Carnalea railway station is located in the

townland A townland (; Ulster-Scots: ''toonlann'') is a traditional small land division used in Ireland and in the Western Isles of Scotland, typically covering . The townland system is of medieval Gaelic origin, predating the Norman invasion, and mo ...

of Carnalea in northwest

Bangor, County Down Bangor ( ; ) is a City status in the United Kingdom, city in County Down, Northern Ireland, on the southern side of Belfast Lough. It is within the Belfast metropolitan area and is 13 miles (22 km) east of Belfast city centre, to whic ...

, Northern Ireland. It was first opened by the B.C.D.R. (

Belfast and County Down Railway The Belfast and County Down Railway (BCDR) was an Irish gauge () railway in Ireland (later Northern Ireland) linking Belfast with County Down. It was built in the 19th century and absorbed into the Ulster Transport Authority in 1948. All but the ...

) on its present site at Station Walk on 1 June 1877 with only an up platform, and a brake van as an office. Through the advent of wooden villas in the late 19th century, the B.C.D.R. (

) built a station house on the upside in 1897, most of which still stands. The station master's former dwelling is the oldest building in the area. The station's low-set signal cabin (disused since the 1930s) and downside shelter have been demolished since the

Northern Ireland Railways NI Railways, also known as Northern Ireland Railways (NIR; and for a brief period Ulster Transport Railways; UTR), is the railway operator in Northern Ireland. NIR is a subsidiary of Translink, whose parent company is the Northern Ireland Tr ...

takeover in 1967. Glass shelters exist on the sites of the former waiting areas. The station remains popular and many locals commute to

Belfast Belfast (, , , ; from ) is the capital city and principal port of Northern Ireland, standing on the banks of the River Lagan and connected to the open sea through Belfast Lough and the North Channel (Great Britain and Ireland), North Channel ...

via the station each morning, with just under 97,000 passengers boarding or alighting at the station in the 2023/24 financial year.

Service

From Mondays to Saturdays there is a half-hourly service towards Belfast Grand Central in one direction, and in the other. Extra services operate at peak times, and the service reduces to hourly operation in the evenings. Certain peak-time express trains will pass through Carnalea station without stopping. On Sundays there is an hourly service in each direction.

References

Railway stations in County Down Bangor, County Down Railway stations served by NI Railways Railway stations in Northern Ireland opened in 1877 {{NorthernIreland-railstation-stub