Yate railway station serves the town of

Yate Yate is a town and civil parish in South Gloucestershire, England. It lies just to the southwest of the Cotswolds, Cotswold Hills and is northeast of Bristol and from Bath, Somerset, Bath. Developing from a small village into a town from t ...

South Gloucestershire South Gloucestershire is a unitary authority area in the ceremonial county of Gloucestershire, South West England. Towns in the area include Yate, Chipping Sodbury, Kingswood, Thornbury, Filton, Patchway and Bradley Stoke. The southern p ...

, in south west

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 ...

. The station is located on the main Bristol to Birmingham line between Bristol Parkway and Cam & Dursley, and is operated by

Great Western Railway The Great Western Railway (GWR) was a History of rail transport in Great Britain, British railway company that linked London with the southwest, west and West Midlands (region), West Midlands of England and most of Wales. It was founded in 1833, ...

History

The Yate station first opened on 8 July 1844 and closed on 4 January 1965, along with other wayside stations on the former

Bristol and Gloucester Railway The Bristol and Gloucester Railway was a railway company opened in 1844 to run services between Bristol and Gloucester. It was built on the , but it was acquired in 1845 by the Midland Railway, which also acquired the Birmingham and Gloucester Ra ...

; the local stopping service on the route having been withdrawn as a result of the

Beeching Axe The Beeching cuts, also colloquially referred to as the Beeching Axe, were a major series of route closures and service changes made as part of the restructuring of the nationalised railway system in Great Britain in the 1960s. They are named ...

. This had both its platforms on the southern side of the road bridge mentioned above - the original 1844 goods shed still stands (now in commercial use) next to the old southbound platform site. The station was reopened by

British Rail British Railways (BR), which from 1965 traded as British Rail, was a state-owned company that operated most rail transport in Great Britain from 1948 to 1997. Originally a trading brand of the Railway Executive of the British Transport Comm ...

on 11 May 1989 with the backing of Avon County Council. When first open, trains headed south along the original B&GR/Midland route via to reach Bristol, although a connection was subsequently laid in to link this route with the rival

's 1903 "Badminton Line" from Wootton Bassett to (the current

South Wales Main Line The South Wales Main Line (), originally known as the London, Bristol and South Wales Direct Railway or simply as the Bristol and South Wales Direct Railway, is a branch of the Great Western Main Line in Great Britain. It diverges from the co ...

) in 1908. The new connection left the older line by means a

flying junction A flying junction or flyover is a railway junction at which one or more diverging or converging tracks in a multiple-track route cross other tracks on the route by bridge to avoid conflict with other train movements. A more technical term is "gr ...

at Yate South before heading southwest to join the SWML at the triangular Westerleigh Junction. Though jointly built by the two companies for the purpose of giving the GWR access to the Severn Rail Bridge and Severn and Wye Railway, it also provided an alternative route to Bristol Temple Meads via

Filton Filton is a town and civil parish in South Gloucestershire, England, north of Bristol. Along with nearby Patchway and Bradley Stoke, Filton forms part of the Bristol urban area and has become an overflow settlement for the city. Filton has la ...

and the Great Western soon made use of it to compete with the Midland for Bristol to Birmingham traffic, much to the dismay of the latter company. All services now use this newer line to get to Bristol, as the original 1844 route through was abandoned in January 1970 following the completion of the Bristol area resignalling scheme. A short section of the old route was retained from Yate South Junction after the rest closed, to serve a domestic waste transfer depot and fuel oil distribution terminal at Westerleigh sidings. This line is still in use today. It is the junction station for the Thornbury Branchline, however the passenger stations on this branch have long since closed (trains ceased in 1944) and the line remained open to serve Tytherington Quarry until September 2013, when it was placed 'Out of Use' 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 railway infrastructure manager, infrastructure manager of most of the railway network in Great Britain. ...

following the mothballing of the quarry at the beginning of the year. The line has now (summer 2017) returned to use following the reopening of the quarry, with

Mendip Rail Mendip Rail Ltd is an independent Rail transport in Great Britain#Goods services, freight operating railway company in Great Britain. It is a joint venture composed of the rail-operation divisions of Aggregate Industries (formerly Foster Yeoman) ...

running periodic stone trains. In the Strategic Rail Authority’s 2007/08 financial year, Yate was ranked as the 1104th most-used station in the UK. In the

Office of Rail and Road The Office of Rail and Road (ORR) is a non-ministerial government department responsible for the economic and safety regulation of Britain's railways, and the economic monitoring of National Highways. ORR regulates Network Rail by setting its ...

's 2019/20 estimations, Yate ranked 1,114th most used station.

Facilities

The station is staffed on weekday mornings. It has two staggered platforms, separated by the A432 road bridge. An automated ticket machine was installed in mid-2007, but stopped functioning due to vandalism and is reported to be "unlikely to be replaced in the foreseeable future". A new ticket machine was installed in 2013 on platform 1, whilst the portakabin ticket office is on the opposite platform. Digital information screens, customer help points and timetable posters provide train running information, whilst CCTV was installed here in 2011."CCTV to deter Yate station vandalism"
BBC News article 1 March 2011; Retrieved 10 April 2017 Step-free access to both platforms is available (via ramps from the road bridge to platform 1).

Services

The station is served Monday to Saturday by a two trains every hour in both directions between and via Bristol Temple Meads (with hourly extensions to/from Worcester northbound and to/from southbound, plus a single service to/from ). In May 2023, additional trains to/from Bristol were introduced as part Phase 2 of the MetroWest scheme. Yate station is also served by a hourly Sunday service. A normal service operates on most bank holidays.

References

External links

Friends of Yate Station site
{{DEFAULTSORT:Yate Railway Station Former Midland Railway stations Railway stations in South Gloucestershire Railway stations in Great Britain opened in 1844 Railway stations in Great Britain closed in 1965 Railway stations in Great Britain opened in 1989 Railway stations served by Great Western Railway Beeching closures in England 1844 establishments in England 1965 disestablishments in England 1989 establishments in England Reopened railway stations in Great Britain DfT Category F1 stations