Bookham railway station
Location | Great Bookham, District of Mole Valley England |
---|---|
Grid reference | TQ127556 |
Managed by | South Western Railway |
Platforms | 2 |
Other information | |
Station code | BKA |
Classification | DfT category E |
History | |
Opened | 1885 |
Passengers | |
2016/17 | 0.332 million |
2017/18 | 0.321 million |
2018/19 | 0.322 million |
2019/20 | 0.291 million |
2020/21 | 45,452 |
Notes | |
Passenger statistics from the Office of Rail and Road |
Bookham railway station is in the village of Great Bookham in Surrey, England. It also serves the adjacent village of Little Bookham. It is 20 miles 45 chains (33.1 km) down the line from London Waterloo.
The station is managed by South Western Railway, which provides the majority of train services; Southern also provides some peak-period services.
History[]
Bookham railway station was opened on 2 February 1885; the line at the time was owned by the London and South Western Railway.[1][2]
Initially the London and South Western Railway wanted to build the line into the centre of Great Bookham village itself, but as often happened in those early days of rail expansion from London, the key landowners (and villagers) were strongly opposed to that idea and forced the company to adopt a much more northerly route, resulting in the station being built nearly one mile (1.6 km) from the village high street in open country.
It effectively remained in an open-field setting until the later 1950s/early 1960s when there was a massive expansion of the village, with new estates built to fill the space between the high street and station, leaving only National Trust-owned land as a "green corridor" along parts of Church Road.
The station buildings remain largely unchanged to this day, including the footbridge and platform canopies, however, the station master's house has been sold off as a private dwelling.
Immediately to the west of the station the original goods siding was removed in the 1960s and the associated goods shed (used as a coal depot by local businessman Howard Weale at that time) was finally demolished in the 1990s having lived on for a time as a builder's yard (Tredan) and then offices.
There are now scant landmarks to identify it as the original siding and goods yard. The siding area was for a period home to a blacksmith, but that land was sold for housing development, and where the shed once stood is now a purpose-built office block.
Services[]
South Western Railway operate all off-peak services at Bookham using Class 455 EMUs.
Until 2022, Class 456 trains were often attached to Class 455 units to form ten carriage trains, but these were withdrawn on 17 January with the introduction of a new timetable. [3]
The typical off-peak service in trains per hour is:[4]
- 2 tph to London Waterloo via Epsom
- 2 tph to Guildford
During the peak hours, the station is also served by a number of Southern services between Guildford and London Bridge via Sutton and West Croydon. These services run towards London in the morning peak and towards Guildford in the evening peak and are operated using Class 377 EMUs.[5]
Services are reduced to hourly in each direction on Sundays.
Preceding station | National Rail | Following station | ||
---|---|---|---|---|
Leatherhead | South Western Railway Mole Valley Line |
Effingham Junction | ||
Southern Sutton & Mole Valley Lines Peak Hours Only |
References[]
- ^ Butt, R.V.J. (1995). The Directory of Railway Stations. Yeovil: Patrick Stephens Ltd. p. 39. ISBN 1-85260-508-1. R508.
- ^ 'Parishes: Great Bookham', A History of the County of Surrey: Volume 3 (1911), pp. 326–35. URL: http://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.asp?compid=42976. Date accessed: 12 August 2007.
- ^ "SWR withdraws '456s' following service cuts". Rail. No. 949. 26 January 2022. pp. 10–11.
- ^ Table 152 National Rail timetable, May 2020
- ^ Table 182 National Rail timetable, May 2020
External links[]
- Train times and station information for Bookham railway station from National Rail
- Railway stations in Surrey
- Former London and South Western Railway stations
- Railway stations in Great Britain opened in 1885
- Railway stations served by Southern
- Railway stations served by South Western Railway