Rainford railway station is situated to the north of the village of

Rainford Rainford is a village and civil parishes in England, civil parish in the Metropolitan Borough of St Helens, Merseyside, England, north of St Helens, Merseyside, St Helens. At the United Kingdom Census 2011, 2011 Census, the population was 7,7 ...

Merseyside Merseyside ( ) is a ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial and metropolitan county in North West England. It borders Lancashire to the north, Greater Manchester to the east, Cheshire to the south, the Wales, Welsh county of Flintshire across ...

England England is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is located on the island of Great Britain, of which it covers about 62%, and List of islands of England, more than 100 smaller adjacent islands. It ...

. It is on the

Kirkby branch line The Kirkby Branch Line is a branch railway line from Wigan to Headbolt Lane. The line's original route was from Liverpool to Bury, Greater Manchester, Bury and later the most northern of the Liverpool to Manchester lines. The line was split at ...

. The station, and all trains serving it, are operated by

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 ...

History

It was built in 1858 as Rainford Junction at the junction of the

Liverpool and Bury Railway The Liverpool and Bury Railway was formed by an act of Parliament in 1845 to link Liverpool and Bury via Kirkby, Wigan and Bolton, the line opening on 20 November 1848. The line became the Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway's main line between ...

, the

East Lancashire Railway The East Lancashire Railway is a heritage railway line in North West England which runs between Heywood, Greater Manchester and Rawtenstall in Lancashire. There are intermediate stations at Bury Bolton Street, , Summerseat and Ramsbott ...

's Skelmersdale Branch and the St. Helens Railway, replacing an earlier station (1848) called Rainford. The main line and Skelmersdale branch were taken over by the

Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway The Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway (L&YR) was a major History of rail transport in Great Britain, British railway company before the Railways Act 1921, 1923 Grouping. It was Incorporation (business)#Incorporation in the United Kingdom, incorpo ...

in 1859, whilst the St Helens line became part of the

London and North Western Railway The London and North Western Railway (LNWR, L&NWR) was a British railway company between 1846 and 1922. In the late 19th century, the LNWR was the largest joint stock company in the world. Dubbed the "Premier Line", the LNWR's main line connec ...

in 1864. The former L&BR route was subsequently upgraded by the L&YR to become its main line between Liverpool and Manchester, carrying expresses to

Manchester Victoria Manchester Victoria station in Manchester, England, is a combined mainline railway station and Metrolink tram stop. Situated to the north of the city centre on Hunts Bank, close to Manchester Cathedral, it adjoins Manchester Arena which was c ...

, and as well as local trains to Wigan Wallgate and until after the

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 ...

of the railways in 1948 and well beyond. Services on the line to St Helens were withdrawn by the

British Transport Commission The British Transport Commission (BTC) was created by Clement Attlee's post-war Labour government as a part of its nationalisation programme, to oversee railways, canals and road freight transport in Great Britain (Northern Ireland had the s ...

on 18 June 1951 and to on 5 November 1956, although goods traffic survived on both until the early 1960s. Through trains from

Liverpool Exchange Liverpool Exchange was a borough constituency within the city of Liverpool in England, centred on Liverpool Exchange railway station. It returned one Member of Parliament (United Kingdom), Member of Parliament (MP) to the House of Commons of the ...

to Bolton via Wigan continued until 1977, though the line from here westwards to had been reduced to single track operation in May 1970.'"Disused Stations - Rainford Junction"
'Disused Stations''; Retrieved 25 March 2016 After the closure of Exchange in May 1977, the line was severed at Kirkby, with through passengers having to change between diesel and electric services there to continue their journeys. The station

signal box A signal is both the process and the result of transmission of data over some media accomplished by embedding some variation. Signals are important in multiple subject fields including signal processing, information theory and biology. In ...

was retained to supervise the single line section (since shortened to since the opening of the new Headbolt Lane station) to what was now the terminus of the branch – this remains in operation today and is now the only one left on the line. The station was renamed Rainford on 7 May 1973.

Facilities

Though the station had sizeable buildings on both platforms at one time, the last of these (on the Wigan-bound platform) was demolished in the late 1990s. There are now just basic shelters in place on each side, along with a footbridge to connect them. The disused branch platform faces are still visible, but heavily overgrown. The station is unstaffed but contains a card only ticket machine. Train running information can be obtained by dot matrix displays, telephone or from timetable poster boards on each platform. Step-free access is available on both platforms via ramps from the nearby road.

Services

All services at Rainford are operated by

. The station is served by one train per hour between and via and . Connections for

Merseyrail Merseyrail is a commuter rail network which serves Merseyside and adjacent areas of Cheshire and Lancashire in the North West England, North West of England. Merseyrail serves 69 Railway station, stations, 67 of which it manages, across two lin ...

services to and from can be made by changing at Headbolt Lane. No services call at the station during late evenings or on Sundays.

References

* Marshall, J. (1981) ''Forgotten Railways North-West England'', David & Charles (Publishers) Ltd, Newton Abbott. * Butt, R.V.J. (1995) ''Directory of Railway Stations'', Patrick Stephens Ltd, Yeovil.

External links

The station on an 1888-1913 Overlay OS Map via National Library of Scotland
{{Merseyrail Northern Line Railway stations in St Helens, Merseyside DfT Category F2 stations Former Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway stations Railway stations served by Northern 1858 establishments in England Railway stations in Great Britain opened in 1858

railway station Rail transport (also known as train transport) is a means of transport using wheeled vehicles running in railway track, tracks, which usually consist of two parallel steel railway track, rails. Rail transport is one of the two primary means of ...