Swanage railway station is a railway station located in Swanage

Swanage

Swanage is a coastal town and civil parish in the south east of Dorset, England. It is situated at the eastern end of the Isle of Purbeck, approximately 10 km south of Poole and 40 km east of Dorchester. The parish has a population of 10,124 . Nearby are Ballard Down and Old Harry Rocks,...

, on the Isle of Purbeck

Isle of Purbeck

The Isle of Purbeck, not a true island but a peninsula, is in the county of Dorset, England. It is bordered by the English Channel to the south and east, where steep cliffs fall to the sea; and by the marshy lands of the River Frome and Poole Harbour to the north. Its western boundary is less well...

 in the English

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

 county of Dorset

Dorset

Dorset , is a county in South West England on the English Channel coast. The county town is Dorchester which is situated in the south. The Hampshire towns of Bournemouth and Christchurch joined the county with the reorganisation of local government in 1974...

. Originally the terminus of a London and South Western Railway

London and South Western Railway

The London and South Western Railway was a railway company in England from 1838 to 1922. Its network extended from London to Plymouth via Salisbury and Exeter, with branches to Ilfracombe and Padstow and via Southampton to Bournemouth and Weymouth. It also had many routes connecting towns in...

 (L&SWR) branch line from Wareham

Wareham, Dorset

Wareham is an historic market town and, under the name Wareham Town, a civil parish, in the English county of Dorset. The town is situated on the River Frome eight miles southwest of Poole.-Situation and geography:...

, the line and station were closed by British Rail

British Rail

British Railways , which from 1965 traded as British Rail, was the operator of most of the rail transport in Great Britain between 1948 and 1997. It was formed from the nationalisation of the "Big Four" British railway companies and lasted until the gradual privatisation of British Rail, in stages...

 in 1972. It has since reopened as a station on the Swanage Railway

Swanage Railway

The Swanage Railway is a long heritage railway in the Purbeck district of Dorset, England. The railway follows the route of the Purbeck branch line between Norden railway station, Corfe Castle railway station, Harman's Cross railway station, Herston Halt railway station and Swanage...

, a heritage railway

Heritage railway

thumb|right|the Historical [[Khyber train safari|Khyber Railway]] goes through the [[Khyber Pass]], [[Pakistan]]A heritage railway , preserved railway , tourist railway , or tourist railroad is a railway that is run as a tourist attraction, in some cases by volunteers, and...

 that currently runs from Norden station

Norden railway station

Norden railway station is a railway station located half a mile to the north of the village of Corfe Castle, on the Isle of Purbeck in the English county of Dorset. It is the northern-most station on Swanage Railway, a heritage railway that currently operates from Norden to Swanage...

 just north of Corfe Castle to Swanage station.

History

Swanage lies at the tip of the Isle of Purbeck, a peninsula

Peninsula

A peninsula is a piece of land that is bordered by water on three sides but connected to mainland. In many Germanic and Celtic languages and also in Baltic, Slavic and Hungarian, peninsulas are called "half-islands"....

 bordered by the English Channel

English Channel

The English Channel , often referred to simply as the Channel, is an arm of the Atlantic Ocean that separates southern England from northern France, and joins the North Sea to the Atlantic. It is about long and varies in width from at its widest to in the Strait of Dover...

 to the south, and by the marshy lands of the River Frome

River Frome, Dorset

The River Frome is a river in Dorset in the south of England. At 30 miles long it is the major chalkstream in southwest England. It is navigable upstream from Poole Harbour as far as the town of Wareham.-Geography:...

 and Poole Harbour

Poole Harbour

Poole Harbour is a large natural harbour in Dorset, southern England, with the town of Poole on its shores. The harbour is a drowned valley formed at the end of the last ice age and is the estuary of several rivers, the largest being the Frome. The harbour has a long history of human settlement...

 to the north and east. Since the 12th century, the area around Swanage has been well known for the Purbeck Marble

Purbeck Marble

Purbeck Marble is a fossiliferous limestone quarried in the Isle of Purbeck, a peninsula in south-east Dorset, England.It is one of many kinds of Purbeck Limestone, deposited in the late Jurassic or early Cretaceous periods....

 that was mined locally and shipped out by sea. The presence of this industry, together with the Purbeck Ball Clay

Purbeck Ball Clay

Purbeck Ball Clay is a concentration of ball clay found on the Isle of Purbeck in the English county of Dorset.-Geology:The main concentration of ball clay in Dorset is to the north of the Purbeck Hills centred around Norden. Ball clays are sedimentary in origin...

 works in the area to the north, attracted railway promoters once the L&SWR main line reached Wareham in 1847.Several schemes were promoted and failed, but eventually the Swanage Railway received its Act

Act of Parliament

An Act of Parliament is a statute enacted as primary legislation by a national or sub-national parliament. In the Republic of Ireland the term Act of the Oireachtas is used, and in the United States the term Act of Congress is used.In Commonwealth countries, the term is used both in a narrow...

 in 1881 and opened on the 20th May 1885.

