Fort William railway station
Fort William railway station is a railway station serving the town of Fort William in the Highland region of Scotland. History. The first station was constructed by the West Highland Railway which was later absorbed by the North British Railway. They chose a site for the station alongside the town shipping pier, which required the purchase of a strip of the foreshore. The railway company bought this for £25 () an acre. Purchase of this land displaced some people from their houses and the railway company was obliged to provide replacement housing. Other residents realised too  late that the railway line cut the town off from the shore and the company responded by providing some wicket gate crossings. It was opened by the Marchioness of Tweedale, Candida Louisa Bartolucci, wife of the chairman of the North British Railway, William Hay, 10th Marquess of Tweeddale on 7 August 1894. They had departed by special train comprising two locomotives and eleven carriages from Glasgow at 8.15am, and arrived in Fort William at 1.30pm. It was sited further west of the present station on what is now the A82 town by-pass alongside Loch Linnhe at Station Square, at  the time in close proximity to then location of the former Caledonian MacBrayne bus station. The old station was a stone built construction featuring a turret and a double arched entranceway and had three platforms. Two of the platforms terminated under the platform canopy, but the third continued past the station, crossing the MacBrayne pier and terminated at the jetty just beyond. In 1970 the British Railways Board put forward proposals to re-site the station north of its location to allow the improvements to the A82 to be implemented. The last train from the old station departed on 7  June 1975 and the station closed on 9 June. It was demolished immediately afterwards to permit construction of the bypass. The present Fort William station of grey concrete construction was opened on 13 June 1975. The current station lies in the shadow of Ben Nevis. During high winds in February 1980 a brick wall at the station collapsed onto the track and blocked a platform. The station is on the West Highland Line and the starting point for "The Jacobite", a steam locomotive hauled passenger service to Mallaig. Refurbishment of the facilities at Fort William railway station was completed in  2007 thanks to a £750,000 investment. The refurbishment includes new shower facilities and refurbished toilets. The shower facilities include two showers for ladies, two for gentlemen and one unisex shower facility for disabled people. Services. As of the summer 2019 timetable, Fort William has three daytime trains per day in each direction on Mondays to Saturdays, running between and . There is also a daily early morning service to Mallaig that starts at Fort William, with a similar return service in the evening (this connects into/out of the "Caledonian Sleeper"). The "Caledonian Sleeper" operates six nights per week (not  Saturdays) from , starting/terminating at Fort William. The sleeper also carries seated coaches and can thus be used as a regular service train to/from Glasgow Queen Street and Edinburgh Waverley. The regular Sunday service consists of two train per day each way between Glasgow and Mallaig, with the schedule in the peak season supplemented by one service between Fort William and Mallaig. "The Jacobite" operates between Fort William and Mallaig, only stopping at . This runs through the summer until late October, with a maximum of two trains per day Monday to Saturday and one on Sunday in the high  season. A reduced Jacobite timetable is operated later in the summer. Signalling. Since its opening in 1975, the present Fort William station has been equipped with colour light signals. The signalling is controlled from an 'NX' (entrance-exit) panel in Fort William Junction signal box. The single line between the junction and the station is worked by the Track Circuit Block system, so no tokens are needed for that part of the route.