Stalybridge railway station

Stalybridge railway station serves Stalybridge, Greater Manchester. It lies on the Huddersfield Line, 7 ¹⁄₂ miles (12.1 km) east of Manchester Piccadilly and 8 ¹⁄₄ miles (13.3 km) east of Manchester Victoria. The station is managed by TransPennine Express.

Stalybridge
Stalybridge railway station
Location
Place	Stalybridge
Local authority	Tameside
Coordinates	53.4841°N 2.0647°W / 53.4841; -2.0647
Grid reference	SJ958986
Operations
Station code	SYB
Managed by	TransPennine Express
Number of platforms	5
DfT category	D
Live arrivals/departures, station information and onward connections from National Rail Enquiries
Annual rail passenger usage*
2014/15	1.086 million
2015/16	1.129 million
2016/17	1.151 million
2017/18	1.150 million
2018/19	1.244 million
– Interchange	0.162 million
Passenger Transport Executive
PTE	Transport for Greater Manchester
History
Key dates	Opened 1845 (1845)
National Rail – UK railway stations
Annual estimated passenger usage based on sales of tickets in stated financial year(s) which end or originate at Stalybridge from Office of Rail and Road statistics. Methodology may vary year on year.

History

Stalybridge station was built by the Sheffield, Ashton-under-Lyne and Manchester Railway and opened on 23 December 1845. There was a Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway station adjacent, which acted as the terminus of that company's line from Manchester Victoria but this closed in 1917. The main function of the station was as a junction for the Stockport-Stalybridge Line, which allowed passengers from London and the South to transfer to the Huddersfield Line. This role has been lost since it is now possible for passengers to change at Manchester Piccadilly. The Micklehurst Loop also diverged from the original 1849 Huddersfield & Manchester main line here - it was closed in October 1966, but the disused tunnel it used to pass below the town's northern suburbs can be seen alongside the original one that is still used today by trains heading to and from Yorkshire.

Facilities

Stalybridge Buffet Bar on platform 4.

The station has an entrance block with a ticket office. Ramps and a passenger subway lead up to the platforms. The station is one of very few to retain its original buffet, the 1998 refurbishment of which won awards from CAMRA and English Heritage.[1] At the 2008 Tameside food and drink festival it was voted best bar.[2]

Following further refurbishment in 2012 Lord Pendry of Stalybridge, who often uses the buffet bar and contributed over half of the £6,000 costs, unveiled a plaque to mark the works.[3]

Michael Portillo visited the buffet bar in "Manchester Piccadilly to Silkstone Common", a 2017 episode of Great British Railway Journeys.[4]

In a £1.5m overhaul of the station, which began in 2007, the platforms were raised and the toilets, information services and shelters on the westbound platform were improved. In December 2008 the new entrance was completed.[5]

Recent developments

Construction work, on platform 3, to add lifts to the station subway.

Further work to expand the station was completed in 2012 - this saw major alterations to the track layout (including the opening of two new platforms) and signalling, with control of the latter passing to the Manchester East signalling centre at Stockport. The project cost £20 million[6] as the station closed on Sundays throughout the summer of 2012 followed by a nine-day line blockade at the end of October but gives improved operational flexibility and reliability, allowed the line speed through the station and junction to be increased to 50 miles per hour (80 km/h) and left it ready for the proposed electrification of the Leeds - Manchester trans-Pennine route in 2022. The two new platforms were opened on 5 November 2012; the former platform 1 was renumbered 4, and a new bay on the northern side is Platform 5.[7]

An Access for All scheme, funded by the Department for Transport, gave easier access to all of the platforms. Lifts were built to give step-free access to the entire station,[8] though the station had no steps previously as there were ramps to all platforms.

Services

A First TransPennine Express Class 185 arrives at platform 4.

TransPennine Express

A major change in calling pattern was implemented at the May 2018 timetable change, though the base 30-minute service frequency remained unchanged. Eastbound departures will now serve the intermediate stations on a "skip-stop" pattern en route to Huddersfield and Leeds (replacing the former Northern local service), with alternate trains continuing to Hull. Westbound trains will now all terminate at Manchester Piccadilly, with no regular service to Manchester Victoria and Liverpool (though connections will still be available at Piccadilly).[9]

Since the winter 2019 timetable change, the frequency has been improved in both directions to three departures per hour - eastbound these run to Hull, Huddersfield (stopping) and Scarborough, whilst westbound there are two to Manchester Piccadilly and one to Liverpool Lime Street via Manchester Victoria.[10]

Northern

Since the May 2018 timetable change, all Northern Trains trains from Manchester Victoria now start and terminate here. The base frequency remains two per hour on weekdays and Saturdays, with one of them continuing to Bolton and Southport (the latter since the summer 2019 timetable change).[11]

An hourly service runs on Sundays.

