Leighton Buzzard railway station

Leighton Buzzard railway station serves the Leighton Buzzard and Linslade area of Bedfordshire and nearby parts of Buckinghamshire. Actually situated in Linslade, the station is 64 km north west of London Euston and is served by London Midland local services from Northampton to London on the West Coast Main Line. Until the 1960s the station was the start of a branch to Dunstable and Luton, with a junction just north of the present station. There have been past proposals about reopening this route, as little of it has been lost to new construction, either for rail or as a guided busway.

Page's Park railway station, terminus for the Leighton Buzzard Railway (a narrow gauge heritage railway), is on the opposite side of the town.

History
The first station simply known as Leighton was opened by the London and Birmingham Railway on 9 April 1838 as part of the first section of its line from London Euston to Denbigh Hall. The line had originally been planned to pass through Buckingham but opposition from the Duke of Buckingham ensured that it forced east through Linslade. A station with two-facing platforms was opened a ¼-mile south of the Linslade tunnels. These are arranged unusually for a four track main line: the southbound slow line has a tunnel to itself as does the northbound fast line, however the northbound slow and southbound fast lines share a tunnel. This stems from the fact that the line was built as double-track and when quadrupled, the two extra lines could only be placed along both sides, as single-track tunnels.

In May 1848, the station became a junction when a branch line to Dunstable was opened. The London and North Western Railway replaced the first station in February 1859 by another more permanent structure located 8 chain to the south. The new building had an imposing frontage featuring arched windows. Access to the Dunstable branch was controlled by Leighton No. 2 signal box situated to the north of the station, while the actual branch signals were controlled by the main line box to the south. In 1874, land was purchased to the south of the station alongside the Dunstable branch for the construction of goods sidings, which eventually became known as Wing Yard.

The LNWR was absorbed by the London, Midland and Scottish Railway in the 1923 railway grouping and, in 1927, it added a crossover between the fast and slow lines. This was to play a significant role in the derailment of Royal Scot No. 6114 "Coldstream Guardsman" at Linslade on 22 March 1931 when the driver took the crossover at 50-60 mph instead of the regulation 15 mph. There had been a diversion in place on the fast lines and the driver had missed the warning signals. The engine overturned and six people were killed including the driver and fireman. The Great Train Robbery of 1963 occurred just south of this station, at near Ledburn, at a bridge on the southbound stretch towards Cheddington. Wing Yard was closed in February 1967 and it is now used as a car park, while the branch to Dunstable was closed from June. In 1989, the platforms were lengthened to accommodate 12-coach trains and a £1.8m project to rebuild the station was started.

Services
The station is served by London Midland and Southern, and is managed by the former. Southbound, three London Midland trains depart per hour on weekdays, one of which sometimes runs non-stop to London. Additionally, one Southern train per hour runs to South Croydon. Northbound, two trains an hour run to Milton Keynes Central, one from each operator. A third train runs to Northampton, whilst the fourth runs to either Rugby or Birmingham New Street.

Other information
The station played host to a tragic event on 11 April 2011 when a 43 year old woman named Sarah James, from Uxbridge, Middlesex, kissed an elderly passenger aboard the 16.25 Northampton to London Euston service which was approaching the station from the north, and set fire to herself within the confines of a train toilet with a can of explosive gas. The train immediately stopped at the station and the passengers were evacuated. The unusual suicide method caused great distress to the passengers and closed the West Coast Mainline for several hours whilst emergency services attended to the fire.