Blaenau Festiniog Junction railway station

Blaenau Festiniog Junction railway station (also known as Stesion Fain railway station) was the Festiniog Railway (FR)'s third of eventually five passenger stations in Blaenau Ffestiniog, then in Merionethshire, now in Gwynedd, Wales.

Blaenau Festiniog Junction
Location	Blaenau Ffestiniog, Gwynedd Wales
Coordinates	52.9956°N 3.9445°W
Grid reference	SH 695 460
Platforms	1[1][2]
Other information
Status	Disused
History
Original company	Festiniog Railway
Key dates
1 April 1881	Opened
18 September 1939	Closed[3][4]

Conwy Valley line
Llandudno Deganwy North Wales Coast Line to Holyhead Llandudno Junction North Wales Coast Line to Crewe Glan Conwy Tal-y-Cafn Dolgarrog North Llanrwst Llanrwst Betws-y-Coed Pont-y-Pant Dolwyddelan Roman Bridge Ffestiniog Tunnel Blaenau Ffestiniog (Pantyrafon) Ffestiniog Railway to Porthmadog Harbour Blaenau Festiniog Junction Blaenau Ffestiniog North Blaenau Ffestiniog Trawsfynydd nuclear power station Bala & Festiniog Railway to Bala Junction

Context

The evolution of Blaenau's passenger stations was complex, with five different railway companies providing services to the area.

History

Stesion Fain opened on 1 April 1881 between Tanygrisiau and the line's northern terminus at Duffws (FR). It was aimed primarily at exchange traffic with the LNWR's Conwy Valley Line station which opened a few yards away on the opposite side of North Western Road[5][6][7] on the same day. Target customers could be travelling from (say) Porthmadog to Llandudno or from Betws-y-Coed to Tan-y-Bwlch. A few could be travelling from (say) Rhyl via Llandudno Junction to Duffws (FR), using the FR for the last leg.

Naming

The station's nameboards declared the station to be Blaenau Festiniog Junction,[8] with the anglicised single "F", but

• the station was not at or near a passenger junction
• locally it was known as "Stesion Fain" (Narrow Station), often misspelled as "Stesion Fein"
• in FR material and Bradshaw's FR timetable it appeared as "Blaenau Festiniog (L&NW)" (i.e. connection for the LNWR)[9][10]
• Bradshaw's LNWR timetable mentions it only by inference by citing a page number.[11][12]
• One authoritative source refers to the station as "Blaenau Ffestiniog exchange" (lower case "e")[4] whilst another uses "Blaenau Ffestiniog Exchange (LNWR)"[13]

Interchange traffic

The FR sought to tap custom not only from Blaenau Ffestiniog itself, but also its wider connections. It co-operated with the LNWR whose permanent northern terminus was an underarm stone's throw away on the opposite side of North Western Road. Timetabling was sympathetic; in 1910, for example, three of the FR's four non-workmen's trains from Porthmadog Harbour arrived between 27 and 42 minutes before an LNWR train headed north, giving a traveller from (say) Tan-y-Bwlch a good chance of getting to Dolgarrog even if his first train was 15 minutes late.[14] Bradshaw may have been mealy-mouthed about the proximity of the FR station, but the LNW station boasted a very large station nameboard proclaiming "BLAENAU FESTINIOG CHANGE HERE FOR NARROW GAUGE LINE TO MINFFORD AND PORTMADOC".[15][16] The FR's 1936 timetable for "Tourist" trains stated they "formed suitable connections with the L.M. and S. and G.W. Coys. in both directions at Blaenau Festiniog."[17]

Station buildings

The station had one very low platform, similar to that at Duffws (FR), a metal waiting shelter with a slate roof and small buildings at both ends,[18] with that at the Tan-y-Grisiau end containing a refreshment room,[19] opposite and a few yards west of which stood a slate water tower topped with a metal tank.[20][13][21][22][23]

The wilderness years

The station stood derelict for some years after closure in 1939, being progressively demolished by the elements, vandals and eventually officialdom. The water tower lived a charmed life, outliving the station buildings.[24][25][26] The site seemed doomed when road alterations buried a stretch of the track in 1963.[27][28][29] In 1956 the waiting shelter was dismantled and re-erected for use by spectators at Manod Football Club,[30][31][32] though it was replaced in turn in the 2000s by a more modern structure.

For a period in the 1970s the FR locomotive "Princess" was mounted on a plinth at the station site as a symbol of remembrance and intention to return.[33][34][35]

Modern times

The station site was a serious contender for the location of the Ffestiniog Railway's return to Blaenau, the location remained as first built, back-to-back with the ex-LNWR Blaenau Ffestiniog North which was the town's sole surviving station from 1960. In the event, in 1982 both British Railways (BR) and the FR opened wholly new stations on the site of Blaenau Ffestiniog Central, meaning that the line through Blaenau Festiniog Junction was reinstated, but the station was not. The site is commemorated with a raised flowerbed.[36]

Preceding station		Disused railways		Following station
Tanygrisiau Line closed, station open		Festiniog Railway Narrow gauge		Duffws (FR) 1881-1883
				Blaenau Festiniog (GWR/FR) 1883-1939

Gallery

• "Tunnel mouth, Blaenau Ffestiniog North & Stesion Fain". Britain from Above.
• "Tunnel mouth, Blaenau Ffestiniog North & Stesion Fain". Britain from Above.
• "Blaenau Ffestiniog North & Stesion Fain". Britain from Above.
• "Stesion Fain and Blaenau LMSR". Archive Images.

