Balerno railway station
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Balerno | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 The site of Balerno Goods station in 1962 with the old goods shed | |||||
| General information | |||||
| Location | Edinburgh Scotland | ||||
| Grid reference | NT163670 | ||||
| Platforms | 1 | ||||
| Other information | |||||
| Status | Disused | ||||
| History | |||||
| Original company | Caledonian Railway | ||||
| Pre-grouping | Caledonian Railway | ||||
| Post-grouping | London Midland and Scottish Railway | ||||
| Key dates | |||||
| 1 August 1874 | Station opens[1] | ||||
| 1 November 1943 (Last train) | Station closes (LMS Last train)[1][2] | ||||
| 1 June 1949 | Station closes (BR Officially)[1] | ||||
| 4 December 1967 | Line closes to goods traffic | ||||
| |||||
Balerno railway station was opened in 1874 and served the area of the village of Balerno that now forms part of the city of Edinburgh. Although primarily built as a goods line, with a dedicated goods station at Balerno, serving the many mills on the Water of Leith, a passenger service was provided by the Caledonian Railway using the Balerno Loop and after grouping by the London, Midland and Scottish Railway, seeing formal closure to passenger traffic shortly after nationalisation. The station was the only one with a separately served goods station on the 'loop' line and lay in rural surroundings that had been popular with families having a day out in the country.
Opened by the Caledonian Railway, it became part of the London Midland and Scottish Railway during the Grouping of 1923, and the LMS ran the last train to serve the station in 1943 with the expectation that the line would re-open after the war. The line passed to the Scottish Region of British Railways upon nationalisation in 1948 who then officially closed Balerno in 1949. The line had many tight curves and the low line speeds made it vulnerable to competition from road transport.
