Ardwick railway station serves the industrial area of

Ardwick Ardwick is an area of Manchester, England, southeast of the city centre. The population at the 2011 census was 19,250. Historically in Lancashire, by the mid-nineteenth century Ardwick had grown from being a village into a pleasant and wealt ...

, in east

Manchester Manchester () is a city and the metropolitan borough of Greater Manchester, England. It had an estimated population of in . Greater Manchester is the third-most populous metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, with a population of 2.92&nbs ...

, England; it is located about one mile (1.5 km) south-east of , on both the

Glossop line The Glossop line is a railway line connecting the city of Manchester with the towns of Hadfield, Derbyshire, Hadfield and Glossop in Derbyshire, England. It formed part of the historic Great Central Main Line between Manchester Piccadilly rail ...

and

Hope Valley line The Hope Valley line is a trans-Pennine railway line in Northern England, linking Manchester with Sheffield. It was completed in 1894. Passenger services on the line are operated by Northern Trains, East Midlands Railway and TransPennine ...

. Plans to close the station permanently were shelved in 2006, due to increasing activity in the area. From the Summer 2024 timetable, the station has just two trains calling per day on Mondays–Fridays and one train per day on Saturdays.

History

Ardwick station was opened by the

Sheffield, Ashton-under-Lyne and Manchester Railway The Sheffield, Ashton-under-Lyne and Manchester Railway was an early British railway company which opened in stages between 1841 and 1845 between Sheffield and Manchester via Ashton-under-Lyne. The Peak District formed a formidable barrier, and ...

in 1842 and became part of 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 Grims ...

following mergers in 1847; that company changed its name to the

Great Central Railway The Great Central Railway in England was formed when the Manchester, Sheffield and Lincolnshire Railway changed its name in 1897, anticipating the opening in 1899 of its Great Central Main Line, London Extension. On 1 January 1923, the company ...

in 1897. The station became a junction between the

London, Midland and Scottish Railway The London, Midland and Scottish Railway (LMSIt has been argued that the initials LMSR should be used to be consistent with London and North Eastern Railway, LNER, Great Western Railway, GWR and Southern Railway (UK), SR. The London, Midland an ...

and the

London and North Eastern Railway The London and North Eastern Railway (LNER) was the second largest (after London, Midland and Scottish Railway, LMS) of the "Big Four (British railway companies), Big Four" railway companies created by the Railways Act 1921 in Britain. It ope ...

under the

Grouping Grouping generally refers to the creation of one or more groups, or to the groups themselves. More specifically, grouping may refer to: * Shot grouping in shooting sports and other uses of firearms * the use of symbols of grouping in mathemati ...

of 1923, and passed to the

London Midland Region of British Railways The London Midland Region (LMR) was one of the six regions created on the formation of the nationalised British Railways (BR), and initially consisted of ex-London, Midland and Scottish Railway (LMS) lines in England, Wales and Northern Irela ...

nationalisation Nationalization (nationalisation in British English) is the process of transforming privately owned assets into public assets by bringing them under the public ownership of a national government or state. Nationalization contrasts with priv ...

in 1948. When sectorisation was introduced in the 1980s, the station was served by

Regional Railways Regional Railways was one of the three passenger sectors of British Rail created in 1982 that existed until 1997, two years after Privatisation of British Rail. The sector was originally called ''Provincial''. Regional Railways was the most sub ...

under arrangement with the

Greater Manchester PTE Transport for Greater Manchester (TfGM) is a local government body responsible for co-ordinating transport services throughout Greater Manchester in North West England. It is an executive arm of the Greater Manchester Combined Authority (GMCA), ...

until the

privatisation of British Rail The privatisation of British Rail was the process by which ownership and operation of the Rail transport in Great Britain, railways of Great Britain passed from government control into private hands. Begun in 1994, the process was largely compl ...

. Ardwick railway depot, opened 2006 for

TransPennine Express TransPennine Trains Limited, trading as TransPennine Express (TPE), is a British train operating company that has operated passenger services in the TransPennine Express franchise area since May 2023. It runs regional and inter-city rail ser ...

's Class 185 DMU fleet, is a short distance to the east. From 1878 to 1902, there was also an Ardwick stop shown on

Crewe–Manchester line The Crewe–Manchester line is a railway line in North West England, running between Crewe and Manchester Piccadilly. It is a spur of the West Coast Main Line. History The line was built by the Manchester and Birmingham Railway Company, which d ...

timetables for collection of Manchester tickets on down trains.

Non-closure

In its draft ''Route Utilisation Strategy'' (RUS) for the North West,

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

proposed the closure of Ardwick, but the closure proposals were dropped from the final report published on 1 May 2007. Proposals to close Ardwick and two other stations in Greater Manchester were shelved after residents and passenger groups persuaded Network Rail that long-term development could improve the business case for keeping the stations open.

Facilities

Ardwick is unstaffed and has a single

island platform An island platform (also center platform (American English) or centre platform (British English)) is a station layout arrangement where a single platform is positioned between two tracks within a railway station, tram stop or transitway inte ...

on the electrified

and the

. Pedestrians can enter the platform from a footbridge, but there is no wheelchair access. It is immediately adjacent to the main Manchester branch of the

West Coast Main Line The West Coast Main Line (WCML) is one of the most important railway corridors in the United Kingdom, connecting the major cities of London and Glasgow with branches to Birmingham, Manchester, Liverpool and Edinburgh. It is one of the busiest ...

and the two routes join just north of the station. The station has a ticket machine and a seating area.

Services

Northern Trains Northern Trains, Trade name, trading as Northern, is a British train operating company that operates Commuter rail, commuter and Inter-city rail, medium-distance intercity services in the North of England. It is owned by DfT Operator for the Dep ...

operates the only daily services that stop at Ardwick; these are the 07:16 to only and the 16:57 to on Mondays–Fridays. On Saturdays there is only the 07:16 to Manchester Piccadilly. There is no service on Sundays. The lines passing through the station are used intensively by non-stop trains and this, coupled with its location in a largely non-residential area, accounts for its infrequent service.

References

Sources

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External links

{{Greater Manchester main railway stations Railway stations in Manchester DfT Category F2 stations Former Great Central Railway stations Railway stations in Great Britain opened in 1842 Railway stations served by Northern 1842 establishments in England