Shipley Great Northern Railway branch line information

Shipley Great Northern Railway branch line
Shipley Great Northern Railway branch line
	The former GNR Shipley and Windhill Station viewed looking south east from the present Shipley railway station (former Midland railway owned)
Overview
Status	Closed
Owner	Great Northern Railway
Locale	West Yorkshire
Termini	Shipley and Windhill railway station; Laisterdyke railway station (Bradford Exchange railway station);
Stations	4
Service
Type	Branch
Operator(s)	Great Northern Railway
History
Opened	1874/1875
Closed	1931/1964/1968
Technical
Line length	6.5 miles
Number of tracks	1
Track gauge	4 ft 8+1⁄2 in (1,435 mm)

Shipley Great Northern Railway branch line

Legend

Airedale line

to Bradford Forster Square

Airedale line

to Skipton

Shipley and Windhill

Shipley

Great Northern yard

Wharfedale line

to Guiseley

Airedale line

to Leeds

Thackley

Idle

Eccleshill

Calder Valley line

to Leeds

Pudsey loop

to Dudley Hill & Leeds

Laisterdyke

Great Northern avoiding line

to Bowling

Queensbury Lines

Adolphus Street

St Dunstans

Calder Valley line

to Halifax

Bradford Interchange

Bradford Exchange

The Shipley Great Northern Railway branch line was a railway line that ran east, south and then westwards from Shipley to Bradford in West Yorkshire, England. The route was opened in 1874 to goods traffic and then to passengers in 1875 by the Great Northern Railway (GNR) and looped around the eastern edge of Bradford. The GNR arrived after other railways had been established in the West Yorkshire area and many of their lines were heavily reliant on tunnels and grand viaducts, the Shipley and Windhill line being an exception to this, although it did have some steep gradients. The branch extended for 8.5 miles (13.7 km) between the two terminuses of Shipley Windhill and Bradford Exchange. The route as built from Laisterdyke to Shipley was actually only 6.5 miles (10.5 km)^[1] as the initial section from Bradford Exchange to Laisterdyke was already in existence as part of the Great Northern Railway's line to Leeds.

The Midland Railway Company offered a shorter route between Shipley and Bradford (Forster Square) due southwards via Bradford Dale on the valley floor at a distance of only 2.5 miles (4 km).^[2]^{[note 1]} The Shipley Great Northern Railway branch line was amalgamated into the London & North Eastern Railway in 1923 and became part of the North Eastern Region of British Rail in 1948.

^ Grinling, Charles (1898). "XVIII The Zenith of Prosperity". The History of the Great Northern Railway 1845 - 1895. London: Methuen & Co. p. 299. Retrieved 8 February 2016.
^ Jacobs, Gerald (2006). Railway Track Diagrams - Eastern (3 ed.). Bradford-On-Avon: Trackmaps. p. 43. ISBN 0-9549866-2-8.

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[:3-1] Grinling, Charles (1898). "XVIII The Zenith of Prosperity". The History of the Great Northern Railway 1845 - 1895. London: Methuen & Co. p. 299. Retrieved 8 February 2016.

[2] Jacobs, Gerald (2006). Railway Track Diagrams - Eastern (3 ed.). Bradford-On-Avon: Trackmaps. p. 43. ISBN 0-9549866-2-8.

Shipley Great Northern Railway branch line information

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