Princes Risborough

Princes Risborough station is a railway station on the Chiltern Main Line that serves the town of Princes Risborough in Buckinghamshire, England. It is operated by Chiltern Railways.

History
At one period there were four different railway routes from the northern end of Princes Risborough station, although there has only ever been one to the south.

The first railway to reach Princes Risborough was the Wycombe Railway, which opened its Oxford extension from Wycombe as far as Thame on 1 August 1862; there were two intermediate stations on this section: Princes Risborough and Bledlow. A branch of the Wycombe Railway was opened from Princes Risborough to Aylesbury on 1 Oct 1863. The Wycombe Railway was worked by the Great Western Railway, and was absorbed by that railway in 1867.

The Watlington and Princes Risborough Railway opened its line on 15 August 1872; that railway became part of the GWR on 1 January 1884.

The Great Western & Great Central Joint Committee was created with the dual objective of providing the Great Central Railway with a second route into London, bypassing the Metropolitan Railway; and of providing the GWR with a shorter route to the Midlands. Central to this scheme was the upgrading of the existing GWR route between High Wycombe and Princes Risborough, which was transferred to the Joint Committee at its establishment on 1 August 1899. The line was extended in a north-westerly direction to Ashendon Junction, at which point the joint line ended, and a GCR route ran northwards to Grendon Underwood Junction, just south of Calvert; both sections opened for goods on 20 November 1905, and for passengers on 2 April 1906. Continuing in the same north-westerly direction from Ashendon Junction, the Bicester cut-off line, which was purely GWR property, was opened for goods trains on 4 April 1910, and to passengers on 1 July 1910.

The Watlington branch closed to passengers on 1 July 1957, and the route to Thame (and Oxford) closed on 7 January 1963; those over the GCR route ended on 5 September 1966, leaving the present network of two lines to the north, to Banbury and to Aylesbury.

The station was transferred from the Western Region of British Rail to the London Midland Region on 24 March 1974.

Chiltern Railways considered reopening the Oxford line, but it is not part of their current plans.

Part of the Watlington line has been reopened by the Chinnor and Princes Risborough Railway, which plans to extend its heritage railway service to an unused platform face at Princes Risborough station.

Princes Risborough station currently has 3 platforms: Platform 1 for Aylesbury; platform 2 for London and Aylesbury; platform 3 for Banbury, and Birmingham. Originally, the station had 4 platforms; two on the mainline to/from London and Birmingham; one for the branch to Oxford or Watlington; and one to Aylesbury. The station also had two fast mainlines running through the middle of the station, one of which, the 'up' line, will be restored by February 2011 as part of Chiltern's Evergreen 3 upgrade project. At one time the station only had two usable platforms, the current platforms 1 and 2. This is due to the radical cuts on the Chiltern Main Line and Great Central Main Line in the 1960s. Chiltern Railways rebuilt the down platform in 1998 to increase capacity on the line, but this is on the old fast down mainline. The original down platforms are still visible from the station.

Services and operators


A single weekday service from London Paddington serves the station, departing at 11:12 hrs (as of July 2008), running non-stop to Gerrards Cross. It traverses the rarely used former main line between Northolt Park Junction and Old Oak Common Junction, in many places reduced to a single track. This section is used more frequently by freight and waste trains, and also diversions during engineering works. There is an equivalent service towards Paddington arriving there at 10:43 hrs, but this train starts some way to the south at Gerrards Cross.

Facilities
The ticket office is staffed for much of the day and a PERTIS (permit to travel) ticket machine is located (3/09) on the London-bound platform for use when un-staffed. There are also 2 passenger operated ticket vending machines.