Corby railway station

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This article or section contains information about a planned or expected future railway station. It may contain information of a speculative nature and the content may change dramatically as the construction and/or completion of the railway station approaches, and more information becomes available.

Corby
Location
Place	Corby
Local authority	Corby
Operations
Managed by	East Midlands Trains
Platforms in use	1
History
1879	Opened
1966-1967	Closed
1987	Reopened
1990	Closed
2008 (proposed)	Reopened
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Corby line
Legend Oakham Birmingham to Peterborough Line Manton Welland Viaduct Harringworth Gretton Corby Midland Main Line Glendon Parkway Kettering

Corby railway station served the town of Corby in Northamptonshire, England. The station closed in 1966, but was reopened in 1987, only to close again in 1990. Plans have recently been drawn up to reopen the station, and possibly the line north to Oakham, with a provisional opening date of December 2008.

[edit] History

Corby station opened in 1879^[1] and closed in April 1966. It was on the Midland Railway's "alternative route" between Kettering and Nottingham, bypassing the present main line via Market Harborough, Leicester and Loughborough and passing through Corby, Oakham and Melton Mowbray instead. The station was initially named "Weldon and Corby" to avoid confusion with Corby Glen station in Lincolnshire.^[1] Corby, along with other stations along the line, closed to passengers in May 1967. Corby is currently the largest town in Europe without a railway station.^[2]

The Oakham – Melton Mowbray section remains open to passengers as part of the Peterborough to Leicester line, and the line south through Corby remains open for freight - it passes through the 1,920 yard Corby Tunnel just north of the town, and still further north still it crosses the colossal 82-arch Welland Viaduct. The line as far as Corby was singled in 1987. On 13 April 1987 a passenger service was reintroduced with 11 shuttle trains running daily between Corby and Kettering, usually operating using a single DMU. The service was initially subsidised by the Council and there were ambitious plans to extend it to Leicester.^[1] However, despite the fact that more than 100,000 people used the service within the first 12 months^[1], it became irregular and unreliable, leading to the withdrawal of subsidies by the Council and the ceasing of passenger services on 2 June 1990. A local pressure group, "Corbyrail", unsuccessfully campaigned against closure.

[edit] Reopening

[edit] Proposals

A plan was put forward to include the Kettering–Corby line in a cross-country service from Swindon to Peterborough, but this came to nothing.^[3] In 2001, Midland Mainline, the rail operator in the county, decided against building a station for Corby. In 2003, Corby’s urban regeneration company, Catalyst Corby, announced plans to build a new station by 2011.^[4]

More positive news came in June 2006 when the Department for Transport (DfT) informed prospective bidders for the new East Midlands rail franchise - bringing together Midland Mainline services from London St Pancras and the eastern section of the Central Trains network - that they would have to include in their tenders a price for a service to a new station in Corby. The DfT's East Midlands rail franchise consultation noted that Corby had been targeted for substantial housing growth over the course of the franchise and the provision of a station would be in line with the Sustainable Communities Plan. A new service for the town could be formed as an extension of the hourly London to Kettering train service.^[5]

[edit] Announcements

In April 2007 Network Rail announced that it had allocated £1.2 million towards the rebuilding of the station as a response to housing and jobs growth in the county. A final decision on the station, which could be open by December 2008, would be made by the DfT.^[6] On 22 June the Dft confirmed that Stagecoach had won the franchise and revealed that the company – operating as East Midlands Trains (EMT) – would run an extra hourly London - Kettering service, with the possibility of extending this to a new station in Corby.^[7] This would put Corby within 75 minutes of central London.^[8]

An article in the June 2008 edition of the railway industry magazine Modern Railways,^[9] produced in cooperation with EMT, suggests that from December 2008 Corby could be served by trains leaving St Pancras for Kettering at 8 minutes past each hour. However, pending the removal of infrastructure constraints – notably, the need for Network Rail to reinstate a third track between Wellingborough and Kettering and raise the line speed between Corby and Kettering – an hourly through service to and from Corby will be unfeasible initially (trains being unable to make the run from Kettering to Corby and back within the projected timings). Therefore, with the possible exception of some peaktime services, the connection to and from Corby would have mostly to be provided by a shuttle service, with a change of trains at Kettering. For this, EMT would need to lease additional rolling stock (the article speculates that this could be stock cascaded from Hull Trains). In addition, DfT approval of the hourly Kettering service was still awaited.

[edit] Design and construction

Site clearance works in March 2008. The platform remaining from the old Midland station can just be seen at the right of the picture, below some 'British Rail lights', from the period when the station was briefly open in the 1980s.

The North Northants Development Company and English Partnerships submitted plans for the design of the station in late July 2007 and detailed planning permission was granted by the Council in November. The Development Company predicted that the new station will unlock an estimated £200 million pounds of further commercial investment in Corby, creating more than 1,200 jobs. It added that the station will also provide added impetus for residential development and aid the transformation of town centre shopping and civic facilities.^[10]

The entire project will cost up to £3 million and construction is due to begin in June 2008 following the conclusion of an agreement with Kettering construction firm Mainline Contractors. The station will be built at Station Road adjacent to the site of the old station and will act as a transport interchange for Corby with bus and taxi facilities being relocated here.^[11] A new road will lead into the interchange which will also have a 140-space car park, taxi rank, drop-off and pick-up areas and a bus area.^[12][13] Site clearance works began in March 2008 and should be completed by the summer.

The station will be the second to be built to the modular station design developed by Network Rail, following Mitcham Eastfields station.^[14] There has been criticism of the design by the Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment which has stated that "[t]here is no evidence of strong design thinking and little indication to suggest the concept has been considered as an integrated whole. This can be read in the awkward junction between the station building and the canopy and poor siting of the railings and street furniture in relation to the station structure. There is also a lack of finesse to the elevations, as illustrated by the mismatch between doors and panels. Taken together, these shortcomings lend the station an ungainly and impoverished form."^[15] An artist's impression of what the station could look like can be seen on the website of the local MP[1].

[edit] Services north

East Midlands Trains, a subsidiary set up by Stagecoach to run the East Midlands rail franchise, is looking into the possibility of operating a service north to Oakham and beyond from 2010.^[16]

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• Catalyst Corby's plans for Station Gateway Business Park and the station
• Corby Borough Council