Aylesford railway station

51°18′05″N 00°27′58″E / 51.30139°N 0.46611°E / 51.30139; 0.46611Grid referenceTQ720586Managed bySoutheasternPlatforms2Other informationStation codeAYLClassificationDfT category F2HistoryOpened18 June 1856Passengers2018/19 0.162 million2019/20 0.166 million2020/21 41,4422021/22 0.118 million2022/23 0.109 million

Notes
Passenger statistics from the Office of Rail and Road

Aylesford railway station is on the Medway Valley Line in Kent, England, serving the village of Aylesford. It is 38 miles 74 chains (62.6 km) down the line from London Charing Cross via Strood and is situated between New Hythe and Maidstone Barracks. The station opened on 18 June 1856.

The station and all trains that serve the station are operated by Southeastern.

History

Aylesford was opened by the South Eastern Railway, which merged with local rival London, Chatham & Dover Railway on 1 January 1899 to form the South Eastern & Chatham Railway. The station became part of the Southern Railway during the grouping of 1923, and was passed on to the Southern Region of British Railways on nationalisation in 1948.

When sectorisation was introduced in the 1980s, the station was served by Network SouthEast until the privatisation of British Railways. On 21 October 1988, a plaque was unveiled at Aylesford in the presence of the Network SouthEast director, Chris Green, to commemorate completion of the project to restore the station building to its original 1856 condition.^[1] The project cost £250,000, £50,000 of which was contributed by the Railway Heritage Trust.^[1] During the ceremony, Green announced plans for a £4 million resignalling package for the Medway Valley line to replace the semaphore signals by a multi-aspect colour light system controlled from Maidstone West box.^[1]

The ticket office, in a building on the northbound platform, was closed in September 1989 and an Indian restaurant—now incorporating a fried chicken takeaway—was subsequently established in the building. In 2007, a permit to travel ticket machine was installed just inside the entrance to the station, on the northbound platform.^[2] In early 2016 the Permit to Travel machine was removed with plans to replace it with a ticket machine.^{[citation needed]}

Services

All services at Aylesford are operated by Southeastern using Class 375 EMUs.

The typical off-peak service in trains per hour is:^[3]

• 2 tph to Strood
• 2 tph to Paddock Wood via Maidstone West

A small number of morning, mid afternoon and late evening trains continue beyond Paddock Wood to Tonbridge.

On Sundays, the service is reduced to hourly in each direction.

Preceding station	National Rail			Following station
New Hythe		Southeastern Medway Valley Line		Maidstone Barracks

Station Building

The section of the line surrounding Aylesford Station passes through what was part of the Preston Hall Estate, the then home of Edward Betts, the railway contractor who built this part of the Medway Valley Line. Consequently, the station building is much grander than other country stations along the line. The station buildings are gabled and highly decorated, built in Kentish ragstone with Caen stone dressings, in part reflecting a simplified version of the style of Preston Hall. Windows replicate those at Aylesford Priory.

Following restoration and refurbishment, the station building received an Ian Allan award in 2001, commemorated by a plaque in the waiting room/booking office, which is now in use as an Indian Takeaway Restaurant.

References

Notes

Bibliography

• 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 (2000). Jowett's Nationalised Railway Atlas (1st ed.). Penryn, Cornwall: Atlantic Transport Publishers. ISBN 978-0-906899-99-1. OCLC 228266687.
• 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.
• Station on navigable O.S. map

External links

London Charing Cross to GillinghamLondon Victoria to Ramsgate
via ChathamLondon Victoria to Dover
via ChathamLondon Victoria to Ashford
via Maidstone EastLondon St Pancras to Paris & Brussels
High Speed 1London Charing Cross to Dover
via TonbridgeLondon Charing Cross to HastingsLondon Bridge to UckfieldAshford to Ramsgate
via Canterbury WestDover to MargateRedhill–TonbridgeSittingbourne to Sheerness-on-SeaAshford to St Leonards
MarshlinkStrood to Paddock Wood
Medway Valley Line

Heritage railways

East Kent RailwayKent & East Sussex RailwayRomney, Hythe & Dymchurch RailwaySpa Valley Railway