Kidsgrove railway station


Kidsgrove railway station serves the town of Kidsgrove in Staffordshire, England. The station is north of Stoke-on-Trent. The station is served by trains on the Crewe to Derby Line which is also a community rail line known as the North Staffordshire line. The station is owned by Network Rail and managed by East Midlands Railway.
In the year 2009/10 the usage of the station grew by almost 58% to over 100,000 recorded journeys, in addition more than 6,434 passengers used the station to change trains. The increase in usage has been attributed to improved timetable in December 2008.

History

The present station was opened 9 October 1848 by the North Staffordshire Railway as Harecastle and was during the early years of the North Staffordshire era variously called Harecastle Junction, Kidsgrove Junction. Kidsgrove Junction, Harecastle before settling upon Harecastle in 1875. Between 1885/6 and 1923/4 it was called Harecastle for Kidsgrove. In 1944 it was renamed Kidsgrove.
In British Rail days it was known as Kidsgrove Central when the town had three stations, the other two were Kidsgrove Liverpool Rd and Market Street Halt on the old North Staffordshire Railway's Potteries Loop Line. It is situated on the Manchester branch of the West Coast Main Line at the junction where the line from Stoke-on-Trent divides for Crewe and Manchester Piccadilly.
It is just north of the Harecastle Tunnels on the Trent and Mersey Canal and the Harecastle railway tunnel and 1965 railway diversion.

Platforms and Services

Services

Services at Kidsgrove are operated by East Midlands Railway, London Northwestern Railway and Northern Trains. The current off peak service in trains per hour is:
East Midlands Railway
These services are operated by Class 153 or Class 158 DMUs.
London Northwestern Railway
These services are operated by Class 350 EMUs.
Northern Trains
These services are operated by Class 323 EMUs and newly introduced Class 331 EMUs.
No services operated by Avanti West Coast or CrossCountry call at Kidsgrove,

Platforms

The station has 4 platforms. Platform 1 serves the hourly Northern service to Stoke-on-Trent. Platform 2 serves the hourly Northern services to Manchester Piccadilly. Platform 3 serves both the East Midlands Railway services to Derby and the London Northwestern Railway services to London Euston. Platform 4 serves both the East Midlands Railway and London Northwestern Railway services to Crewe.