Alton Station
Alton Station is at the eastern end of our railway. Alton is still a part of the national network and electric trains operate a regular service to London Waterloo, as they have since 1937. These services use Platforms 1 and 2 while the Watercress Line uses Platform 3.
The present Alton station was built in 1865 for the opening of the Mid-Hants line. An earlier station, terminus of a branch line from Guildford which opened in 1852, was located in what is now the station car park. At one time the station had extensive sidings and covered a much larger area. A modern industrial estate now stands behind Platform 1 on the site of the old goods yard.
The main building and many of the structures on platforms 2 and 3 survive largely as built although the large signal box on Platform 1 closed in 1980 and was later demolished. The wooden footbridge linking Platforms 1 and 2, dating from around 1900, was closed in 2015 due to rot and subsequently removed, although the main span survives in storage elsewhere. Its replacement is a modern footbridge equipped with lifts.
Today the Platform 3 area represents the British Railways (Southern Region) [BR(SR)] era of the late 1950s/early 60s. The rest of the station is painted in green and cream to fit in with our colour scheme. The Watercress Line has added a toilet block on platform 3 in an appropriate period style and a replica “W.H. Smith” kiosk which is used as a refreshment counter and ticket office.
Looking east from Platform 3 you can see a number of sidings* used for rolling stock storage. These stand on what was once the site of a water tower and a turntable. Today, water for our steam locomotives is provided by a small combined “balloon” tank and water crane at the west end of the station. This is one of a pair recovered from Aldershot (the other is at Ropley). The corrugated iron shed by the water crane is the old oil store from Itchen Abbas, on the closed section of line between Alresford and Winchester, and is one of the few surviving relics of that station.
The Watercress Line’s signal box to the west of the station is believed to have originated at Bentley, the next station up the line to Farnham. For many years the wooden superstructure stood on platform 1 at Alton, where it served as the stationmaster’s office. Today it controls our colour light signals in the Alton area.
Small details to look out for are several signs advertising SOUTHERN ELECTRIC, BR period posters, the hotdog shaped signs on the platform lights known as totems and the staff uniforms with their BRITISH RAILWAYS cap badges. You may notice the latter are of three types, all (reasonably) legitimately worn on a BR station. The first depicts the early heraldic emblem of British Railways (a lion astride a wheel), the second type is in the shape of a totem and the third is a “fishtail” design.
* A siding is a length of track on which vehicles can be parked clear of the main running line.
