Knottingley railway station

Knottingley
Platform 2
Location
Place	Knottingley
Local authority	City of Wakefield
Coordinates	53°42′23″N 1°15′32″W / 53.7065°N 1.2590°WCoordinates: 53°42′23″N 1°15′32″W / 53.7065°N 1.2590°W
Grid reference	SE490235
Operations
Station code	KNO
Managed by	Northern
Number of platforms	2
DfT category	F1
Live arrivals/departures, station information and onward connections from National Rail Enquiries
Annual rail passenger usage*
2010/11	0.173 million
2011/12	0.166 million
2012/13	0.141 million
2013/14	0.155 million
2014/15	0.158 million
Passenger Transport Executive
PTE	West Yorkshire (Metro)
Zone	3
History
Key dates	Opened April 1848
National Rail – UK railway stations
* Annual estimated passenger usage based on sales of tickets in stated financial year(s) which end or originate at Knottingley from Office of Rail and Road statistics. Methodology may vary year on year.
UK Railways portal

Platform 1

Knottingley railway station serves the town of Knottingley in West Yorkshire, England. It lies on the Pontefract Line, operated by Northern, and is 16 miles (26 km) south east of Leeds railway station.

The station is the final one in West Yorkshire before the North Yorkshire border and most services terminate (or start) there.

History

The station was constructed by the Wakefield, Pontefract & Goole Railway as part of their main line from Wakefield to Goole, which opened in April 1848. It wasn't long though before it became a busy junction, as within two years links to Doncaster via the Askern branch (on 6 June 1848), Leeds via Castleford and Methley Junction (1 December 1849) and York via Ferrybridge and Burton Salmon (1 August 1850)^[1] had all been opened. The first of those was jointly built and operated by the Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway and Great Northern Railway and the station also became jointly managed by these two companies in 1854. The Great Northern made use of its running powers and traffic agreements with the LYR to run through trains from Doncaster to both Leeds and York, putting the town on a new main line between London & York for a number of years until shorter, more direct lines could be constructed.

By 1871 the station had lost its trunk line status with the opening of new lines from Doncaster via Wakefield (to Leeds) & Selby (to York), but it still handled plenty of local passenger and freight traffic (particularly coal from a large number of collieries in the area).

Whilst all of the aforementioned lines are still open, only the original WP&G routes now carry passenger trains as services to York ended on 11 July 1947 and those to Doncaster just over a year later on 27 September 1948.^[2] The line to Wakefield Kirkgate also lost its passenger trains from 2 January 1967 (leaving only the route to Leeds serving the station) but it was re-opened in May 1992 with financial assistance from West Yorkshire PTE. Services on the Leeds line were re-routed via the former NER station at Castleford Central from 7 October 1968.

Regular passenger trains on the Askern line now operate once again (commencing on 23 May 2010 after an absence of more than 60 years), following the decision to grant open access operator Grand Union track access rights for a new service between London Kings Cross and Bradford Interchange in January 2009.^[3] These run via the Askern line, Pontefract, Wakefield and Brighouse to reach Bradford but are not able to call at Knottingley as the old Doncaster line platforms have long been removed.

Knottingley Depot is just south of the station, on the Askern Line. It opened in 1967 to maintain the locomotives and hopper wagons for planned 75 Merry-go-round trains a day, expected to use the Wakefield and Goole line.^[4]

Services

There is an hourly service from Knottingley to both the nearby cities of Leeds and Wakefield Kirkgate via Pontefract Monkhill with one train to and two trains from Goole each weekday.^[5]

On Sundays there is a two-hourly service to Leeds.

New Northern franchise operator Arriva Rail North plans to extend the Wakefield service through to Westgate and on to Leeds via Outwood once the new franchise agreement comes into effect in April 2016. The Sunday service will also be doubled to hourly, with trains running alternately via Castleford & Wakefield.^[6]

Notes

1. History of Knottingley's Railways
2. Body, p. 98
3. ORR Track Access Rights Applications for the ECML ORR Website; Retrieved 2009-01-29
4. Modern Railways October 1966 p. 521 'The NER prepares for big three-power station coal feed'
5. GB National Rail Timetable 2015-16, Table 32
6. Northern Franchise Improvements - DfT

References

• Body, G. (1988), PSL Field Guides - Railways of the Eastern Region Volume 2, Patrick Stephens Ltd, Wellingborough, ISBN 1-85260-072-1

External links

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

Preceding station		National Rail		Following station
Pontefract Monkhill		Northern Rail Pontefract Line		Whitley Bridge
Pontefract Monkhill		Northern Rail Pontefract Line		Terminus
	Disused railways
Terminus		Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway Askern Branch Line		Womersley