Stranraer railway station

Stranraer railway station (formerly known as Stranraer Harbour railway station) is a railway station that serves the town of Stranraer, Dumfries and Galloway, Scotland. The station is 94.5 miles (151 km) southwest of Glasgow and is the terminus of the Glasgow South Western Line. It has two platforms (although only one of these is currently in use) and is staffed on a part-time basis. Stranraer station remains owned by Stena Line and not Network Rail.

Stranraer Scottish Gaelic: An t-Sròn Reamhar[1]
156 434 at Stranraer
General information
Location	Stranraer, Dumfries and Galloway Scotland
Coordinates	54.9093°N 5.0249°W / 54.9093; -5.0249
Grid reference	NX062613
Managed by	ScotRail
Platforms	2 (1 in use)
Other information
Station code	STR
History
Original company	Portpatrick Railway
Pre-grouping	Portpatrick and Wigtownshire Joint Railway
Post-grouping	London Midland and Scottish Railway
Key dates
1 October 1862	Opened as Stranraer Harbour
by 1996[2]	Renamed Stranraer
Passengers
2019/20	65,862
2020/21	9,014
2021/22	31,858
2022/23	40,138
2023/24	31,866
Notes Passenger statistics from the Office of Rail and Road

The station is located on the east pier of Stranraer Harbour, formerly used by ferry services to Northern Ireland.

History

Passengers have just arrived on the train and transfer to the ferry in 1978

Stranraer Harbour station in August 1980

The station was opened on 1 October 1862 by the Portpatrick Railway;^[3] however, the current station buildings date from 1877^[4] under the Portpatrick Railways Act 1877. The original facility was a concrete platform. Passengers and mail were meant to use the station at Portpatrick. The Portpatrick ferry service was never successful as, despite its apparently attractive location and significant initial investment, the harbour there was unsuitable as it was too small and insufficiently sheltered.

A ferry service had commenced by 1861 but passengers made their way from Stranraer Town station to the steamers, not Stranraer Harbour station. The first daily ferry service started on 1 October 1862 to Larne and was provided by PS Briton. However, it only lasted until 31 December 1863.^[5] Originally named Stranraer Harbour,^[3] the station name was simplified to Stranraer by 1996.^[2]

The Stena Line ferry service to Larne was moved to Belfast on 12 November 1995. P&O Ferries still sails there from nearby Cairnryan. Stena stopped serving Stranraer on 21 November 2011, having invested £200 million on a new route to Loch Ryan Port, near Cairnryan.^[6] ScotRail has cut services to Stranraer since the ferry services started departing from further up Loch Ryan^[6] and ferry passengers who travel by rail now face a long journey to Ayr by bus.

The line that runs from Stranraer station was temporarily closed between August and November 2018 due to the closures of platform 3 and 4 of Ayr station. This was caused by the adjacent hotel building that was found to be structurally unsound, which was then subsequently secured and services then resumed.^[7]

Services 2023

Due to the first fire at Ayr Station Hotel, an emergency timetable operated from the station and as a result there were only 2 train to/from Girvan departing at 0704 and 1305 Monday to Saturdays and 1041 and 1441 on Sundays, All other services were cancelled and replaced by buses to Girvan and Ayr.

All services from Stranraer to Girvan, Ayr and Glasgow were reinstated as of July 2024.

Bus link to Cairnryan ferry terminals

In September 2013 a bus link, route 350 operated by McLeans, was introduced between the railway station and the P&O Ferries and Stena Line ferry terminals at Cairnryan.^[8] The bus also serves the centre of Stranraer. Note this service meets all trains but does not operate on Sundays. As of 2017 the 350 service was rerouted and no longer calls at Stranraer station.^[9]

Preceding station	National Rail			Following station
Terminus		ScotRail Glasgow South Western Line		Barrhill
	Historical railways
Terminus		Caledonian, Glasgow & South Western, Midland and London North Western Railways Portpatrick and Wigtownshire Joint Railway		Castle Kennedy Line open; station closed
	Ferry services
Cairnryan		Stena Line Ferry		Port of Belfast
Cairnryan		P&O Ferries Ferry		Larne Harbour

Future

The station is the southern terminal of the South West Scotland Community Rail Partnership^[10] which comprises local Community Councils, representation from South Ayrshire Council, ScotRail as well as private individuals. SWSCRP has adopted the station and has provided tubs, shrubs and plants. These are tended to by South West Scotland Station Adopters Gardening Group.

Plans by Dumfries & Galloway Council, to close the station and replace it by a new structure a few hundred metres further east to create a new transport hub for Stranraer have been ditched and the ring-fenced money used on other projects. On 21 November 2011, Stena Line operations ceased at Stranraer and were transferred a few miles up Loch Ryan to Cairnryan.^[11]

See also

• Stranraer Town railway station

References

Notes

1. Brailsford 2017, Gaelic/English Station Index.
2. Baker 1996, p. 70, section C1
3. Butt 1995, p. 222
4. Thorne 2005, p. 90
5. "History". Port of Larne. Retrieved 24 January 2011.
6. Jamieson, Teddy (19 November 2011). "End of an era as Stranraer ferry sails for new waters". The Herald. Herald & Times Group. Retrieved 20 November 2011.
7. "20/12/18: Services return to normal at Ayr station | ScotRail". www.scotrail.co.uk.
8. "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 21 October 2013. Retrieved 20 October 2013.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
9. "Secret launch of another Stranraer service". 17 December 2020.
10. "South West Scotland Community Rail Partnership - What we do" Retrieved 14 November 2017
11. "MiniWeb: South West of Scotland Transport Partnership (SWESTRANS) - Strategy". Archived from the original on 2 June 2008.

Sources

• Baker, S.K. (1980) [1977]. Rail Atlas of Britain (3rd ed.). Oxford: Oxford Publishing Company. ISBN 0-86093-106-4.
• Baker, S.K. (2007) [1977]. Rail Atlas - Great Britain & Ireland (11th ed.). Oxford Publishing Company. ISBN 978-0-86093-602-2.

• Baker, Stuart K. (1996) [1977]. Rail Atlas Great Britain & Ireland (8th ed.). Yeovil: Oxford Publishing Co. ISBN 0-86093-534-5. T534.
• Brailsford, Martyn, ed. (December 2017) [1987]. Railway Track Diagrams 1: Scotland & Isle of Man (6th ed.). Frome: Trackmaps. ISBN 978-0-9549866-9-8.
• Butt, R. V. J. (October 1995). The Directory of Railway Stations: details every public and private passenger station, halt, platform and stopping place, past and present (1st ed.). Sparkford: Patrick Stephens Ltd. ISBN 978-1-85260-508-7. OCLC 60251199. OL 11956311M.
• Jowett, Alan (March 1989). Jowett's Railway Atlas of Great Britain and Ireland: From Pre-Grouping to the Present Day (1st ed.). Sparkford: Patrick Stephens Ltd. ISBN 978-1-85260-086-0. OCLC 22311137.
• Thorne, H. D. (2005). Rails to Portpatrick. Wigtown: G.C. Books. ISBN 1-872350-63-1.

External links

• Video and narration on Stranraer (Harbour) Railway Station.
• Photographic record of Stranraer (harbour) railway station and approach.
• A train at Stranraer Harbour Station