Rugby railway station
Rugby railway station serves the town of Rugby in Warwickshire, England. It opened during the Victorian era, in 1885, replacing earlier stations situated a little further west. Since the closure of the former Rugby Central station on the now-abandoned Great Central Railway route through the town, it is Rugby's only station. Between 1950 and 1970 the station was known as Rugby Midland before reverting to its original title. The station underwent an extensive remodelling during 2006–2008, with new platforms added, and a new ticket office and entrance building constructed, however the original Victorian part of  the station was retained in the upgrade. Rugby station is at the centre of two important junctions of the West Coast Main Line (WCML) connecting London to Birmingham and North West England and Scotland. The junction of the Trent Valley Line to the North West, and the Rugby-Birmingham-Stafford Line to Birmingham is a short distance west of the station. East of the station, the Northampton Loop Line diverges at a junction from the direct line to London. Until the 1960s it also had routes to , and but these have all since been closed. The present station, managed by  Avanti West Coast, is located roughly half a mile north of Rugby town centre. On the WCML as a whole, it is located north of London Euston, and south of . Current services. Inter-city train services are operated by Avanti West Coast, with off peak services to London and Birmingham New Street and morning peak and evening peak services to/from Glasgow, Manchester, Chester, Liverpool, Blackpool, Preston, Carlisle, Wolverhampton, Crewe and Lancaster West Midlands Trains operate frequent regional services under the "London Northwestern" branding between London Euston or Northampton to Birmingham New Street and they operate services between London Euston  to Stafford, Stoke-on-Trent and Crewe (via the Trent Valley Line). Off peak weekday service in trains per hour (tph) is: Railway lines served. West Coast Main Line. Since the 1960s, Rugby is served only by the West Coast Main Line. However, as the WCML divides here on either side of the station, it provides an interchange between the routes and consequently many trains stop here. In the chainage notation traditionally used on the railway, the station is from Euston. Hillmorton Junction. To the southeast of the station, the original London and Birmingham Railway (L&BR) line (opened 1838), which  runs directly to London, is joined at a grade separated junction near Hillmorton by the Northampton loop line (opened 1881) which runs to Northampton before rejoining the line to London at Hanslope Junction. This junction is from Euston. Trent Valley Junction. To the northwest of the station the WCML diverges again between the original London and Birmingham line, now referred to as the Birmingham Loop, which runs westwards to Coventry and Birmingham, and the Trent Valley Line (opened 1847) which diverges at a flyover junction northwestwards towards Stafford and the North West of England and Scotland. It is from Euston . Closed Lines. Until the 1960s Rugby station served several other railway lines, which were closed mostly as part of the Beeching Axe. At one time railway lines diverged from Rugby station in seven different directions. The closed lines were: The Great Central Main Line (GCML) also ran through the town and had its own station at , but as this was built by a rival company, it never had any connection to the other railways in Rugby. It was opened in 1899 and closed between 1966 and 1969. Layout. Rugby station has a total of six platforms, consisting of five through  platforms (platforms 1, 2, 4, 5 & 6) and one east facing bay platform (platform 3) which is not in regular use. Platform 1 on the south of the station is a side platform, to its north are two island platforms which contain platforms 2,3 & 4 and 5 & 6 respectively. The platforms are above street level on a brick embankment, and are accessed from a subway via ramps stairs and lifts, except platform 1 which is accessed by stairs and a lift directly from the ticket office. The main entrance and ticket office is on the south side facing the town  centre, with a secondary subway entrance to the north. Between 1885 and 2008, Rugby station consisted of one large island platform, containing only two through platforms which are now platforms 2 and 4. The through platforms were long enough however to allow two trains to call at them at the same time, a feature enabled by scissors crossovers at the midway point of the platforms; this practice was abandoned in the 1960s when the crossovers were removed. At each end were bay platforms, four west facing, and two east facing: The bay platforms historically accommodated the various terminating branch line  and local services, but had become largely redundant when these services were withdrawn. All but one of the bay platforms were removed during the 2008 remodelling, and the extra through platforms were added. History. First station (1838–40). The first railway station to be built in Rugby was a wooden temporary structure located