Richmond station was the terminus of the now disbanded Eryholme-Richmond branch line. The station and the line were built in 1846 by the York & Newcastle Railway Company. The station is a large collegiate type of building, unusual for G.T.Andrews, the architect, in being in medieval style. It has a cloister-like Gothic arcade, tall mullion windows, a gabled bay window, steep roofs, tall chimneys and parapets.
As late as the 1950s, 13 trains a day arrived from, and departed towards Darlington. The line survived the Beeching cuts mainly thanks to the military's use of the sub-branch line to Catterick Garrison. The passenger station at Richmond closed in 1968, the line continued to be used for occasional freight traffic until it finally closed on March 3, 1969.
Before the line was closed the station was included in the List of Buildings of Special Architectural or Historic Interest, and it is a Grade II* listed building.
The station complex consists of Station Bridge, re-named Mercury Bridge in 1975, the passenger terminus, the goods shed, engine shed, gas house, depot manager's house, Station Cottages and the station master's house. The houses were sold off and still survive. The goods shed was demolished but the rest of the railway infrastructure survives including the bridge which continues to form part of the main road between Richmond and Catterick Garrison, the A6136.
Eventually the passenger terminus became a popular Farm & Garden Centre, though it closed in 2001.
In 2003 a community-based project to regenerate Richmond Station was given the go ahead. The aims of the project, which was spearheaded by the Richmondshire Building Preservation Trust, were:
To provide activities and recreational spaces that will meet established local demands at affordable prices.
To include a limited number of commercial operations sufficient to generate an income to maintain the project and subsidise community activities on site.
To include at least one use that will attract substantial numbers of visitors to provide the building tenants, and (as a consequence) the building management, with income.
The building re-opened - named simply The Station - on 9 November 2007, with two cinema screens, a restaurant and caf©-bar, an art gallery, a heritage centre, a number of rooms for public use, and a range of artisan food-producers.
By Road: Central Richmond.
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