Comments on: Friday Photo: Old West Kirby Station

By: Andrew

Andrew — Mon, 10 Oct 2011 21:26:45 +0000

Ah….happy memories! I spent many very happy hours at the old ‘joint’ station. I remember that each Monday, the train drivers changed and if you were lucky, you could get a ride on the engine when it ran round the track for its return journey to Hooton.RAF personnel used the station for journeys to Hooton and the Queen used the line on a visit to Cadburys at Moreton.

Whilst I love walking along the Wirral Way, I cannot help wishing that the line had become a preserved steam railway. The scenic route the line took would surely have attracted many visitors.

By: mason edwards

mason edwards — Sun, 18 Sep 2011 17:57:28 +0000

Thanks for the chance to see these fascinating photographs. I remember the old railway station at West Kirby too. I even went on a steam train from it. A school friend lived in Caldy right next to the station and I caught the train from West Kirby to his house…. to play with his Hornby-Dublo train set!

We used to visit my grandparents who lived in Grafton Walk at the top of Grange Hill on Sunday and on that day the trains did not run. The engine and I think just one or maybe two coaches were “parked” for the day at West Kirby station. Once the Royal train made a visit to Wirral (in the 50s?) and the train came along the Wirral line from the Meols direction and then through the old West Kirby station and along the line towards Hooton. I think it then joined the Great Western line and made its way back to Paddington, London. Birkenhead Woodside was the terminus for this classic London route. (not via Meols or Hooton, that was just a one-off for the Royal train).

Chris Hankin might remember this.. I believe I went to school with him at Calday Grammar.
Hi Chris!

By: Clive Grey

Clive Grey — Mon, 22 Aug 2011 10:35:01 +0000

On the old Joint Station and the Joint line to Hooton: I have this distinct early memory

from about 1966 of a large turntable right below the old Grange Road bridge which the steam

engines used. Totally overgrown but still very unusual to see.

Incidentally just checking the July 1922 Bradshaw: of the 14 trains leaving West Kirby on

weekdays all but one terminated at Hooton. The 8.20am however was a fast train to Woodside,

calling all stations to Heswall, then non-stop to Rock Ferry and arriving Woodside at

9.03am. It seems this was the only ‘express’ service to run on the line at the time. There

was also a Sunday service then.

By June 1948, eight years before passenger traffic on the line ceased, nearly all the 15

trains ran round to Woodside, but some return journeys could take as long as an hour and 12

minutes to cover the 19 miles back to WK. The Sunday Service had ended.

Years ago someone told me there were once through coaches from West Kirby to Paddington at

one point. I wonder whether anyone can confirm this? Gordon Suggitt’s book ‘Lost Railways

of Merseyside and Greater Manchester’ refers to through coaches to Euston from the old

station up to 1939.

By: Peter Absalom

Peter Absalom — Mon, 23 Aug 2010 21:42:37 +0000

I remember frequent family departures from this station in the 1940′s and 50′s for holidays with my grandparents in Wales – slow and stately journey through to the terminus at bleak Hooton Junction where, after often a chilly wait, one joined a train on to Ruabon. The West Kirby to Hooton branch line was known locally as the “New and Expeditious” – in deference to a faded sign, proudly displayed for many years outside the station, which, until it mouldered away with age, read something like “Announcing a New and Expeditious route to Chester…….” By my day, the route was by no means new and had never been expeditious!

The wayside stations such as Kirby Park, Caldy and Thurstaston, were little enough frequented and very basic in their facilities – Caldy station platform still lit by oil lamps.

Near Kirby Park, the line ran past my father’s allotment and my sister and I used to amuse ourselves by placing pennies on the line and then standing back to watch the train (which could be heard coming for miles) turn them into impressively larger discs of copper.