References

1. "Stesion Fain". flickr.
2. Stretton 1999, pp. 16-18.
3. Butt 1995, p. ???.
4. Quick 2009, p. 89.
5. "Both stations in 1950". Newton Abbot Rly Studies.
6. Mitchell & Smith 2010, Map XX and Plate 59.
7. Rear 1991, Map opposite Plate 15.
8. Stretton 1999, p. 16.
9. Bradshaw 1968, p. 477.
10. Bradshaw 1985, p. 584.
11. Bradshaw 1968, p. 471.
12. Bradshaw 1985, p. 462.
13. Prideaux 1982, p. 21.
14. Bradshaw 1968, pp. 471 and 477.
15. Rear 1991, Plate 16.
16. Mitchell & Smith 2010, Plate 59.
17. Boyd 1975, p. 606.
18. Boyd 1975, Plates 13h, 13R & 41H.
19. Stretton 1999, pp. 48-49.
20. Welbourn 2000, p. 67.
21. Rear 1991, Plate 11.
22. "Blaenau Ffestiniog Central, Junction (Stesion Fain) and North in 1955". YouTube.
23. "Train for Duffws at the station c1901". Francis Frith.
24. Peddie 2014, p. 43, mis-captioned as "The terminus".
25. "The water tower long after closure". flickr.
26. Clemens 2014, 1 hr 8 mins from start.
27. Mitchell & Smith 2010, Map XX.
28. Rear 1991, Plate 24.
29. "The partially buried station". D J Norton.
30. "Stesion Fain canopy at Manod FC". Britain from Above.
31. Richards 2001, p. 112.
32. Stretton 1999, pp. 49.
33. "Princess on a plinth on the station site". flickr.
34. "Princess and water tower at the station site". Geograph.
35. "Princess on her plinth with trackbed". Geograph.
36. "The station's history". Festipedia.

Sources

• Boyd, James I.C. (1975) [1959]. The Festiniog Railway 1800 - 1974; Vol. 1 - History and Route. The British Narrow Gauge Railway. Blandford: The Oakwood Press. ISBN 978-0-85361-167-7. OCLC 2074549. B1A.
• Boyd, James I.C. (1975) [1959]. The Festiniog Railway 1800 - 1974; Vol. 2 - Locomotives and Rolling Stock; Quarries and Branches: Rebirth 1954-74. The British Narrow Gauge Railway. Blandford: The Oakwood Press. ISBN 978-0-85361-168-4. OCLC 874117875. B1B.
• Butt, R. V. J. (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.
• Bradshaw, George (1968) [April 1910]. April 1910 Railway Guide. Newton Abbot: David and Charles. ISBN 978-0-7153-4246-6. OCLC 30645.
• Bradshaw, George (1985) [July 1922]. Bradshaw's General Railway and Steam Navigation guide for Great Britain and Ireland: A reprint of the July 1922 issue. Newton Abbot: David and Charles. ISBN 978-0-7153-8708-5. OCLC 12500436.
• Clemens, Jim (2014) [1959]. Steam to North Wales (DVD). Uffington, Shropshire: B&R Video Productions. Vol 136.
• Mitchell, Vic; Smith, Keith (2010). Bala to Llandudno: Featuring Blaenau Ffestiniog. Midhurst: Middleton Press (MD). ISBN 978-1-906008-87-1.
• Peddie, Donald (2014). A North Wales Railway Travelogue. Lydney: Lightmoor Press. ISBN 978-1-899889-92-1.
• Prideaux, J.D.C.A. (1982). The Welsh narrow gauge railway: A pictorial history (2nd ed.). Newton Abbot: David and Charles. ISBN 978-0-7153-8354-4.
• Quick, Michael (2009) [2001]. Railway passenger stations in Great Britain: a chronology (4th ed.). Oxford: Railway and Canal Historical Society. ISBN 978-0-901461-57-5. OCLC 612226077.
• Rear, W.G. (1991). Conway Valley Line - Blaenau Ffestiniog to Llandudno Junction. Scenes from the Past, Railways of North Wales. Stockport: Foxline Publishing. ISBN 978-1-870119-14-6. No. 12.
• Richards, Alun John (2001). The Slate Railways of Wales. Llanrwst: Gwasg Carreg Gwalch. ISBN 978-0-86381-689-5.
• Stretton, M.J. (1999). Ffestiniog Railway in Camera: One Hundred Years 1871-1971. Penistone: Challenger Publications. ISBN 978-1-899624-40-9.
• Welbourn, Nigel (2000). Lost Lines: British Narrow Gauge. Shepperton: Ian Allan Publishing. ISBN 978-0-7110-2742-8.

Other material

• Boyd, James I.C. (1988) [1972]. Narrow Gauge Railways in South Caernarvonshire – Volume 1. Headington: The Oakwood Press. ISBN 978-0-85361-365-7. OCLC 20417464.
• Southern, D. W. (1995). Bala Junction to Blaenau Ffestiniog (Scenes from the Past, Railways of North Wales, No. 25). Stockport: Foxline Publishing. ISBN 978-1-870119-34-4.

External links

• "The station on navigable OS Maps". National Library of Scotland.
• "The station and line". Rail Map Online.
• "The station site after demolition". Old UK Photos.