Location type

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Note: text in square brackets is added for clarity and was not part of the location's name.

Description

This was a large station in the north of Ardrossan. The last of the site has been reused for housing (2017). This station was built in competition with the Glasgow and South Western Railway's Ardrossan Town station in the south of the town. It was built on reclaimed land of the North Bay. Similar substantial station buildings built in timber containing offices, waiting rooms etc could be found at Oban (with trainshed), Barnton and Kilbirnie [CR].

There were two through platforms on the line to Ardrossan Montgomerie Pier and, on the east side, two bay platforms. The bay platforms and circulating area were covered with a glazed roof and the through platforms heavily canopied. The station building had a tall tower. A goods line and marshaling sidings bypassed the station on the west side. A locomotive shed (Ardrossan Shed [CR]) and goods yard (Ardrossan North Goods) were to the north of the station.

There were two signal boxes. The box controlling the northern approach, Ardrossan North No 1, was close to Glasgow Street at the point where the lines divided into, from north to south: the locomotive shed, (then the box), station bypass, through passenger line, bay platform line and goods yard.

No 2 box controlled the southern approach. Here lines split into: goods lines, (then the box), passenger line to Ardrossan Montgomerie Pier, goods lines to the Eglinton Dock and on to join the G&SWR.

Ardrossan Refinery was developed by Shell on further reclaimed land on the west side of the station. This was rail served, an extension of the goods lines already on the west side of the station. Sidings entered the site at both its north and south ends.

The original station burned down in December 1898 and was replaced with a similar timber building with tudor styling.

The station closed in 1932. The canopies were re-used at Glasgow's Buchanan Street. The station building and disused platforms and lines remained intact for many years. The building succumbed in 1965. Even after the closure of Montgomerie Pier to boat trains lines gave access to the goods yard and refinery. The boxes were reduced to ground frames in 1969. Eastwards to Stevenston closed around 1968. The refinery lines and goods yard remained in operation.

After the station building was demolished its site became a bus garage.

The last lines, which were on the west side of the station for the refinery, were finally lifted in 1987. These were latterly served from the former G&SWR line.

Platforms were finally obliterated in 2017 with a housing development.

Proposals for a new station 'Ardrossan North' do not refer to re-opening this station, but to a new station on the Largs branch.

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