Kemble railway station is a

railway station Rail transport (also known as train transport) is a means of transport that transfers passengers and goods on wheeled vehicles running on rails, which are incorporated in Track (rail transport), tracks. In contrast to road transport, where the ...

that serves the village of Kemble in

Gloucestershire Gloucestershire ( abbreviated Glos) is a county in South West England. The county comprises part of the Cotswold Hills, part of the flat fertile valley of the River Severn and the entire Forest of Dean. The county town is the city of ...

, England. The station is on the to "Golden Valley" line. Despite its rural location, Kemble station has a high number of passengers, due mainly to the proximity of

Cirencester Cirencester (, ; see below for more variations) is a market town in Gloucestershire, England, west of London. Cirencester lies on the River Churn, a tributary of the River Thames, and is the largest town in the Cotswolds. It is the home of ...

History

The station was opened by the

Great Western Railway The Great Western Railway (GWR) was a British railway company that linked London with the southwest, west and West Midlands of England and most of Wales. It was founded in 1833, received its enabling Act of Parliament on 31 August 1835 and ran ...

(GWR) as an exchange station on 12 May 1845 with the line opening from Swindon to Gloucester. Only on 1 May 1882 did it become a public station replacing the nearby . The distance between the platforms and the large clearance between the remaining running lines is a legacy from when Kemble first opened because it originally accommodated Brunel's

broad gauge A broad-gauge railway is a railway with a track gauge (the distance between the rails) broader than the used by standard-gauge railways. Broad gauge of , commonly known as Russian gauge, is the dominant track gauge in former Soviet Union ( C ...

tracks. These were changed to

standard gauge A standard-gauge railway is a railway with a track gauge of . The standard gauge is also called Stephenson gauge (after George Stephenson), International gauge, UIC gauge, uniform gauge, normal gauge and European gauge in Europe, and SGR in E ...

tracks in 1892. Until the 1960s the station was a junction, with services to the nearby market towns of (to the northeast) and (southwest). Both the Tetbury branch line and the Cirencester Branch Line were closed to traffic under '' The Reshaping of British Railways'', the first day without service being 6 April 1964. British Rail reduced the line to Swindon to single track in 1968 but the second track was reinstated in 2014.

Stationmasters

*Jeremiah Greenaway ca. 1869 – 1900 *John William Boyd 1900 - 1922 (formerly station master at Tetbury) *G. Evans 1922 – 1929 (formerly station master at Purton) *M.E. Waters until 1935 (also station master at Cirencester Town, afterwards station master at Cirencester Town) *C. Feldwick. 1935 – 1942 (afterwards station master at Cirencester Town) *Walter John Butt Watts from 1942 (formerly station master at Brimscombe)

Description

The station has two platforms in use. The former Tetbury bound platform remains but the track has been lifted. The building on the down platform (no. 2) has been out of use for several years, containing toilets and a waiting room, which are still ''in situ''. On the former Cirencester platform, a short stub of track remains for the occasional stabling of track machines. This ends at a buffer stop just before the station car park. In 2013,

Cotswold District Council The Cotswolds (, ) is a region in central-southwest England, along a range of rolling hills that rise from the meadows of the upper Thames to an escarpment above the Severn Valley and Evesham Vale. The area is defined by the bedrock of Jura ...

refused an application by

Network Rail Network Rail Limited is the owner (via its subsidiary Network Rail Infrastructure Limited, which was known as Railtrack plc before 2002) and infrastructure manager of most of the railway network in Great Britain. Network Rail is an "arm's len ...

to demolish part of the Grade II listed Cirencester bay platform in connection with the redoubling of the line from Swindon. According to the Council, the platform was still in a good state of repair and any public benefit from the demolition would not outweigh the damage that would be caused to the historical significance of the station. The station has a ticket office and a small café. The limestone bridge, at the south end of the station, was Grade II listed from 5 November 2015 and the station and water tank from 27 February 1986. File:Kemble station geograph-2398408-by-Ben-Brooksbank.jpg, Diesel-hauled Up stopping train in 1962 File:Station entrance, Kemble - geograph.org.uk - 337280.jpg, Station entrance File:Kemble Station Signals.jpg, Signals at Kemble Station File:Kemble station former Cirencester platform.jpg, The former Cirencester platform, June 2009 File:Kemble station platforms.jpg, Station platforms looking north-west File:Water_tank,_Kemble_Station_-_geograph.org.uk_-_1235771.jpg, The Grade II listed water tank

Services

operate all services at Kemble using mainly Class 800 bi-mode trains. The typical off-peak service in trains per hour is: * 1 tph to

London Paddington Paddington, also known as London Paddington, is a Central London railway terminus and London Underground station complex, located on Praed Street in the Paddington area. The site has been the London terminus of services provided by the Great We ...

* 1 tph to via The station is also served by limited services extending beyond Cheltenham Spa to . There is also a limited service to/from via the

Wessex Main Line The Wessex Main Line is the railway line from Bristol Temple Meads to Southampton Central. Diverging from this route is the Heart of Wessex Line from Westbury to Weymouth. The Wessex Main Line intersects the Reading to Taunton Line at and ...

. The station is occasionally served by trains to and from and during periods of engineering work.

References

External links

History of the line

Gloucestershire Transport
* {{Transport in Gloucestershire Railway stations in Gloucestershire DfT Category D stations Railway stations in Great Britain opened in 1882 Former Great Western Railway stations Railway stations served by Great Western Railway Grade II listed buildings in Gloucestershire Grade II listed railway stations Kemble, Gloucestershire