Location type

Name and dates

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

Description

This was a single platform terminus. The former station still exists, today in use as a series of shops and units. The station served the spa town of Strathpeffer which was very popular with the Victorians, even giving rise to a dedicated express train to the town (the Strathpeffer Spa Express from Aviemore). The station building is a single storey in timber with a large glazed canopy over the platform, similar to that at Dingwall. The station was approached from Fodderty Junction and Dingwall to the east.

The platform was on the north side of a loop. This platform was 154 yards long with a timber extension at its east end of 40 yards. At the buffer end was a coach length of platform on the south side. There was a water column, the water tank was south of the east end of the platform, over the line and west of the signal box.

The goods yard was on the north side. There was a loading bank in the north of the yard and goods shed behind the passenger platform close to the station building.

The signal box, opened wit the station in 1885, was on the south side of the loop, at its east end.

The station replaced Strathpeffer [1st] which was inconvenient being some way to the east and at a higher level than the road and town. This older station was on the alignment forced upon the railway by a local landowner and the town which did not want a railway running through it. This has resulted in the town not being served by a railway, following the closure of both stations, and a long climb to Raven Rock Summit from both directions on the Kyle line.

There were a number of hotels in the town. The Highland Railway were to build their own hotel Highland Hotel [Strathpeffer] which remains open.

The box closed in 1936, replaced with a ground frame.

A marshalling yard, Fodderty Junction Yard, was established close to the junction to facilitate the carriage of heavy mines traffic westwards over Raven Rock Summit and on to Kyle of Lochalsh in the Second World War.

The timber part of the platform was removed in 1948/49.

The line closed in 1951 and was dismantled by a contractor based in Motherwell.

The Museum Coffee Shop is located in the station alongside the Highland Museum of Childhood .

The Strathpeffer Spa Railway Association wishes to reinstate the railway on the largely intact trackbed, and build a locomotive shed and museum. The ticket office would be within the former station building. With a connection to the main line steam services could operate to both Dingwall and Kyle of Lochalsh from the base at Strathpeffer.

Local

Strathpeffer Pavillion

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