Place Cholsey Station code CHO DfT category E Opened 1841 | Grid reference SU584860 Managed by Great Western Railway 2011/12 0.204 million Number of platforms 5 Original company Great Western Railway | |
 | ||
Address Cholsey, Wallingford OX10 9LN, United Kingdom Similar Appleford railway station, Cholsey and Wallingfo, Radley railway station, Goring & Streatley railway st, Culham railway station | ||
Cholsey railway station (previously known as Cholsey and Moulsford railway station) serves the village of Cholsey in South Oxfordshire. The station is managed by Great Western Railway who operate local services to Oxford, Reading and London Paddington. Chosely is also the junction for the heritage railway services on the Cholsey and Wallingford Railway.
Contents
Layout
The station frontage building is on two levels, with station offices in the lower (street) level and the London bound waiting room on the upper (platform) level. There are two small car parks, one at street level in front of the station building, the other at platform level to the south of the station.
The station has platforms on each of the fast and relief (slow) lines, although the platforms on the fast lines see little use. It also has a terminal platform used by trains on the Wallingford line. The platforms are located on an embankment, with access to street level by stairs and a pedestrian underpass.
High-speed passenger and freight trains pass through platforms 1 – 4 with little or no warning. As with any station, it is advisable to keep a safe distance from the platform edge, particularly on platforms 1 and 2 as trains can pass through at speeds of up to 125 miles per hour (201 km/h).
History
The station is on the original line of the Great Western Railway, which opened on 1 June 1840. The original station, opened with the line and known as Wallingford Road, was several hundred yards further up the main line towards Goring & Streatley, just east of the point where the A329 road crosses the line (grid reference SU592851). Some of the original station buildings can still be seen at this point. On 2 July 1866 Wallingford Road station was renamed Moulsford and the branch to Wallingford was opened five days later; whilst the junction for this was at Moulsford station, the branch line track ran parallel to the main line for nearly 1 mile (1.6 km) before curving away.
In 1892, during quadrupling of the main line, the junction for Wallingford was resited closer to the point of divergence and a new station was built there. On 29 February 1892 the new station opened and Moulsford station closed.
The Wallingford branch closed to passenger trains in 1959 and to freight trains in 1981. Part of it is now preserved as the Cholsey and Wallingford Railway.
Services
Cholsey station is served by stopping services run by GWR between Reading and Oxford. Most of these services start or continue as semi-fast services between Reading and London Paddington and run twice hourly for most of the day, and hourly on Sundays. Typical journey times are approximately 20 minutes to Reading and Oxford, and just over 1 hour to Paddington.
Services on the volunteer-run Cholsey and Wallingford railway run intermittently, usually on weekends and bank holidays.