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Keith railway station

Coordinates: 57°33′05″N 2°57′15″W / 57.5514°N 2.9542°W / 57.5514; -2.9542
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General information
LocationKeith, Moray
Scotland
Coordinates57°33′05″N 2°57′15″W / 57.5514°N 2.9542°W / 57.5514; -2.9542
Grid referenceNJ430516
Managed byScotRail
Platforms1
Other information
Station codeKEH[2]
Key dates
10 October 1856Opened
Passengers
2017/18Decrease 89,948
2018/19Decrease 81,112
2019/20Decrease 68,102
2020/21Decrease 10,934
2021/22Increase 47,084
Notes
Passenger statistics from the Office of Rail and Road

Keith railway station is a railway station serving the town of Keith, Moray, Scotland. The station is managed by ScotRail and is on the Aberdeen to Inverness Line, between Huntly and Elgin, measured 53 miles 8 chains (85.5 km) from Aberdeen, or 30 miles 20 chains (48.7 km) from Forres.[3]

History

The exterior of the station

The station was originally owned by the Highland Railway and was known as Keith Junction, the line from the west having opened by the Inverness and Aberdeen Junction Railway in 1858 and becoming part of the Highland Railway in 1865.[citation needed] It was the point where the line from Inverness made an end-on junction with the Great North of Scotland Railway from Aberdeen (which opened in 1856)[4] to enable exchange of goods and passengers. As built, it was located in the vee of the routes to Inverness and to Dufftown (which diverges to the southwest here) and had four platforms - one through one for each route, plus two east facing bays for GNSR services.[5] It was taken over by the London, Midland and Scottish Railway at the 1923 Grouping and then became part of the Scottish Region of British Railways upon nationalisation in 1948.

Today only a single platform remains in full-time use, though the Dufftown branch platform (numbered 1) is available if required for turning back trains from the Aberdeen direction (though no trains are scheduled to do so in the current timetable).[6] The bays have been filled in, having been abandoned and tracks lifted in the early 1970s after the closure of the Moray Coast Line (for which the station was a terminus). A signal box (which retains the name Keith Junction) remains at the eastern end to control a passing loop on the single track main line beyond the station, the now little-used goods yard (formerly used by trains accessing the nearby Chivas Regal whisky plant) and the stub of the Dufftown branch.

Keith's other station, Keith Town, was on the Great North of Scotland Railway branch line to Dufftown (first opened in 1862) and subsequently extended to Boat of Garten via Craigellachie - this was much nearer the centre of Keith than the Junction station.

The Dufftown and Craigellachie line was closed to passengers by British Railways in May 1968 as a result of the Beeching Axe, though freight traffic and latterly Northern Belle excursion trains to the distillery at Dufftown kept the route to there open until 1991.[citation needed] The line has since been preserved as the Keith and Dufftown Railway (reopening in 2000/01), but the link between it and the national network was severed by Railtrack in 1998 - two 60-foot track panels having been removed as a condition of the transfer of the branch to the K&DR.[7] The preservation society hopes to reinstate the connection and the still-extant but disused section beyond to Keith Town at some point in the future and run through trains from here to Dufftown, which would see platform 1 return to regular use. Discussions with regard to this were held between the K&DRA, the local MSP Richard Lochhead and Transport Scotland in the autumn of 2015.[8]

The old station buildings were replaced by new ones in 1988 in a rebuilding programme costing £200,000[9] (equivalent to £680,000 in 2023).[10]

Facilities

The station has good facilities for its rural location, with a part-time-staffed ticket office, accessible toilet, ticket machine, two car parks, bench, bike racks and help point. The station has four methods of step-free access.[11]

Passenger Volume

Passenger Volume at Keith[12]
2002-03 2004-05 2005-06 2006-07 2007-08 2008-09 2009-10 2010-11 2011-12 2012-13 2013-14 2014-15 2015-16 2016-17 2017-18 2018-19 2019-20 2020-21
Entries and exits 62,766 66,531 70,599 68,963 75,036 77,354 77,030 89,690 94,336 95,002 97,033 102,074 98,666 91,992 89,948 81,112 68,102 10,934

The statistics cover twelve month periods that start in April.

Services

As of May 2022, There is a basic two-hourly frequency in each directions (with peak extras), to Inverness northbound and Aberdeen southbound, giving a total of 11 trains each way. The first departure to Aberdeen each weekday and Saturday continues south to Edinburgh Waverley, and another continues to Stonehaven in the evening. On Sundays there are five trains each way.[6]

Preceding station National Rail National Rail Following station
Huntly   ScotRail
Aberdeen to Inverness Line 		  Elgin
  Historical railways  
Strathisla Mills   Great North of Scotland Railway
Keith and Dufftown Railway 		  Terminus

Future Proposals

In addition to the potential reinstatement of the Dufftown branch, Transport Scotland have published proposals to improve the facilities here. This could see the existing passing loop extended through the station and a second platform built north of the current one.[13] Other upgrades planned for the station include a bus interchange, taxi drop-off point and car park extension.[14]

References

  1. ^ Brailsford, Martyn, ed. (December 2017) [1987]. "Gaelic/English Station Index". Railway Track Diagrams 1: Scotland & Isle of Man (6th ed.). Frome: Trackmaps. ISBN 978-0-9549866-9-8.
  2. ^ Deaves, Phil. "Railway Codes". railwaycodes.org.uk. Retrieved 27 September 2022.
  3. ^ Bridge, Mike, ed. (2017). TRACKatlas of Mainland Britain: A Comprehensive Geographic Atlas Showing the Rail Network of Great Britain (3rd ed.). Sheffield: Platform 5 Publishing Ltd. p. 101. ISBN 978 1909431 26 3.
  4. ^ Timeline of the Great North of Scotland RailwayThe LNER Encyclopedia; Retrieved 2013-12-19
  5. ^ GNSRA Stations GalleryGreat North of Scotland Railway Association; Retrieved 2013-12-19
  6. ^ a b eNRT May 2022 Edition, Table 214
  7. ^ Keith & Dufftown Railway - Keith Junction Archived 20 December 2013 at the Wayback MachineKeith & Dufftown Railway; Retrieved 2013-12-19
  8. ^ "Campaign to reconnect whisky railway to main lines" Robertson, John The Press and Journal news article 9 October 2015; Retrieved 19 August 2016
  9. ^ "Keith Railway Station Re-opened". Aberdeen Press and Journal. Scotland. 20 August 1988. Retrieved 13 November 2021 – via British Newspaper Archive.
  10. ^ UK Retail Price Index inflation figures are based on data from Clark, Gregory (2017). "The Annual RPI and Average Earnings for Britain, 1209 to Present (New Series)". MeasuringWorth. Retrieved 7 May 2024.
  11. ^ "National Rail Enquiries -". www.nationalrail.co.uk. Retrieved 19 August 2022.
  12. ^ "Estimates of station usage | ORR Data Portal". dataportal.orr.gov.uk. Retrieved 19 August 2022.
  13. ^ "Transport Scotland - Appendix D - Keith Station" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 19 December 2013. Retrieved 19 December 2013.
  14. ^ "Keith Station in line for improvements"The Northern Scot; Retrieved 2013-12-19
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