Huntly railway station
Huntly railway station is a railway station serving the town of Huntly in Scotland. The station is managed by ScotRail and is on the Aberdeen to Inverness Line, between Insch and Keith, 40 miles 67 chains (65.7 km) from Aberdeen.[4]
 | |
|---|---|
 Looking south towards Insch from the footbridge | |
| General information | |
| Location | Huntly, Aberdeenshire Scotland |
| Coordinates | 57.4445°N 2.7758°W |
| Grid reference | NJ535396 |
| Managed by | ScotRail |
| Platforms | 2 |
| Other information | |
| Station code | HNT[2] |
| History | |
| Original company | Great North of Scotland Railway |
| Pre-grouping | Great North of Scotland Railway |
| Post-grouping | LNER |
| Key dates | |
| 20 September 1854 | Opened[3] |
| Passengers | |
| 2017/18 |  92,956 |
| 2018/19 | 77,782 |
| 2019/20 | 72,090 |
| 2020/21 | 12,612 |
| 2021/22 |  44,894 |
| Notes | |
Passenger statistics from the Office of Rail and Road | |
A small goods yard is located adjacent to the station and operated by DB Schenker. A goods shed remains standing within the yard.
History
The station was opened by the Great North of Scotland Railway on 20 September 1854,[3] with the commissioning of the line from the original Waterloo terminus in Aberdeen. A goods service had started a week earlier. The initial passenger service took 2 hours, with 3 trains a day, calling at all stations. Only mail trains ran on Sundays. The route onwards to Keith followed on 11 October 1856,[5] with the through link to the new joint station at Aberdeen completed in November 1867 to connect the GNSR to the Aberdeen Railway. The track was doubled in 1896, when a non-stop train from Aberdeen was speeded up to a 45-minute schedule for the 40+3⁄4 mi (65.6 km), though it ceased when the overnight London express was slowed later that year.[5]
The station passed into the hands of the LNER at the 1923 Grouping and the Scottish Region of British Railways in January 1948. It has retained its signal box, which has been refurbished and controls the passing loop and level crossing here.
The original station building, which had an overall roof[5] and was described in 1898 as, "a decent structure of the old fashioned 'roofed-over' type",[6] was demolished and replaced in 1999 with a smaller ticket office (staffed part-time) and waiting room.
Facilities
The station's ticket office is staffed six days per week from early morning until early afternoon (06:50 – 13:50, Mon-Sat). A self-service ticket machine is provided for use outside of these times and for collecting advance purchase tickets. A pay phone and post box are available, along with shelters on each platform and toilets in the booking hall (the latter open only when the station is staffed). Train running information is offered via customer help points, CIS displays, automatic announcements and timetable posters. Step-free access is available to both platforms via ramps, though the footbridge linking them has steps.[7]
Services
As of May 2022, there is a basic two-hourly frequency in each directions (with peak extras), to Inverness northbound and Aberdeen southbound (12 trains southbound, 11 northbound). The first departure to Aberdeen each weekday and Saturday continues south to Edinburgh Waverley, and another continues to Stonehaven in the evening. On Sundays there are five trains each way.[8]
| Preceding station | National Rail |
Following station | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Insch | ScotRail Aberdeen to Inverness Line |
Keith | ||
| Historical railways | ||||
| Rothiemay Line open; Station closed |
Great North of Scotland Railway | Gartly Line open; Station closed | ||
References
- Brailsford 2017, Gaelic/English Station Index.
- Deaves, Phil. "Railway Codes". railwaycodes.org.uk. Retrieved 27 September 2022.
- Butt (1995), p. 125
- Bridge, Mike, ed. (2017). TRACKatlas of Mainland Britain: A Comprehensive Geographic Atlas Showing the Rail Network of Great Britain (3rd ed.). Sheffield: Platform 5 Publishing Ltd. p. 101. ISBN 978 1909431 26 3.
- Vallance, H. A. (January 1954). "The Great North of Scotland Railway". Railway Magazine pp. 43–51. Retrieved 16 May 2017.
- Scott, W. J. (January 1898). "Little and Good". Railway Magazine p. 22. Retrieved 16 May 2017.
- "National Rail Enquiries - Station facilities for Huntly". www.nationalrail.co.uk. Retrieved 19 August 2022.
- eNRT May 2022 Edition, Table 214
Bibliography
- Brailsford, Martyn, ed. (December 2017) [1987]. Railway Track Diagrams 1: Scotland & Isle of Man (6th ed.). Frome: Trackmaps. ISBN 978-0-9549866-9-8.
- Butt, R. V. J. (October 1995). The Directory of Railway Stations: details every public and private passenger station, halt, platform and stopping place, past and present (1st ed.). Sparkford: Patrick Stephens Ltd. ISBN 978-1-85260-508-7. OCLC 60251199. OL 11956311M.
- Jowett, Alan (March 1989). Jowett's Railway Atlas of Great Britain and Ireland: From Pre-Grouping to the Present Day (1st ed.). Sparkford: Patrick Stephens Ltd. ISBN 978-1-85260-086-0. OCLC 22311137.
- Jowett, Alan (2000). Jowett's Nationalised Railway Atlas (1st ed.). Penryn, Cornwall: Atlantic Transport Publishers. ISBN 978-0-906899-99-1. OCLC 228266687.
External links
