HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

Penzance railway station serves the town of
Penzance Penzance ( ; kw, Pennsans) is a town, civil parish and port in the Penwith district of Cornwall, United Kingdom. It is the most westerly major town in Cornwall and is about west-southwest of Plymouth and west-southwest of London. Situated ...
in west Cornwall, England. It is the terminus of the
Cornish Main Line The Cornish Main Line ( kw, Penn-hyns-horn Kernow) is a railway line in Cornwall and Devon in the United Kingdom. It runs from Penzance to Plymouth, crossing from Cornwall into Devon over the famous Royal Albert Bridge at Saltash. It directly ...
from
Plymouth Plymouth () is a port city and unitary authority in South West England. It is located on the south coast of Devon, approximately south-west of Exeter and south-west of London. It is bordered by Cornwall to the west and south-west. Plymouth ...
, from via , and is the southernmost railway station in Great Britain. The first station opened in 1852 and through travel to and from London commenced from 1859 with the opening of the
Royal Albert Bridge The Royal Albert Bridge is a railway bridge which spans the River Tamar in England between Plymouth, Devon and Saltash, Cornwall. Its unique design consists of two lenticular iron trusses above the water, with conventional plate-girder app ...
. The station was rebuilt by the
Great Western Railway The Great Western Railway (GWR) was a British railway company that linked London with the southwest, west and West Midlands of England and most of Wales. It was founded in 1833, received its enabling Act of Parliament on 31 August 1835 and ran ...
in 1876 and the current layout was the result of a further rebuilding in the 1930s. In 2020 the station 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
Great Western Railway The Great Western Railway (GWR) was a British railway company that linked London with the southwest, west and West Midlands of England and most of Wales. It was founded in 1833, received its enabling Act of Parliament on 31 August 1835 and ran ...
who also operate the train services, together with CrossCountry.


History


Broad gauge era

The station was opened by the
West Cornwall Railway The West Cornwall Railway was a railway company in Cornwall, Great Britain, formed in 1846 to construct a railway between Penzance and Truro. It purchased the existing Hayle Railway, and improved its main line, and built new sections between Pen ...
on 11 March 1852 as the terminus of its line from
Redruth Redruth ( , kw, Resrudh) is a town and civil parishes in Cornwall, civil parish in Cornwall, England. The population of Redruth was 14,018 at the 2011 census. In the same year the population of the Camborne-Redruth urban area, which also inc ...
. The station itself consisted of a single platform face, and along with the rest of the West Cornwall Railway was laid as
standard gauge A standard-gauge railway is a railway with a track gauge of . The standard gauge is also called Stephenson gauge (after George Stephenson), International gauge, UIC gauge, uniform gauge, normal gauge and European gauge in Europe, and SGR in Ea ...
. This changed in 1866 when the West Cornwall Railway was relaid to mixed gauge allowing
South Devon Railway Leopard class The Leopard class were four broad gauge locomotives designed for passenger trains but were also used on goods trains when required. They were built by the Avonside Engine Company for the South Devon Railway, but also operated on its associated ...
locomotive ''Lance'' to bring in the first broad gauge train which carried dignitaries from Truro, although the small station with the single platform remained with little other alteration. A siding extended beyond the goods shed and ran along Albert Quay. In 1876 the
Great Western Railway The Great Western Railway (GWR) was a British railway company that linked London with the southwest, west and West Midlands of England and most of Wales. It was founded in 1833, received its enabling Act of Parliament on 31 August 1835 and ran ...
took over the West Cornwall Railway and a major redevelopment was undertaken. An enlarged goods shed was built and the wooden passenger buildings were replaced by a much larger station built in rock-faced granite to a design by
William Lancaster Owen William Lancaster Owen (8 November 1843 - 28 November 1911) was a British civil engineer primarily with the Great Western Railway. Career In 1868 he took a commission as a First Lieutenant in the 1st Gloucestershire Engineer Volunteer Corps which ...
. The total cost was around £15,000 () which included the 250ft by 80ft roof which cost £5,000 for the iron and the 50 tons of glass. The new station had the booking office at street level with the two platforms were accessed by a staircase, and was used for the first time on 18 November 1879. However, the new station suffered from teething problems, as by 1880 it was reported that some settlement in the masonry and shrinkage of the iron in the roof had caused several sheets of the glazing to break. In 1892, station was converted from broad gauge to
standard gauge A standard-gauge railway is a railway with a track gauge of . The standard gauge is also called Stephenson gauge (after George Stephenson), International gauge, UIC gauge, uniform gauge, normal gauge and European gauge in Europe, and SGR in Ea ...
. At the same time, work was undertaken to widen and extend both the two platforms, and a fourth road was laid in the station.