around half a mile to the west of the present station. It opened on 9 April 1838 when the London and Birmingham Railway was constructed. However great difficulty in constructing the Kilsby Tunnel in Northamptonshire delayed the full opening of the line, which was not finished in time  for the coronation of Queen Victoria on 28 June 1838. Aware of the lucrative traffic the event would generate, the company opened the north end of the line, between Birmingham and Rugby, and the south end from London to a temporary station at near Bletchley, with a stagecoach shuttle service linking the two parts to allow through journeys to London. The line was officially fully opened on 17 September 1838, with the first passenger train from London to Birmingham arriving that day. At the time of the railway's construction, Rugby was a small market town of around 2,500 inhabitants , notable only for its school. The town was around half a mile to the south, uphill from the station, which at the time was located in open countryside. The original station was located on the western side of where the railway crossed "Newbold Road" (the Rugby to Leicester turnpike road, now the A426) because at the time this was the only road north from Rugby. Second station (1840–1885). The first station lasted only a few years. When a junction was made with the Midland Counties Railway in 1840, a new station was built at the site of the junction, which  opened on 4 July 1840; it was to the east of the original station, and to the west of the present station. A new road, "Railway Terrace" had to be built to link it to the town centre, because at the time it was located in open countryside. This second station was effectively managed by two companies – the London and North Western Railway and the Midland Railway – and for this reason grew up in a haphazard fashion. It was at first no more than a temporary wooden structure, but was gradually rebuilt into a more permanent structure over the following  decade. This station consisted of platforms at each side of the track with one bay platform. The platforms were rather low and passengers complained of having to perform an "acrobatic feat" to board trains. The station was at the centre of a busy junction and often saw chaotic scenes. It featured, only lightly disguised, in Charles Dickens's story "Mugby Junction": This was inspired by an incident in April 1866, when Charles Dickens was travelling from London to Liverpool. Dickens's train made an unscheduled stop at Rugby due to one of the carriages catching fire. While waiting for his  journey to resume, he went into the refreshment room for a cup of coffee, and the proprietess, clearly not recognising the celebrity author, treated him rudely. Inspired by this, his story 'Mugby Junction' in chapter three made a scathing attack on railway refreshment rooms and their staff. The present station (1885–). The second station lasted until the 1880s, when a new line from Rugby to Northampton (the Northampton loop) was built, the old station was deemed by the LNWR to be no-longer satisfactory, and in 1882, £70,000 was allocated to replace it with the current station which opened  on 5 July 1885. Another £30,000 was allocated to build a hotel, although this was never built. The Midland Railway retained the part of the older station which it had managed, however. One platform of the old station, separate from the new station, continued to be used by local trains on the Midland Railway's branch to Leicester until 8 March 1930. No trace of this now remains, however, as it was demolished in the 1960s to make way for the postal sorting office. When constructed the station consisted of one large island platform with bay platforms at each  end for terminating local services. The main island platforms are accessed from a tunnel at road level and a ramp leading to the platforms. When constructed the station had a large steel and glass trainshed roof which consisted of 117 ft (35.6 m) wide spans on each side, covering the station platforms and tracks. Originally the sides of the station had glass side screens but these were later removed. The condition of the roof deteriorated, and in the 1980s the glass over the tracks was removed, and finally the entire structure was dismantled between 2000 and 2002 when it became  unstable, and was replaced with modern canopies over the platforms. The station had one of the longest platforms of any British railway station, at , but the two main island platforms were both shortened as part of the 2007–08 station upgrade. The platform was long enough to allow two trains to call at it at the same time. This unusual feature was enabled by 'scissors crossings' halfway along the platforms. The scissor crossings were X-shaped junctions which allowed one train to pass another one already in the platform, and call into the same platform ahead of it, and allowed the  train to the rear to pull out of the station, effectively doubling the capacity of the platform. The scissor crossings remained in use until the railway was electrified in the 1960s. In 1899 a second station, , was opened in Rugby. To