Furness Abbey railway station


Furness Abbey is a former railway station in the Barrow-in-Furness area of the Furness Peninsula, England.

Context

Furness Abbey Station was situated at the southern end of the Furness Abbey complex. It served the nearby local attraction, the ruins of Furness Abbey, the Furness Abbey Hotel and the few houses and farms scattered about the general area. The Cistercian Way, which begins at Furness Abbey is a walking trail to Dalton-in-Furness made famous by the poet William Wordsworth.

History

The Furness Railway was authorised in 1844 to build a line which would link Kirkby-in-Furness with Dalton-in-Furness. The railway was extended in places and subsequently took over the Whitehaven and Furness Junction Railway and the Ulverston and Lancaster Railway. The station at Furness Abbey was opened in 1846 and began receiving passengers from further afield in 1862. Passengers had already begun to travel from West Cumbria from 1850.

Services

Services stopped at Furness Abbey to allow passengers to use the Furness Abbey Hotel, owned by the railway company. All services north of Barrow had initially to travel back to Furness Abbey towards Dalton, where they reversed at Dalton Jcn and continued onto Askam. This practice eventually ceased in 1882, when the loop line to the new central Barrow station on Abbey Road was completed and trains could continue from there northwards to Askam without reversal.
The station was closed by British Railways shortly after nationalisation, on 25 September 1950 and was subsequently demolished. No trace of the station now remains.