In 1836 the York & North Midland Railway (YNM) was authorised to construct a 32-mile railway from York to Normanton. The line was part of a trunk route that was being created by four companies (the YNM, the North Midland Railway [NMR], the Birmingham & Derby Junction Railway and the London & Birmingham Railway) between York and Euston (London). At Normanton the YNM connected to the NMR. A connection with the Leeds & Selby Railway (L&S) was also authorised. A driving force behind the YNM was George Hudson who was also Mayor of York and the engineer appointed to construct the line was George Stephenson. Because other railway schemes were in the process of being developed, including the Great North of England Railway (GNER) which would link Newcastle and York, Stephenson wanted to build a station at York outside the city walls. George Hudson, however, wanted the station to be within the walls as he felt that would be more prestigious. The walls had only recently been saved from demolition and breaching them for a railway had to be dealt with sensitively. As a result the line was ready before the station was complete.
The first section of the YNM line opened between York and York Junction (on the L&S) on 30 May 1839. To serve it a temporary station was erected at Queen Street just outside the city walls. The features of the temporary station are not known however it was probably a timber construction that could easily be removed once the permanent station opened.
The section of line between York Junction and Normanton came into use on 1 July 1840.
On 4 January 1841 the permanent station opened and the temporary one was closed. It is likely that any structures that did exist would have been quickly removed.
Sources:
- Awdry, C British railway companies (Guild Publishing,1990)
- Clinker, C R Clinker’s register of closed passenger stations and goods depots in England, Scotland and Wales 1830-1977 (Avon-Anglia,1978)
- Cobb, M H The Railways of Great Britain – vol.1 (Third Edition) (Author, 2015)
- Quick, Michael Railway passenger stations in Great Britain - a chronology (RCHS, 2009 and on-line supplements)
- Simmons, Jack & Biddle, Gordon The Oxford Companion to British Railway History (Oxford University Press, 1997)
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