Milestone anniversary for Calderdale station as commemorative board unveiled
A commemorative board has been unveiled to celebrate a milestone anniversary of a Calderdale train station.
Dignitaries could be seen on Platform 1 at Sowerby Bridge Train Station yesterday (Tuesday) as the community celebrated the 150th anniversary of the re-siting of the station.
A commemorative information board was unveiled by Virginia Lloyd, DL, along with Coun Mike Payne, Chair of the Friends of Sowerby Bridge Railway Station group (FOSBRS), Coun Andrew Tagg, Mayor of Calderdale, representatives of Northern train network, as well as members of FOSBRS, including Secretary Charles Adams.
A second commemorative board was also installed further down the platform, which read: “Sowerby Bridge Station, re-sited here, 1st September 1876.”
Dozens of community members celebrated the milestone by enjoying tea and coffee in the station’s Jubilee Refreshment Rooms, where they could watch a Calder Valley Rail Partnership film and listen to a presentation about the station’s history and its re-siting.
The present station was opened by the Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway on September 1, 1876, and replaced an earlier station which was approximately one third of a mile to the west — now the Tesco car park.
According to FOSBRS, the main station buildings of the 1876 structure were damaged in a fire in 1978 and demolished in 1980.
A booking office was subsequently created within the surviving parts of the building, which later became the Jubilee Refreshment Rooms.
Formed in 2010, the FOSBRS group has around 70 members and maintains a number of planters and green spaces around the station, as well as installing information boards around the platforms.