distinguish it from the other station, the present station became known as Rugby Midland. Rugby Central closed in 1969, and Rugby Midland reverted to being called just Rugby in 1970. The station came under the management of the London and North Western Railway (LNWR) (1885–1923), and then the London, Midland and Scottish Railway (LMS) (1923–1948), and then the nationalised  British Railways (1948–1997). It is now owned by Network Rail. 2006–2008 remodelling. As a part of the West Coast Main Line modernisation programme carried out by Network Rail, major track restructuring work was carried out to allow higher speed running through Rugby. Previously non-stopping trains passing through Rugby were limited to 75 mph, the track upgrades raised the speed to 125 mph, thus eliminating another bottleneck from the WCML. The station itself also underwent a major £170 million redevelopment which included: It was at one time thought that remodelling of the track layout would entail complete demolition of  the present station, but the final plans involved retention of the existing island platform and buildings. Work began in September 2006 and was completed late in 2008. The platform on the south side of the station opened for use on 29 May 2007, and as a result all of the platforms were renumbered. This platform became Platform 1, the former Platform 1 became Platform 2 and 2 became 4. The additional platforms on the north side of the station are numbered Platforms 5 and 6 and they opened on 27 August 2008. Platform 8 became Platform 3. At the same  time four former westbound bay platforms originally numbered 3 to 6, and one eastbound bay numbered 7 were removed. Another distinctive feature of the local railway landscape also vanished at this time – the '. This was a 'heavy' girder bridge of two substantial spans over the West Coast Main Line to the east ('up' side) of the station. This was the means by which the Great Central Main Line crossed the London & North Western Railway competing line. Signalling. Rugby once had the largest concentration of mechanical signalling in the world and was home to one of the most impressive signal gantries  in Britain. Situated to the south of the station and erected in 1895, it spanned three tracks and carried forty-four semaphore arms. Every arm was duplicated due to sighting difficulties that resulted from the Great Central Railway's 'Birdcage' bridge crossing the WCML behind the gantry's location. The gantry acquired the nickname of "the Rugby Bedstead" on account of its appearance. In 1939, the London, Midland and Scottish Railway resignalled the Rugby area with colour light signals, although the mechanical signal boxes were retained. The famous signal gantry became redundant, following which it was divided up into smaller  pieces to form a number of smaller structures for re-use elsewhere. SGE was awarded a contract to resignal the Rugby area in preparation for electrification. Rugby Power Signal Box (PSB) opened in 1964. It is located east of the station, on the south (Down) side of the railway. The whole station area, together with part of the WCML stretching as far south as Castlethorpe, was controlled from this new box. It was equipped with an 'NX' (entrance-exit) panel. In 1991, Rugby PSB took over control of the Northampton area using Solid State Interlocking (SSI). Rugby PSB closed in  May 2012 when control of Northampton was transferred to Rugby SCC. Rugby Signalling Control Centre (SCC), located north-west of the station, opened in 2004. Initially, its area of control was limited to a portion of the WCML between Kings Langley and Linslade Tunnel. The current area of control is Kings Langley, Hertfordshire to Armitage in Staffordshire. Area of control also includes small portions of branch lines around Nuneaton; these include the Coventry-Nuneaton (from Three Spires to Nuneaton) and part of the Arley/Hinckley lines (Arley Tunnel to Padge Hall). In March 2016, the WCML South Rail Operating Centre  (ROC) was opened at Rugby – this will supervise the signalling on the entire southern end of the WCML and associated branch routes. Motive Power Depots. A shed for three locomotives was opened here in 1838 by the London and Birmingham Railway and another in 1847. These were demolished to make way for two larger sheds in 1852, one for the use of the Northern Division locomotives and one by the Southern Division. The LNWR replaced these with a single 12-road shed in 1876, which was closed in 1965, but used for stabling diesel shunters. An adjoining 12-road shed  was opened in 1886, but was closed and demolished by British Railways in 1960. Connections. Bus route 4, operated by Stagecoach Midlands, connects the railway station with Rugby town centre and the suburbs of Cawston and Bilton. Bus route D1 and D2, operated by Stagecoach Midlands, previously connected the railway station with Rugby town centre, now replaced on this section by services 1 and 2, which connects with buses D1 and D2 to the suburbs of Barby, Braunston, Brownsover, DIRFT, Hillmorton, and Kilsby. The service then continues onto serve the nearby town of Daventry.