After 1892

Following
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 ...
, about 60 staff were employed at Penzance station by the 1930s. In 1937 the GWR were granted permission to reclaim land from the sea, permitting a significant enlargement of the station with the capacity being doubled with two platforms providing four platform faces, three of which were under the main roof. The blocked-up archway in the wall that retains the hillside behind the platforms was used by the railway as a coal store. The last train of the steam era to Penzance was a railtour hauled by West Country class 34002 ''Salisbury'' on 3 May 1964. The WCR station had a disc-and-crossbar signal on the end of the single platform, this being common on the GWR and associated companies. This was replaced by the familiar semaphore signals, and these were replaced in turn by colour light signals in 1982. Further alterations were made in 1983 when a new ticket office and buffet were opened. The 1983 refurbishment also included the replacement of the
lantern roof A roof lantern is a daylighting architectural element. Architectural lanterns are part of a larger roof and provide natural light into the space or room below. In contemporary use it is an architectural skylight structure. A lantern roof w ...
with a different design. The new roof failed to vent diesel fumes from the trains to the necessary safety standard, meaning passengers had to alight outside the concourse. From 1996,
South West Trains Stagecoach South Western Trains Limited, trading as South West Trains (SWT), was an English train operating company owned by Stagecoach Group, Stagecoach, which operated the South Western franchise between February 1996 and August 2017. SWT op ...
operated a weekly weekend service from as an extension of its service to . This ceased in December 2009. In 2012–13 the station's roof was refurbished.


Station Masters

*James D. Christian ???? - 1865 *John Greenwood Bone 1865 - 1882 *G. Bain 1882 - 1886 (formerly station master at ) *William Blair 1887 - 1911 (formerly station master at
Wootton Bassett Royal Wootton Bassett , formerly Wootton Bassett, is a market town and civil parish in Wiltshire, England, with a population of 11,043 in 2001, increasing to 11,385 in 2011. Situated in the north of the county, it lies to the west of the major ...
) *H. Morris 1912 - 1916 (formerly station master at ) *James Tierney 1916 - 1920 *H.C. Foster 1921 - 1924 (formerly station master at Paignton, afterwards station master at ) *Harry T. Giles 1924 - 1931 (formerly station master at
Acton Acton may refer to: Places Antarctica * Mount Acton Australia * Acton, Australian Capital Territory, a suburb of Canberra * Acton, Tasmania, a suburb of Burnie * Acton Park, Tasmania, a suburb of Hobart, Tasmania, formerly known as Acton Canada ...
) *Herbert Edgar Tucker 1931 - 1940 (formerly station master at
Kingsbridge Kingsbridge is a market town and tourist hub in the South Hams district of Devon, England, with a population of 6,116 at the 2011 census. Two electoral wards bear the name of ''Kingsbridge'' (East & North). Their combined population at the abo ...
) *Henry Gordon Lyon 1940 - 1949 (afterwards station master at )


Platform layout

Platforms 1, 2 and 3 are within the main
train shed A train shed is a building adjacent to a station building where the tracks and platforms of a railway station are covered by a roof. It is also known as an overall roof. Its primary purpose is to store and protect from the elements train car ...
; Platform 4 on the south side is in the open air. A large stone at the end of this platform welcomes people to Penzance in both English and Cornish. This side of the station is built on the sea wall near the harbour; the other side is cut into the hillside. There is only one bi-directional line into/out of the station as far as the (now defunct) station at , as the former northbound line has been used to access
Penzance TMD Penzance TMD, also known as Long Rock TMD, is a railway traction maintenance depot situated in the village of Long Rock east of Penzance, Cornwall, England, and is the most westerly and southerly rail depot in the country. The depot operator i ...
at Long Rock since 1977.


