Brackley railway station

Brackley
Brackley LNWR station in 1961
Location
Place	Brackley
Area	South Northamptonshire
Grid reference	SP585365
Operations
Original company	Buckinghamshire Railway
Pre-grouping	London and North Western Railway
Post-grouping	London, Midland and Scottish Railway London Midland Region of British Railways
Platforms	2
History
1 May 1850	Opened
1 July 1950	Renamed (Brackley Town)
2 January 1961	Closed to passengers
2 December 1963	Closed to goods
Disused railway stations in the United Kingdom
Closed railway stations in Britain A B C D–F G H–J K–L M–O P–R S T–V W–Z

Brackley Town was a railway station which served the Northamptonshire town of Brackley in England. It opened in 1850 as part of the Buckinghamshire Railway's branch line to Verney Junction which provided connections to Banbury, Bletchley and Oxford and closed in 1963.

From 1899 until 1963, Brackley was served by two railway stations on different lines. Brackley Central - opened by the Great Central Railway - was the second, the Buckinghamshire Railway having already connected the town to the railway in 1850. As the Great Central's station was constructed at the top of the hill upon which Brackley is situated and Buckinghamshire Railway's station at the foot of the hill, locals referred to them respectively as the Top Station and the Bottom Station.

The Buckinghamshire Railway's station was built at the southern end of the main high street and was constructed of a yellow-grey coloured stone. A single loop was enclosed between two-facing platforms, each of a height of 32 inches. A water tower for locomotives was positioned on the roof of a stone shelter situated on the up platform, slowly refilling from a nearby spring. The station's goods shed was built at a right angle to the line where a wagon turntable enabled vehicles to roll into the shed, aided by a slight gradient. A short spur on a severe gradient served the Hopkins and Norris brewery; horses drew the wagons up the gradient to allow them to be returned to the station yard by gravity. The spur (known locally as the "barrel line") fell into disuse in the early 1920s and the rails were lifted by 1935. The station's goods yard was not large, but was capable of accommodating the daily 3 to 12 wagons destined for the gasworks and the 4 to 5 wagons of malt and sugar for the brewery. A cattle dock could take four vans, and a 5-ton capacity crane was stationed in the yard.

The arrival of the Great Central in Brackley saw a great deal of trade ebb away from the branch. The Great Central provided a faster and more direct route to London; its station enjoyed seven trains a day from Marylebone, including an express which took 84 minutes, compared with the line's infrequent sparse service to Euston via Bletchley. The branch line was used to transport bricks for the construction of the Great Central's station, and a new siding was installed near the line's ten mile post.