Shotton railway station serves the towns of Shotton and

Connah's Quay Connah's Quay ( cy, Cei Connah), known locally as "The Quay" and formerly known as Wepre, is a town and community in Flintshire, lying within the Deeside conurbation along the River Dee, near the border with England. It is the largest town in ...

Flintshire , settlement_type = County , image_skyline = , image_alt = , image_caption = , image_flag = , image_shield = Arms of Flint ...

Wales Wales ( cy, Cymru ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is bordered by England to the east, the Irish Sea to the north and west, the Celtic Sea to the south west and the Bristol Channel to the south. It had a population in ...

. It is situated where the Borderlands Line crosses the North Wales Coast Line. All passenger services are operated by

Transport for Wales Transport for Wales (TfW; cy, Trafnidiaeth Cymru; cy, TrC, label=none) is a not-for-profit company owned by the Welsh Government and managed at arms length by its appointed board. TfW oversees the Transport for Wales Group (TfW Group) consi ...

, which manages the station. Shotton is split into two sections: Shotton High Level is above street level and serves the Borderlands Line; Shotton Low Level serves the North Wales Coast Line. Each level has two

side platform A side platform (also known as a marginal platform or a single-face platform) is a platform positioned to the side of one or more railway tracks or guideways at a railway station, tram stop, or transitway. A station having dual side platform ...

s and both are double tracked. The tracks of the high and low levels cross each other at right angles. There is a ticket office on the high level Bidston-bound platform. The station is staffed on weekdays and Saturday mornings only.

History

The town gained its first railway as early as 1848 with the opening of the

Chester and Holyhead Railway The Chester and Holyhead Railway was an early railway company conceived to improve transmission of Government dispatches between London and Ireland, as well as ordinary railway objectives. Its construction was hugely expensive, chiefly due to ...

, but the railway company did not provide a station to serve it. The town had to wait until 1890 for its first station, when one was built by the

Wrexham, Mold and Connah's Quay Railway The Buckley Railway was opened from Buckley to a connection with the Chester to Holyhead main line on 7 June 1862, to convey coal and finished brickworks products from the Buckley area. Numerous short tramroads had existed in the area from the ...

as the northern end of their ''Hawarden Loop'' line from Buckley. This station opened on 1 October 1891 as ''Connah's Quay & Shotton'' and became ''Shotton High Level'' on 15 September 1952. It connected there to the

Manchester, Sheffield and Lincolnshire Railway The Manchester, Sheffield and Lincolnshire Railway (MS&LR) was formed in 1847 when the Sheffield, Ashton-under-Lyne and Manchester Railway joined with authorised but unbuilt railway companies, forming a proposed network from Manchester to Grimsb ...

's line from Chester Northgate via Hawarden Bridge. The link to Bidston was added by the North Wales and Liverpool Railway in 1896, whilst the

LNWR The London and North Western Railway (LNWR, L&NWR) was a British railway company between 1846 and 1922. In the late 19th century, the L&NWR was the largest joint stock company in the United Kingdom. In 1923, it became a constituent of the L ...

built two wooden platforms on the main line to Holyhead in 1907 to give the town access to trains along the coast to Crewe, Rhyl, Llandudno and Holyhead and to allow interchange with the Wrexham line. The

Beeching cuts The Beeching cuts (also Beeching Axe) was a plan to increase the efficiency of the nationalised railway system in Great Britain. The plan was outlined in two reports: ''The Reshaping of British Railways'' (1963) and ''The Development of the M ...

of the 1960s saw the low level platforms closed on 14 February 1966 and services to Chester Northgate withdrawn on 9 September 1968, leaving only the Wrexham - Bidston line to serve the high-level platforms. The loss of the link to Chester proved unpopular however and BR eventually agreed to restore it by re-opening the low level platforms, partly funded by the Hawarden Rural District Council which had lobbied for re-opening. Trains began calling again on 21 August 1972 after new platforms had been built (the slow lines that served the original platforms having been removed in the late sixties as an economy measure). There was an opening ceremony on 17 August. Between 2009 and 2010, both sets of platforms were refurbished as part of a £1.5 million modernisation scheme. This work (which commenced in March 2009) included platform resurfacing, the installation of new waiting shelters & ticket vending machines, improved signage and a new ticket office. The scheme was completed in early November 2010 with the official opening of the new ticket office by former Alyn & Deeside MP Lord Jones.

Facilities

The ticket office is located on the northbound high level platform and is staffed on weekday mornings (07:30 - 10:30) and on Saturdays (08:45 - 13:45) as noted. At other times, intending passenger should purchase their tickets from the ticket machine or prior to travel (pre-paid tickets can also be collected from the machine). Train running information on all platforms are provided by CIS screens, timetable poster boards and automatic announcements; there is also a customer help point on the high level platform 4 and a payphone on platform 3. No wheelchair access is available to platforms 1, 3 or 4 - the former is only accessible via footbridge, whilst the latter two both have steep ramps unsuitable for wheelchairs and mobility-impaired users. Platform 2 can be reached via a shallow ramp from the small car park at the end of Alexandra Street.

Services

Shotton High Level

The high level of the station is on the Borderlands Line and consists of two platforms: 3 & 4. Services operate hourly in each direction (Monday-Saturday daytime) between Wrexham Central and Bidston (where passengers can change for

Liverpool Liverpool is a city and metropolitan borough in Merseyside, England. With a population of in 2019, it is the 10th largest English district by population and its metropolitan area is the fifth largest in the United Kingdom, with a populat ...

). The frequency drops to two-hourly in the evenings and is every 90 minutes on Sundays. To the north of the station on the Borderlands line is

Hawarden Bridge Hawarden Bridge (; cy, Pont Penarlâg) is a railway bridge over the River Dee, near Shotton, Flintshire, Wales. It was built by the Manchester, Sheffield and Lincolnshire Railway (which later became the Great Central Railway), as part of t ...

over the River Dee.

Shotton Low Level

Trains operate approximately every hour on the North Wales Coast Line. Services travel between Llandudno and Manchester Piccadilly/ via Chester and . A number of morning & evening services between and either /

Birmingham New Street Birmingham New Street is the largest and busiest of the three main railway stations in Birmingham city centre, England, and a central hub of the British railway system. It is a major destination for Avanti West Coast services from , and vi ...

or also stop here. There is also a direct Transport for Wales service from (Airport) to Holyhead, calling at Birmingham New Street, Wolverhampton, Shrewsbury, Wrexham, Chester and the North Wales coast stations including Shotton. Sunday services are infrequent during the morning and late evening, but between midday and 20:00 the Crewe - Holyhead service calls hourly in each direction.

Future

In March 2015 Network Rail published the draft version of their Welsh Route Study. It contained a proposal to build a new interchange station that would replace the existing High and Low Level stations, allowing for greater connectivity between the North Wales Coast Main Line and the Borderlands Line. The document recommended a transport planning study to establish the cost, feasibility and benefits of the proposed scheme.

References

Bibliography

* *Baughan, P.E (1980) ''A Regional History of the Railways of Great Britain; Volume XI: North and Mid Wales''. David & Charles (Publishers) Ltd, Newton Abbott. . *

External links

History of the North Wales Coast Line

{{Flintshire railway stations Railway stations in Flintshire DfT Category E stations Former Great Central Railway stations Railway stations in Great Britain opened in 1891 Former London and North Western Railway stations Railway stations in Great Britain opened in 1907 Railway stations in Great Britain closed in 1966 Railway stations in Great Britain opened in 1972 Railway stations served by Transport for Wales Rail Beeching closures in Wales