Upton railway station serves the village of Upton and the

Noctorum Noctorum is a suburb of Birkenhead, Merseyside, England. Administratively it is within the Metropolitan Borough of Wirral as part of Claughton Ward. Noctorum is in the north east of the Wirral Peninsula, bounded by the Beechwood estate to the ...

area of

Birkenhead Birkenhead (; cy, Penbedw) is a town in the Metropolitan Borough of Wirral, Merseyside, England; historically, it was part of Cheshire until 1974. The town is on the Wirral Peninsula, along the south bank of the River Mersey, opposite Liver ...

, on the

Wirral Peninsula Wirral (; ), known locally as The Wirral, is a peninsula in North West England. The roughly rectangular peninsula is about long and wide and is bounded by the River Dee to the west (forming the boundary with Wales), the River Mersey to t ...

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

. The station is situated on the Borderlands line.

Transport for Wales Transport for Wales (TfW; cy, Trafnidiaeth Cymru; cy, TrC, label=none) is a not-for-profit company owned by the Welsh Government and managed at arms length by its appointed board. TfW oversees the Transport for Wales Group (TfW Group) consi ...

operates the station and all trains serving it.

History

Upton Station was opened to passengers on 18 May 1896, as part of the Dee and Birkenhead Railway. The station became part of the

North Wales and Liverpool Railway The North Wales and Liverpool Railway (NWLR), was the name given to the joint committee formed to construct a railway between Bidston, on the Wirral Railway and Hawarden on the Manchester, Sheffield and Lincolnshire Railway's (MSLR) Chester & Co ...

, less than three months later, on 7 July 1896. The station had a booking office on the road bridge which spans the two platforms.Flickr – 92xxx Upton Stn. 19.7.67
Accessed 2014-06-07 Staffing ended on 20 April 1969, with the booking office removed during redevelopment of the station and expansion of the road bridge in the 1970s. The station had a brick-built waiting room situated on each platform.

Freight and goods

Adjacent to the station there was a coal and goods yard with a cattle pen. From 1 February 1965, the goods yard only handled coal, and closed on 28 April 1969. The site of the goods yard now has a

Co-operative A cooperative (also known as co-operative, co-op, or coop) is "an autonomous association of persons united voluntarily to meet their common economic, social and cultural needs and aspirations through a jointly owned and democratically-control ...

supermarket. Access to the yard was operated by a small signal box with a 24-lever frame, which was used until 25 June 1969. The signal box was situated at the southern end of the Bidston-bound platform.Flickr – 92057 Upton Stn. 19.7.67
Accessed 2014-06-07

Iron ore Iron ores are rocks and minerals from which metallic iron can be economically extracted. The ores are usually rich in iron oxides and vary in color from dark grey, bright yellow, or deep purple to rusty red. The iron is usually found in the fo ...

freight trains also passed through the station. These freight trains operated from

Bidston Dock Bidston Dock was a Dock (maritime), dock at Birkenhead, in England. It was situated to the west of the Great Float, between Bidston and Poulton, Merseyside, Poulton. History A proposal for the construction of the dock on most of what remained ...

to the John Summers

steelworks A steel mill or steelworks is an industrial plant for the manufacture of steel. It may be an integrated steel works carrying out all steps of steelmaking from smelting iron ore to rolled product, but may also be a plant where steel semi-fini ...

in Shotton. The Class 9F locomotive 92203, later named as ''Black Prince'', worked the final steam-hauled iron ore train in November 1967. The freight service itself ended around 1980.

Future

Proposals have been put forward to electrify the track as part of the proposed Borderlands line electrification scheme.

Merseyrail Merseyrail is a commuter rail network serving the Liverpool City Region and adjacent areas of Cheshire and Lancashire. Merseyrail operates 66 railway stations across two lines – the Northern Line and Wirral Line, which are dedicated electri ...

would like to see the line electrified and incorporated into the

Wirral line The Wirral line is one of two commuter rail routes operated by Merseyrail and centred on Merseyside, England, the other being the Northern line. The Wirral line connects Liverpool to the Wirral Peninsula via the Mersey Railway Tunnel, with b ...

to link with its own third-rail service, with a doubling of the frequency of services. This would allow the station to serve as a part of a direct service to

Liverpool Liverpool is a city and metropolitan borough in Merseyside, England. With a population of in 2019, it is the 10th largest English district by population and its metropolitan area is the fifth largest in the United Kingdom, with a popul ...

. Transport for Wales have an ''Adopt a Station'' initiative. Upton station is on their list of adopted stations and has been adopted by a member, or members, of the public. In June 2018 it was announced that, as part of the new KeolisAmey operation of the

Wales & Borders franchise , image_filename = , image_size = , caption = , nameforarea = service area , regions = Wales, North West England, the West Midlands, and Gloucestershire. , operator = Transport for Wales Rail , dates = 14 ...

, the frequency of trains on the line would increase to 2tph from December 2022. It is expected to be increased by December 2021, but is currently experiencing delays were caused by the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic, also known as the coronavirus pandemic, is an ongoing global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The novel virus was first identif ...

Facilities

The station facilities are somewhat rudimentary. Although longer, each platform is surfaced to receive four carriages only. The station is unstaffed at nearly all times, but has platform

CCTV Closed-circuit television (CCTV), also known as video surveillance, is the use of video cameras to transmit a signal to a specific place, on a limited set of monitors. It differs from broadcast television in that the signal is not openly t ...

. Each of the two platforms has a waiting shelter with seating. There is no

payphone A payphone (alternative spelling: pay phone) is typically a coin-operated public telephone, often located in a telephone booth or in high-traffic outdoor areas, with prepayment by inserting money (usually coins) or by billing a credit or debit ...

or booking office, but there are electronic departure and arrival screens for live information to passengers. There is no official station

car park A parking lot (American English) or car park (British English), also known as a car lot, is a cleared area intended for parking vehicles. The term usually refers to an area dedicated only for parking, with a durable or semi-durable surfac ...

, but very limited parking outside the station, at the drop-off point, on the old Ford Road bridge.

Wheelchair A wheelchair is a chair with wheels, used when walking is difficult or impossible due to illness, injury, problems related to old age, or disability. These can include spinal cord injuries ( paraplegia, hemiplegia, and quadriplegia), cerebr ...

and pram access to each of the two platforms is possible, and relatively easy, via the ramp-staircases. Though, as yet, platform access has not been modernised to the standard of that at Hooton.

Services

From Monday to Saturday, there is an hourly service between

Bidston Bidston is a village, a parish and a suburb of Birkenhead, on the Wirral Peninsula, in the modern county of Merseyside. The area is a mixture of the well-preserved Bidston Village, Bidston Hill, a modern housing estate, and the Bidston Moss nat ...

and Wrexham Central (two-hourly in the evening and on Bank Holidays).GB eNRT May 2017 Edition, Table 101 There is a service every 90 minutes each way on Sundays. Services are timed according to a Class 153 ''Super Sprinter'' DMU, although usually provided by a Transport for Wales Class 150/2 ''Sprinter'' DMU.

References

Bibliography

* * * *

External links

The railway in Upton
including various historical photographic images, courtesy of Upton.cx Upton Station is on the list o
stations adopted
as part of th
Adopt a Station
initiative of Transport for Wales. {{Merseyside railway stations Railway stations in the Metropolitan Borough of Wirral DfT Category F2 stations Former Great Central Railway stations Railway stations in Great Britain opened in 1896 Railway stations served by Transport for Wales Rail