bordered by the Cheshire Plain to the south, the Pennines to the north and east, and the neighbouring city of Salford to the west. The t ...

with regular

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 ...

services to these towns as well as the city of

Salford Salford () is a city and the largest settlement in the City of Salford metropolitan borough in Greater Manchester, England. In 2011, Salford had a population of 103,886. It is also the second and only other city in the metropolitan county afte ...

, Swinton and Hindley. It was opened by the

Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway The Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway (L&YR) was a major British railway company before the 1923 Grouping. It was incorporated in 1847 from an amalgamation of several existing railways. It was the third-largest railway system based in northern ...

One of the busier stations on the line, the station used to be known as Walkden High Level to differentiate it from the London and North Western Railway's

Walkden Low Level railway station Walkden Low Level railway station served the town of Walkden, City of Salford, Greater Manchester, England. History The station was opened as "Walkden" in 1875 by the London and North Western Railway on its new line from Roe Green Juncti ...

(on the line from Manchester Exchange to Bolton Great Moor Street, which was closed to passengers in 1954). It controlled a junction for the goods line to Ellesmere Colliery. First opened in 1888 with the line, it has only ever had two platform faces - when the line was quadrupled at the turn of the century, the two additional tracks were laid to the south and were not provided with platforms. The fast lines were subsequently decommissioned in November 1965 and lifted. In February 2007 th
Friends of Walkden Station
community volunteer group was founded to campaign for improvements to the station's facilities and services. One of the line's two remaining signal boxes was formerly located here (it acted as the 'fringe' box to Manchester Piccadilly signalling centre), but it and neighbouring Atherton Goods Yard box were both closed in the spring of 2013 and their semaphore signals replaced by colour lights worked from Piccadilly SCC.

Facilities

The station has a staffed ticket office, though this is only staffed part-time (06:10 to 12:40 weekdays, 07:10 to 13:40 Saturdays, closed Sundays). A ticket machine is also available. Train running information is provided by digital display screens, automated announcements and timetable posters. No step-free access is possible, as the station is above street level and is reached via two flights of stairs.

Service

Monday to Saturday daytimes, two trains per hour go eastbound to Manchester Victoria and two per hour towards Wigan - both trains continue to westbound and one continues to (down from three each way prior to the pandemic). Only one train per day (weekdays and Saturdays) continues to since the summer 2019 timetable change. All Sunday services continue to Southport. Most Manchester departures continue along the

Caldervale Line The Calder Valley line (also previously known as the Caldervale line) is a railway route in Northern England between the cities of Leeds and Manchester as well as the seaside resort of Blackpool. It is the slower of the two main rail rou ...

to , and or to via . On 18 December 2009 the

Greater Manchester Passenger Transport Executive Greater Manchester Passenger Transport Executive was the Passenger transport executive, public body responsible for public transport in Greater Manchester between 1974 and 2011, when it became part of Transport for Greater Manchester. SELNEC PTE ...

(GMPTE) voted to approve funding for a one-year trial of Sunday trains from Walkden, starting on 23 May 2010. This proved successful and now runs twice per hour in each direction (one Blackburn to Southport train and a second between Wigan and Manchester Victoria).

References

External links

Photo by Keith Palin

Friends of Walkden Station campaign website.
{{coord, 53.5197, -2.3960, region:GB_type:railwaystation, display=title Railway stations in Salford DfT Category E stations Former Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway stations Northern franchise railway stations Railway stations in Great Britain opened in 1888