Swanage station was constructed with two platform tracks, on either side of a single passenger platform. The longer of these tracks had a run round loop, and was flanked by a station building built in the grey Purbeck stone. A single track goods shed

Goods shed

A goods shed is a railway building designed for storing goods before or after carriage in a train.A typical goods shed will have a track running through it to allow goods wagons to be unloaded under cover, although sometimes they were built alongside a track with possibly just a canopy over the door...

 provided facilities for general merchandise, and a turntable

Turntable (railroad)

A railway turntable is a device for turning railroad rolling stock. When steam locomotives were still in wide use, many railroads needed a way to turn the locomotives around for return trips as their controls were often not configured for extended periods of running in reverse and in many...

, coaling stage and single track locomotive shed

Roundhouse

A roundhouse is a building used by railroads for servicing locomotives. Roundhouses are large, circular or semicircular structures that were traditionally located surrounding or adjacent to turntables...

 were provided for use by the steam locomotive

Steam locomotive

A steam locomotive is a railway locomotive that produces its power through a steam engine. These locomotives are fueled by burning some combustible material, usually coal, wood or oil, to produce steam in a boiler, which drives the steam engine...

s that operated the line. In order to handle the anticipated volumes of stone traffic, a four track goods yard was constructed. One of the lines in the goods yard was extended as a tramway running in a narrow alley behind Station Road to a stone store near the waterfront. This tramway should not be confused with the earlier Swanage Pier Tramway

Swanage Pier Tramway

The Swanage Pier Tramway was a narrow gauge tramway in the port town of Swanage, in the English county of Dorset.From the 12th century, the Swanage area was well known for the quarrying of Purbeck Marble, actually a hard wearing form of limestone...

 that linked nearby stone stores to a pier in Swanage Bay.

Towards the end of the 19th century, Swanage started to develop as a tourist resort. Through coaches and through trains were operated to Swanage from both London

London

London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...

 and from the industrial towns of the Midlands

English Midlands

The Midlands, or the English Midlands, is the traditional name for the area comprising central England that broadly corresponds to the early medieval Kingdom of Mercia. It borders Southern England, Northern England, East Anglia and Wales. Its largest city is Birmingham, and it was an important...

 and North of England. To accommodate this traffic, the station was extensively altered in 1937, with extensions to the station buildings using matching materials and in a design blending well with the 1885 original. The new facilities provided a parcels office, ticket office, a waiting hall, a newsagents shop, and an extended goods shed. However the use of lorries to transport the Ball Clay, Purbeck Stone, and Portland Stone, and the increase in private car ownership in the second half of the 20th century eventually made the line unprofitable. Closure was first proposed in 1967, and despite local opposition the line finally closed on the 3rd January 1972.

After closure, a strong campaign was waged to allow the railway to reopen both as an independent community railway linking with the main line at Wareham

Wareham, Dorset

Wareham is an historic market town and, under the name Wareham Town, a civil parish, in the English county of Dorset. The town is situated on the River Frome eight miles southwest of Poole.-Situation and geography:...

 and as a steam locomotive

Steam locomotive

A steam locomotive is a railway locomotive that produces its power through a steam engine. These locomotives are fueled by burning some combustible material, usually coal, wood or oil, to produce steam in a boiler, which drives the steam engine...

 operated heritage railway

Heritage railway

thumb|right|the Historical [[Khyber train safari|Khyber Railway]] goes through the [[Khyber Pass]], [[Pakistan]]A heritage railway , preserved railway , tourist railway , or tourist railroad is a railway that is run as a tourist attraction, in some cases by volunteers, and...

. The Swanage Railway began operating a steam service at the Swanage end of the line in 1982. The passenger station, goods shed and locomotive facilities have been restored to their 1937 configuration, although the goods yard is now the site of a supermarket

Supermarket

A supermarket, a form of grocery store, is a self-service store offering a wide variety of food and household merchandise, organized into departments...

.

Services

Services run every day from the beginning of April to late October, with weekend only operation in March, November and December. The level of service varies from 6 to 17 trains a day in each direction, depending the season and the day of the week. Northbound, trains operate to stations at Herston (trains stop only on request), Harman's Cross (10 mins), Corfe Castle

Corfe Castle railway station

Corfe Castle railway station is a railway station located in the village of Corfe Castle, in the English county of Dorset. Originally an intermediate station on the London and South Western Railway branch line from Wareham to Swanage, the line and station were closed by British Rail in 1972...

 (20 mins), and Norden

Norden railway station

Norden railway station is a railway station located half a mile to the north of the village of Corfe Castle, on the Isle of Purbeck in the English county of Dorset. It is the northern-most station on Swanage Railway, a heritage railway that currently operates from Norden to Swanage...

 (23 mins).

Facilities

• Birds Nest Buffet - Open daily.
• Railway Shop - Selling railway books and paraphernalia, open daily.
• Bus Station - Three bus stops where all of Swanage's bus services terminate