Reigate railway station

Reigate railway station serves the town of Reigate, Surrey, England, on the North Downs Line. The station is managed by Southern, which use it as one of their termini and provide an hourly direct service to London Victoria.

History
The original Reigate stations were located two miles from the town centre in a hamlet then known as Warwick Town but which later became Redhill. Red Hill and Reigate Road station was opened by the London and Brighton Railway on 12 July 1841. The nearby town was then served by a horse-drawn omnibus service operated by the railway. This was followed on 26 May 1842 by the South Eastern Railway (SER) Red Hill station (later misleadingly renamed 'Reigate'). Both these stations closed on 15 April 1844 when a new joint Redhill and Reigate station opened on the site of the present Redhill railway station.

The current Reigate station opened 4 July 1849 with the opening of the branch line from Redhill to Reigate by the Reading Guildford and Reigate Railway. It was then called Reigate Town. The station was operated by the SER until 1898, the South Eastern and Chatham Railway until 1922, the Southern Railway (UK) until 1947 and British Railways until 1997.

The line to Redhill to Reigate was electrified 1 January 1933 but the remainder remains unelectrified.

Station building
The buildings on the north side are original, dating from 1849.



The station is 24 mi from Charing Cross, and has two platforms; platform 1 is long enough for an eight-coach train, but platform 2 only accommodates four coaches. The platforms are connected by a subway. Westbound services to Dorking, Guildford and Reading always leave from the south platform (2); so too do eastbound services to Redhill and London that start from Reigate. Eastbound through services to Redhill and Gatwick Airport leave from platform 1.

Southern
Southern currently operates an hourly train to and from London Victoria which terminates at Reigate. These trains call at Redhill, East Croydon and Clapham Junction. This service does not run on Sundays.

Great Western Railway
Great Western Railway operates two trains per hour westbound to Reading (one stopping, one semi-fast) and two trains per hour eastbound to Redhill, of which one continues to Gatwick Airport.

Westbound, the semi-fast service calls only at Dorking (Deepdene), Guildford, North Camp, Blackwater, Wokingham and Reading. This service starts from Gatwick Airport. The stopping service's calling points alternate every two hours as follows:

This service starts from Redhill.

Similarly, eastbound, the stopping service runs only to Redhill (non-stop), while the semi-fast service continues to Gatwick Airport.

In peak hours the stopping service calls at all stations in both directions.

On Sundays the service is hourly in each direction. Eastbound, all off-peak trains continue to Gatwick Airport. Westbound, trains alternate each hour between:
 * running semi-fast to Guildford, then stopping at all stations to Reading;
 * stopping at all stations to Guildford, then running semi-fast to Reading.

Signal box
The station also incorporates a signal box, built in 1929 to replace an earlier box at the other end of the station. This remained in use in 2016 to operate the Level crossing gates.

Notes and references

 * Notes
 * References