Petrockstow railway station explained

Petrockstow
Status:Disused
Borough:One mile outside Petrockstowe village, Torridge
Country:England
Grid Name:Grid reference
Platforms:Two
Original:North Devon and Cornwall Junction Light Railway
Years:1925
Events:Opened for passenger trains
Years1:1 March 1965
Events1:Closed

Petrockstow railway station[1] was a station serving the village of Petrockstowe in West Devon, which is about one mile away. The station was, throughout its passenger-carrying life from 1925 to 1965, spelt without the final "e" of the village name.

The railway was originally built as a narrow-gauge freight line to carry ball clay to Torrington from the Marland and Meeth clay pits.[2] The Torrington and Marland Railway then became the basis of the northern section of the North Devon and Cornwall Junction Light Railway, which opened in 1925 and remained a private line until finally becoming part of the Southern Region of British Railways in 1948.[3]

A victim of Beeching, the line closed to passengers in 1965[4] but it remained open for freight trains from the Meeth quarries which passed into the rail network through Barnstaple and Torrington until 1982.[5]

In 2014 a small group of local railway enthusiast began clearance work at the Station, clearing the platforms and vegetation. It is hoped to partly restore the Station, in conjunction with the owners, Devon County Council.

References

  1. http://myweb.tiscali.co.uk/mickssrsource/srmiddgazet/csr.html As spelt by Col Stevens original timetable
  2. Petrockstowe Station railway premises in Backtrack magazine (Vol 19 p649) Farmer,R November 2005
  3. Branch Lines to Torrington Mitchell,V/Smith,K: Midhurst, Middleton Press,1994
  4. "Discovering Britain's lost railways" Atterbury,P: Basingstoke, AA Publishing
  5. http://disused-rlys.fotopic.net/c1147820.html Freight details

External links

50.8753°N -4.1095°W