Heighington railway station

Heighington
Location
Place	Newton Aycliffe
Local authority	County Durham
Coordinates	54°35′50″N 1°34′54″W / 54.5972°N 1.5818°WCoordinates: 54°35′50″N 1°34′54″W / 54.5972°N 1.5818°W
Grid reference	NZ271224
Operations
Station code	HEI
Managed by	Northern
Number of platforms	2
DfT category	F2
Live arrivals/departures, station information and onward connections from National Rail Enquiries
Annual rail passenger usage*
2004/05	10,297
2005/06	12,954
2006/07	10,450
2007/08	9,591
2008/09	8,736
2009/10	7,538
2010/11	9,472
2011/12	11,458
2012/13	12,938
2013/14	15,606
History
Original company	Stockton and Darlington Railway
Pre-grouping	North Eastern Railway
Post-grouping	London and North Eastern Railway
27 September 1825	Station opened as Aycliffe Lane
?	Renamed Aycliffe and Heighington
1 July 1871	Renamed Aycliffe
1 September 1874	Renamed Heighington
National Rail – UK railway stations
* Annual estimated passenger usage based on sales of tickets in stated financial year(s) which end or originate at Heighington from Office of Rail and Road statistics. Methodology may vary year on year.
UK Railways portal

Heighington railway station located on Heighington Lane and serves Aycliffe Business Park (formerly Aycliffe Industrial Park) in the town of Newton Aycliffe, County Durham, England. The station is on the Tees Valley Line and is operated by Northern who provide all passenger train services. The station is on the Bishop Line and is somewhat unusual in that its platforms are staggered, sited either side of a level crossing.

Station facilities here have recently been improved as part of the Tees Valley Metro project. The package for this station included new fully lit waiting shelters, renewed station signage and the installation of CCTV. The long-line Public Address system (PA) has been renewed and upgraded with pre-recorded train announcements.

History

The station lies on the route of the Stockton and Darlington Railway (S&D), the first passenger railway. The station's historical claim to fame is that the first train on that line, the Locomotion No. 1, was assembled here in 1825 before starting on its first journey.

The main line of the S&D was opened on 27 September 1825 from Phoenix Colliery at Etherley to Stockton,^[1] and this station was opened the same day, being originally named Aycliffe Lane. It was subsequently renamed three times: first to Aycliffe and Heighington, later, on 1 July 1871, it became Aycliffe, although this name lasted for just over three years, because on 1 September 1874 it gained the present name of Heighington.^[2]

Accidents and incidents

• On 1 July 1828, the boiler of Locomotion No. 1 exploded, killing the driver.^[3]

Services

The station has a basic two-hourly service each way on weekdays, increasing to hourly during morning & evening peak periods (10 per day in each direction in total). The service is also two-hourly on Sundays. Trains usually run through to Saltburn, though there is one departure each weekday to Nunthorpe and a summer-only through service on Sundays to Whitby.^[4]

Intercity Express Program Factory

The new Hitachi Intercity Express Programme train assembly plant was built a short distance from the station in the Aycliffe Business Park in 2014 - work commenced on the £82 million facility in March 2014 and it was officially opened on 3 September 2015 by UK Prime Minister David Cameron.^[5] The factory has a rail connection to the running line controlled from the station signal box to allow for delivery of the new sets once completed (there are also 7km of sidings and a 1km long electrified test track within the plant).^[6] The new class 800/801 IEP sets will be built or fitted out here for use on the East Coast Main Line and Great Western Main Line, along with class 385 (AT200) commuter EMUs destined for use on Scottish suburban routes around Glasgow & Edinburgh.

References

1. Allen, Cecil J. (1974) [1964]. The North Eastern Railway. Shepperton: Ian Allan. p. 24. ISBN 0-7110-0495-1.
2. Butt, R.V.J. (1995). The Directory of Railway Stations. Yeovil: Patrick Stephens Ltd. pp. 22,117. ISBN 1-85260-508-1. R508.
3. Hewison, Christian H. (1983). Locomotive Boiler Explosions. Newton Abbot: David & Charles. p. 26. ISBN 0 7153 8305 1.
4. Northern Rail Timetable 3 - Bishop Auckland and Darlington to Middlesbrough and Saltburn 19 May - 7 December 2013 www.northernrail.org; retrieved 2013-08-08
5. "Multi-million pound factory opens to produce trains of the future for the Great Western Mainline" Denholm-Hall, Rupert, Wales Online article 03-09-2015; Retrieved 28 September 2015
6. "Hitachi Rail Europe's Newton Aycliffe train factory connected to national rail network' Keighley, Tom, The Journal news article, 25-03-2015; Retrieved 28-09-2015

External links

• Bishop Line

Preceding station		National Rail		Following station
North Road		Northern Rail Tees Valley Line		Newton Aycliffe