Somerton railway station

Somerton (Somerset)
Somerton Station c1906
Location
Place	Somerton
Area	South Somerset
Grid reference	ST487284
Operations
Pre-grouping	Great Western Railway
Post-grouping	Great Western Railway
Platforms	2
History
2 July 1906	Opened as Somerton(Somerset)
10 Sept.1962	closed for passengers
6 July 1964	Closed for freight
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

Somerton railway station (not to be confused with Fritwell & Somerton) was a small railway station situated on the Great Western Railway's Langport and Castle Cary Railway. It served the town of Somerton in Somerset, England.

Somerton station opened to the public on 2 July 1906, in a cutting adjoining the town centre. The station had two signal boxes and a goods shed, however none of these are still standing. The station stopped handling passenger services on 10 September 1962 but continued to serve freight traffic until closing altogether on 6 July 1964. Despite all the stations between Castle Cary and Taunton being closed, the line remained open for trains from London Paddington station to stations such as Paignton, Plymouth and Penzance.

In recent times there have been various aspirations to re-open the station by local people, including local MP David Heath - but until that may happen, the only real sign of the station today is a 350-metre (1,150 ft)-long siding which had been built originally to let goods trains be overtaken. This siding is still used occasionally by Network Rail during night-time engineering works.

The station lay just behind the West Street girder bridge and ran all the way down to the Perry Hill area of the town. The main building was sited on the eastbound platform, with the goods shed at the west end of that platform. The original signal box was placed just opposite this platform, but a second signal box was opened in 1942 to control and monitor some new loop lines and sidings which created to the west of the station itself.