Canterbury West

Kent Rail

Canterbury West

Since ancient times, Canterbury has been an important location in Kent - both religiously and in terms of market trade. Throughout Tudor times and beyond, the City had for long relied on the River Stour for exports of goods, notably crops and cattle. However, over time the river - a vital connection between Canterbury and the Thames - became chocked with silt, hindering shipping along the water. The silting occurred to the extent that the Stour could only be used by vessels as far as Fordwich, two and a half miles to the north east of the city. A canal built between Ashford and Whitstable via Canterbury was eventually considered in 1811 as an alternative trading waterway as opposed to the Stour, but this never came to fruition. The dawn of the railway age would finally give rise to a new mode of land transport to assume the silting river's responsibilities.

In 1823, one William James advocated the possibility of a railway between Canterbury and the fishing village of Whitstable, the latter proposed for serving as a port for exporting goods brought up from the former. Subsequently, an Act passed on 10th June 1825 formed a concern known as the ''Canterbury & Whitstable Railway Company'' to build a single track line, little over six miles, between the two locations. With a final estimation £31,000 being required to construct the line, George Stephenson (whom was brought in to assist William James), enlisted the services of his colleague Joseph Locke to actually oversee the laying of the track. Completion came within just under five years, when a formal opening ceremony took place on 3rd May 1830 to commission Kent's first passenger railway. Passenger traffic commenced the following day, worked by the sole steam locomotive owned by the company: an 0-4-0 outside cylinder engine named ''Invicta'' (the Roman name for Kent). The locomotive, built by the line engineer's son Robert Stephenson, was short-lived due to it being too large for the single-bore 1012 yard tunnel through Tyler Hill, in addition to being underpowered to handle the 1 in 25 gradient into Canterbury. Thereafter, the line was worked by stationary steam engines using a cable system until more modern motive power arrived as a new company came on the scene: the South Eastern Railway.

On 7th February 1844 the SER began running direct London to Dover trains on completion of its main trunk route between Redhill and the English Channel port, via Tonbridge and Ashford. Between London Bridge and Redhill, the company was forced to utilise the metals of the London & Brighton and London & Croydon Railways, as explained in this website's London Bridge section. During the construction of the Dover main line, the rapidly expanding SER began looking at extending its railway network into Thanet to serve the growing seaside resorts of Margate and Ramsgate, not least the en-route Cathedral City of Canterbury. The SER's progress began in this area with it acquiring the Canterbury & Whitstable in 1844, and then being granted permission by an Act on 23rd May 1844 to build a thirty-four mile branch between Ashford and Margate, via Canterbury. The City was reached by the double-track line from Ashford on 6th February 1846. A connecting line between the Whitstable branch and the SER station was fully commissioned in 1846, where a bay platform was provided. The original Canterbury & Whitstable terminus in North Lane (200 yards south of the SER buildings) closed in the same year. The route to Margate opened throughout on 1st December 1846. The Canterbury & Whitstable lived on in memory with a record to its name: the railway was the world's first to issue season tickets.

July 1988

John Horton has kindly submitted this selection of pictures for inclusion, depicting the station at a time when

semaphore signals were still in use. Network SouthEast-liveried 4 Cep No. 1572 was observed trundling into the

station on a Ramsgate to Charing Cross service, via the Tonbridge cut-off line. The signal box is in fact a

product of the SE&CR, having been built by this company during the London Bridge station enlargement works

of 1901. It was similarly suspended across the tracks on that section of line which ran between Cannon Street

West Junction and Waterloo Junction (Waterloo East). John Horton

July 1988

Now beyond the signal box, 4 Cep No. 1533 was pictured approaching the station, the unit, too, forming a

Ramsgate to Charing Cross service. In this year, trainshed dismantling had begun at the London terminus,

in readiness for comprehensive redevelopment. Note the splendid array of semaphore signals, which were

replaced by colour aspect lights during the Summer of 2004. John Horton

July 1988

4 Cep No. 1590 was seen departing Canterbury West for Ramsgate, as it approached the level crossing which

resides approximately a third of a mile north of the station. The fourth track on the far right of this view

forms a station avoiding loop, passing behind the ''down'' platform. John Horton

Next: the History Continues >>

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