Location type

Name and dates

Description

This station is closed. The two storey station building remains standing although it has lost its platform canopy. It was a single platform station although there were two loops alongside the platform line and a siding on the east side, approached from the north. The goods yard was to the south of the station and on the west side, approached from the south. The signal box (1893) was at the south end of the platform. The station was very much associated with the Dalmellington Iron Works.

The railway initially opened here in 1849, a disconnected part of the proposed Ayrshire and Galloway Railway which ultimately became the Ayr and Dalmellington Railway opened in 1856.

The iron works was dependent on the railway, its connection to Ayr Harbour, local coal mines and the iron ore mines on the plateau above the iron works to the north. The iron company built many lines of its own to connect these various ore mines and needing to connect these to the works found itself building the first part of the Dalmellington line between Drumgrange Incline Foot [1st] (to the north west of Waterside) and Sillyhole Coal Pit Nos 1,2,3,4,5 (near Dalmellington) to the south east. Waterside station was later opened on this section in 1856 when the Ayr and Dalmellington Railway opened from Falkland Junction through Ayr Townhead station to Dalmellington taking over the Drumgrange to Sillyhole portion of line.

In the immediate vicinity of the station there was, just north of the station, a siding which ran from the north west into the Dalmellington Iron Works to reach the furnace bank foot. This line was looped and continued to rejoin the main railway to the south east of the works near Dunaskin Bridge. This south eastern portion was the original connection into the iron works.

The iron works closed in 1921, but Bairds and Dalmellington Limited kept the site in operation for the large private railway network connecting the coal mines to Waterside. The LMS were to build the exchange sidings, Cutler Sidings, close to Dunaskin Bridge and the Dunaskin Central Washery.

Waterside station, and the line from Dalrymple Junction to Dalmellington, closed to passengers in 1964. The box closed in 1968 and was replaced with a ground frame.

Traffic continued to the washery until 1986 when the line closed. The railway was retained and re-opened in 1989.

No coal traffic runs at present and the line remains in place but not in use.

Local

Nearby the Scottish Industrial Railway Centre is based by the former Dalmellington Iron Works.