March railway station

March National Rail
Location
Place March
Local authority Fenland
Coordinates 52°33′38″N 0°05′26″E / 52.5605°N 0.0905°E / 52.5605; 0.0905Coordinates: 52°33′38″N 0°05′26″E / 52.5605°N 0.0905°E / 52.5605; 0.0905
Grid reference TL418978
Operations
Station code MCH
Managed by Abellio Greater Anglia
Number of platforms 2
DfT category E
Live arrivals/departures, station information and onward connections
from National Rail Enquiries
Annual rail passenger usage*
2010/11 Increase 316,292
2011/12 Increase 335,232
2012/13 Increase 350,246
2013/14 Increase 357,864
2014/15 Increase 378,586
National Rail – UK railway stations
* Annual estimated passenger usage based on sales of tickets in stated financial year(s) which end or originate at March from Office of Rail and Road statistics. Methodology may vary year on year.
UK Railways portal

March railway station serves the town of March in Cambridgeshire, England. The station is 14 miles (23 km) east of Peterborough on the Ely to Peterborough Line.

The station, which was opened in 1847, was once a major railway junction with a confluence of lines radiating from the town. The station has been reduced in importance in recent years with several railway lines being dismantled or mothballed. The important cross-country regional route between Ely and Peterborough still runs through the station and an increasing number of freight trains pass through the town.

The station originally had seven platforms. However, two of these are now filled-in bay platforms, and the track has been removed from a further west-facing bay on the southern side of the station. There are now just two operational platforms, although track has recently been re-laid on two disused platforms on the northern side of the station and it is anticipated that these may be used should proposals to reopen the line to Wisbech come to fruition. The Whitemoor marshalling yard returned to use in 2004 having been disused since the early 1990s.

Spalding, St Ives and Wisbech branches

March was once a junction for lines to Spalding (opened in 1867 by the Great Northern Railway and subsequently vested jointly with the Great Eastern Railway in 1879), St Ives and Watlington via Wisbech.[1] The Spalding line was closed by British Rail in November 1982 and was completely lifted a few years later. The St Ives branch (opened in 1848) was closed completely in March 1967 as a result of the Beeching Axe, whilst the Wisbech line (known as "The Bramley Line" by some) closed to all traffic in 2000 having lost its regular passenger services (through to Kings Lynn) in September 1968. The trackwork however remains intact and there are plans to reopen the line as a heritage line run and maintained by enthusiasts. As part of these plans during 2006 the level crossing over the A47 was re-laid, having been removed following one complaint about the rails being loose, so supposedly dangerous, in 2004.

Service

On weekdays, Abellio Greater Anglia operate a two hourly service eastbound to Ipswich and westbound to Peterborough.[2] CrossCountry operate an hourly service eastbound to Cambridge and Stansted Airport, westbound services serve Peterborough, Leicester and Birmingham New Street. The hourly East Midland Trains service between Norwich and Liverpool Lime Street via Peterborough, Nottingham and Manchester Piccadilly normally runs through without stopping, though a few morning and evening peak trains do call.[3]

On Sundays the service frequency is similar, without CrossCountry services to Whittlesea and Manea.

References

  1. ↑ Disused Stations - MarchDisused Stations; Retrieved 2014-01-10
  2. ↑ GB eNRT December 2015 Edition, Table 14
  3. ↑ GB National Rail Timetable 2015-16, Tables 47 & 49

Image gallery

Preceding station   National Rail   Following station
CrossCountry
Limited Service
Limited Service
Abellio Greater Anglia
East Midlands Trains
Limited Service
Limited Service
  Proposed Heritage railways
Terminus   Wisbech and March Bramleyline   March Elm Road
Historical railways
Eastrea
Line open, station closed		   Great Eastern Railway
Peterborough to Ely		   Stonea
Line open, station closed
Disused railways
Terminus   Great Eastern Railway
March to King's Lynn		   Coldham
Line and station closed
Guyhirne
Line and station closed		   Great Northern and Great Eastern Joint Railway
Doncaster to March		   Terminus
Terminus   Great Northern and Great Eastern Joint Railway
March to St Ives		   Wimblington
Line and station closed

External links

Media related to March railway station at Wikimedia Commons

This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the Wednesday, March 23, 2016. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.