Calvert was a railway station at

Calvert, Buckinghamshire Calvert is a village in Buckinghamshire, England, near the village of Steeple Claydon. Originally named after a wealthy local family who had inherited property at Claydon House, Middle Claydon, on condition that they changed their surname to Ver ...

on the former

Great Central Main Line The Great Central Main Line (GCML), also known as the London Extension of the Manchester, Sheffield and Lincolnshire Railway (MS&LR), is a former railway line in the United Kingdom. The line was opened in 1899 and built by the Great Central Railw ...

between

Manchester Piccadilly Manchester Piccadilly is the principal railway station in Manchester, England. Opened as Store Street in 1842, it was renamed Manchester London Road in 1847 and became Manchester Piccadilly in 1960. Located to the south-east of Manchester city ...

and

London Marylebone Marylebone station ( ) is a Central London railway terminus and connected London Underground station in the Marylebone area of the City of Westminster. On the National Rail network it is also known as London Marylebone and is the southern te ...

. The station was opened in 1899 and closed to passengers in 1963 and goods in 1964.

History

Calvert was the last station on the Great Central's London Extension before it reached the Metropolitan's station at Quainton Road away. The station and line between

Brackley Brackley is a market town and civil parish in West Northamptonshire, England, bordering Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire, from Oxford and from Northampton. Historically a market town based on the wool and lace trade, it was built on the inters ...

and Quainton Junction were constructed by Walter Scott and Company of

Newcastle upon Tyne Newcastle upon Tyne ( RP: , ), or simply Newcastle, is a city and metropolitan borough in Tyne and Wear, England. The city is located on the River Tyne's northern bank and forms the largest part of the Tyneside built-up area. Newcastle is ...

. Although the station was named Calvert, no such place existed at the time and the name was that of the local landowner, Sir Harry Verney, who had been born a Calvert but changed his name upon succeeding to the Verney Baronetcy. At the time, Calvert was a very rural settlement with the few houses making up the village being situated close to the station and nearby

brickworks A brickworks, also known as a brick factory, is a factory for the manufacturing of bricks, from clay or shale. Usually a brickworks is located on a clay bedrock (the most common material from which bricks are made), often with a quarry for cl ...

, which was the largest employer in the area. In Great Central style, the station had a single

island platform An island platform (also center platform, centre platform) is a station layout arrangement where a single platform is positioned between two tracks within a railway station, tram stop or transitway interchange. Island platforms are popular on ...

located below a road overbridge, from the centre of which a staircase led down to the platform; the centre piers of the bridge were left hollow to provide lamp rooms. The design was chosen as it would allow the track to be quadrupled if ever required. About south of Calvert was

Grendon Underwood Grendon Underwood is a village and civil parish in west Buckinghamshire, England, near the border with Oxfordshire. The village sits between Woodham and Edgcott, near the Roman road Akeman Street (now part of the A41), and around north-west o ...

Junction where "Calvert Cabin"

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'' ...

controlled the line as it split into two: one line branching out towards

Princes Risborough Princes Risborough () is a market town in Buckinghamshire, England, about south of Aylesbury and north west of High Wycombe. It lies at the foot of the Chiltern Hills, at the north end of a gap or pass through the Chilterns, the south end ...

, the other towards

Amersham Amersham ( ) is a market town and civil parish within the unitary authority of Buckinghamshire, England, in the Chiltern Hills, northwest of central London, from Aylesbury and from High Wycombe. Amersham is part of the London commuter belt. ...

. A connecting spur, brought into use on 14 September 1940, linked the OxfordCambridge

Varsity Line The Varsity Line (or the Oxford to Cambridge railway line) was the main railway route that once linked the English university cities of Oxford and Cambridge, operated by the London and North Western Railway. During World War II the line was ...

with the Great Central at Calvert, allowing much of the freight which used the Verney JunctionQuainton Road section to be diverted over the Great Central. Calvert was to remain open a further 23 years before closing to passengers on 4 March 1963, the same day as nearby Quainton Road. Fast passenger trains continued to pass through the station until 1966 when the Great Central Main Line was closed.

Routes

Present and future

The station buildings have long since been demolished, the track through the station was lifted in 2021 and the platforms were demolished in May 2022. The stationmaster's house stands nearby. The line of

High Speed 2 High Speed 2 (HS2) is a planned high-speed railway line in England, the first phase of which is under construction in stages and due for completion between 2029 and 2033, depending on approval for later stages. The new line will run from its m ...

is under construction and will pass through the site of the disused station. This location (called 'Thame Road') and a fall-back site, 'Great Pond' were announced in December 2010 as the site for the HS2 maintenance depot.Infrastructure Maintenance Depot
Released December 2010 The nearby Calvert Waste Plant has also been identified for heat and power generation. A railhead at Calvert is being used to deliver construction materials for High Speed 2. Just to the north of the former station site, the route of the former Varsity Line is being rebuilt as

East West Rail East West Rail is a major project to establish a strategic railway connecting East Anglia with Central, Southern and Western England. In particular, it plans to build (or rebuild) a line linking Oxford and Cambridge via Bicester, Milton Keyne ...

, which will pass over HS2 and provide rail access to its planned Calvert Infrastructure Maintenance Depot. The original scope of this section of EWR included reopening the branch line to : , this element is 'under review'. There are no plans for a station.

External links

Great Central Main Line photos, including a sign formerly at Calvert and 1900s / 2006 photos of the station house

References

{{coord, 51.91657, -0.99965, type:railwaystation_region:GB_source:enwiki-osgb36(SP689247), display=title Disused railway stations in Buckinghamshire Former Great Central Railway stations Railway stations in Great Britain opened in 1899 Railway stations in Great Britain closed in 1964 1899 establishments in England 1964 disestablishments in England