Facilities

As the western terminus of the Night Riviera service from London Paddington, the station has a sleeper lounge and a shower room to the northern end of the concourse, as well as waiting rooms and two cafes in the concourse. There is also an information point on platform 3.


Services

Penzance is the terminus of the
Cornish Main Line The Cornish Main Line ( kw, Penn-hyns-horn Kernow) is a railway line in Cornwall and Devon in the United Kingdom. It runs from Penzance to Plymouth, crossing from Cornwall into Devon over the famous Royal Albert Bridge at Saltash. It directly ...
. The journey time to or from
London Paddington station Paddington, also known as London Paddington, is a Central London railway terminus and London Underground station complex, located on Praed Street in the Paddington area. The site has been the London terminus of services provided by the Great We ...
is between five and six hours and there are additional services as far as and . London services include the ''
Night Riviera The ''Night Riviera'' is a sleeper train operated by Great Western Railway (GWR). It is one of only two sleeper services on the railway in the United Kingdom (the other being the ''Caledonian Sleeper'' services between London and Scotland). ...
'' overnight sleeping car service and the ''Golden Hind'' which offers an early morning service to London Paddington and an evening return. Other fast trains are the mid-morning '' Cornish Riviera'' and the afternoon ''Royal Duchy''. There are a limited number of CrossCountry trains providing a service to destinations in the West Midlands and north such as ,
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 ...
, ,
Edinburgh Edinburgh ( ; gd, Dùn Èideann ) is the capital city of Scotland and one of its 32 Council areas of Scotland, council areas. Historically part of the county of Midlothian (interchangeably Edinburghshire before 1921), it is located in Lothian ...
, and . Penzance is the terminus of the longest train service in the United Kingdom, which runs from takes about 13 and a half hours. From 1996,
South West Trains Stagecoach South Western Trains Limited, trading as South West Trains (SWT), was an English train operating company owned by Stagecoach Group, Stagecoach, which operated the South Western franchise between February 1996 and August 2017. SWT op ...
operated a weekly weekend service from as an extension of its service to . This ceased in December 2009.


Freight and mail

The WCR station had both a goods shed and a locomotive shed between the passenger station and the sea, and when a fire destroyed the goods shed in 1876 the building was enlarged considerably incorporating the original locomotive shed which had been replaced by one on the opposite side of the line near the end of the retaining wall, which in turn was replaced by the new Penzance Traction Maintenance Depot outside the station at
Long Rock Long Rock ( kw, Carrek Hyr) is a village in west Cornwall, England, United Kingdom. It is approximately east of Penzance and west of Marazion in the civil parish of Ludgvan. The village is named after the tidal Long Rock just offshore at . Lo ...
. In the first decade of the 20th century Penzance was typically handling 45,000 tons of goods each year. In November 1882 there were complaints about the paving, rail tracks and the difficulty for traffic to pass on the Albert Pier. The Borough Council requested the Railway Company to replace the paving with granite setts before relaying the rails. When the expansion of 1937 doubled the number of platform faces, the fourth face was outside the overall roof, and this was used for mail and parcels traffic as access to the road was provided. In 1987 the goods facilities were removed and the land levelled for use as a car park.


Passenger volume

Penzance is the second busiest station in Cornwall, being the busiest with more than twice the number of passengers compared with Penzance. Comparing the year from April 2011 to that which started in April 2002, passenger numbers increased by 48%. The statistics cover twelve month periods that start in April.


Notes


References


Citations


References

* *


External links


Video footage and history of Penzance railway station
**


Further reading

* {{cornwall, state=collapsed Former Great Western Railway stations Railway stations in Cornwall Railway stations in Great Britain opened in 1852 Railway stations served by CrossCountry Railway stations served by Great Western Railway Railway stations serving harbours and ports in the United Kingdom William Lancaster Owen railway stations 1852 establishments in England Buildings and structures in Penzance DfT Category C1 stations Cardinal points of the Great British railway network