The "parliamentary service" from Stockport

A parliamentary train still travels along the whole Stockport-Stalybridge Line, which for many years was in one direction only and with no return service. An attempt was made to close the line to passenger services in the early 1990s (the service having been drastically cut in May 1989 after the re-routing of TransPennine Express services from Manchester Victoria to Manchester Piccadilly), but closure was refused by the Department of Transport which ordered that a regular service continue. The train is the only one to call at Denton and Reddish South. The train ran on a Friday as the 09:22 Stockport to Stalybridge;[12] however, from the start of the summer 2018 timetable, the service shifted to Saturday and operates in both directions. The new southbound train left at 08:46 for Stockport and returns from there at 09:45, arriving back at Stalybridge around 20 minutes later.[13][14] However, from December 2019, this service now operates as the 10:13 Stalybridge - Stockport and 10:43 return, allowing just 10 minutes in Stockport.

Gallery

• 
  New station entrance
• 
  Old station entrance
• 
  View from Platform 2 towards Huddersfield
• 
  Construction work on new platforms, October 2012
• 
  An EWS Class 66 passes platform 3, with a goods service

References

1. "Home - Pub Heritage Site". pubheritage.camra.org.uk.
2. "Edition 47 of Tameside Citizen Online". Archived from the original on 14 July 2014.
3. Milne, Andy (3 May 2012). "Honourable outcome". Railstaff. Retrieved 3 May 2012.
4. "Beerhouses | Michael Portillo's Great British Railway Journeys visits Stalybridge Buffet Bar". Archived from the original on 4 March 2017. Retrieved 3 March 2017.
5. "£1.5m refit is on track". Tameside Advertiser. 8 December 2008. Archived from the original on 26 December 2008. Retrieved 28 July 2010.
6. Refurbishment of Stalybridge Station begins Archived 16 January 2013 at Archive.today Rail.co news article; Retrieved 2012-08-30
7. Haddon, Mike (February 2013). Pigott, Nick (ed.). "New look at Stalybridge". The Railway Magazine. Horncastle: Mortons Media Group. 159 (1342): 78. ISSN 0033-8923.
8. Major Engineering Work at Stalybridge Station Archived 3 June 2014 at Archive.today Accessed 2014-06-03
9. North Route Timetables - Major changes from 20 May 2018 Archived 8 May 2018 at the Wayback Machine TransPennine Express website news article; Retrieved 7 May 2018
10. Table 39 National Rail timetable, December 2019
11. Table 39 & 82 National Rail timetable, December 2019
12. Table 78A National Rail timetable, May 2017
13. 2J44 0846 Stalybridge to Stockport, 26 May 2018 Archived 7 May 2018 at the Wayback Machine Realtime Trains website; Retrieved 7 May 2018
14. 2J45 0945 Stockport to Stalybridge, 26 May 2018 Archived 7 May 2018 at the Wayback Machine Realtime Trains website; Retrieved 7 May 2018

External links

• Train times and station information for Stalybridge railway station from National Rail

Railway lines in Tameside
Oldham Lines to Oldham Oldham Lines to Saddleworth Mossley Micklehurst Loop Park Bridge Micklehurst Oldham Road Staley and Millbrook Manchester Lines North to Manchester Victoria Droylsden Stalybridge Ashton-under-Lyne Ashton West Ashton-under-Lyne Ashton Moss Metrolink | L&NWR Ashton Park Parade Audenshaw Dukinfield and Ashton Droylsden Dukinfield Central Cemetery Road Metrolink to Manchester Piccadilly Guide Bridge Hooley Hill Fairfield Manchester Lines South to Hyde Road Flowery Field Manchester Lines North to Manchester Piccadilly Hyde North Denton Hyde Central Stockport Lines to Stockport Newton for Hyde to Marple Godley Hattersley Broadbottom Glossop lines to Glossop & Hadfield

Micklehurst Loop
to Huddersfield Standedge Tunnel Diggle Butterhouse tunnel Uppermill Friezland Royal George tunnel Micklehurst Staley and Millbrook Stalybridge to Manchester

Preceding station		National Rail		Following station
Manchester Piccadilly		TransPennine Express North TransPennine		Huddersfield
				Mossley
Ashton-under-Lyne		Northern Trains Huddersfield Line		Terminus
Guide Bridge		Northern Trains Stockport–Stalybridge line Parliamentary service		Terminus
Disused railways
Terminus		London and North Western Railway Micklehurst Line		Staley and Millbrook Line and station closed
Dukinfield and Ashton Line and station closed		London and North Western Railway Stalybridge Junction Railway		Terminus