Knottingley railway station

Knottingley
Platform 2
Location
Place	Knottingley
Local authority	City of Wakefield
Coordinates	53°42′23″N 1°15′32″W / 53.7065°N 1.2590°W / 53.7065; -1.2590Coordinates: 53°42′23″N 1°15′32″W / 53.7065°N 1.2590°W / 53.7065; -1.2590
Grid reference	SE490235
Operations
Station code	KNO
Managed by	Northern Rail
Number of platforms	2
Live arrivals/departures and station information from National Rail Enquiries
Annual rail passenger usage*
2004/05	85,416
2005/06	0.115 million
2006/07	0.120 million
2007/08	0.129 million
2008/09	0.170 million
2009/10	0.156 million
2010/11	0.172 million
Passenger Transport Executive
Zone	3
History
Opened April 1848 (April 1848)
National Rail – UK railway stations
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
* Annual estimated passenger usage based on sales of tickets in stated financial year(s) which end or originate at Knottingley from Office of Rail Regulation statistics. Methodology may vary year on year.
UK Railways portal

Platform 1

Knottingley railway station serves the town of Knottingley in West Yorkshire, England. It lies on the Pontefract Line, operated by Northern Rail, and is 16 miles (26 km) south east of Leeds railway station.

The station is the final one in West Yorkshire before the North Yorkshire border and most services terminate (or start) there.

History [edit]

The station was constructed by the Wakefield, Pontefract & Goole Railway as part of their main line from Wakefield to Goole, which opened in April 1848. It wasn't long though before it became a busy junction, as within two years links to Doncaster via the Askern branch (on 6 June 1848), Leeds via Castleford and Methley Junction (1 December 1849) and York via Ferrybridge and Burton Salmon (1 August 1850)^[1] had all been opened. The first of those was jointly built and operated by the Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway and Great Northern Railway and the station also became jointly managed by these two companies in 1854. The Great Northern made use of its running powers and traffic agreements with the LYR to run through trains from Doncaster to both Leeds and York, putting the town on a new main line between London & York for a number of years until shorter, more direct lines could be constructed.

By 1871 the station had lost its trunk line status with the opening of new lines from Doncaster via Wakefield (to Leeds) & Selby (to York), but it still handled plenty of local passenger and freight traffic (particularly coal from a large number of collieries in the area).

Whilst all of the aforementioned lines are still open, only the original WP&G routes now carry passenger trains as services to York ended on 11 July 1947 and those to Doncaster just over a year later on 27 September 1948.^[2] The line to Wakefield Kirkgate also lost its passenger trains from 2 January 1967 (leaving only the route to Leeds serving the station) but it was re-opened in May 1992 with financial assistance from West Yorkshire PTE.

Regular passenger trains on the Askern line now operate once again (commencing on 23 May 2010 after an absence of more than 60 years), following the decision to grant open access operator Grand Union track access rights for a new service between London Kings Cross and Bradford Interchange in January 2009.^[3] These run via the Askern line, Pontefract, Wakefield and Brighouse to reach Bradford but are not able to call at Knottingley as the old Doncaster line platforms have long been removed.

Services [edit]

There is an hourly service from Knottingley to both the nearby cities of Leeds and Wakefield (Kirkgate) via Pontefract Monkhill with one train to/two trains from Goole each weekday. On Sundays there is a two-hourly service to Leeds.

Notes [edit]

References [edit]

• Body, G. (1988), PSL Field Guides - Railways of the Eastern Region Volume 2, Patrick Stephens Ltd, Wellingborough, ISBN 1-85260-072-1

External links [edit]

• Train times and station information for Knottingley railway station from National Rail

Preceding station		National Rail		Following station
Pontefract Monkhill		Northern Rail Pontefract Line		Whitley Bridge
Pontefract Monkhill		Northern Rail Pontefract Line		Terminus
	Disused railways
Terminus		Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway Askern Branch Line		Womersley