Autumn is always bad, trees down, floods… Now we endure trains with not enough coaches, hitting commuters and weekend trippers. Not everyone clings to their cosy car. Train overcrowding is an issue even on Sundays.
We see two-car trains on the Blackpool-York line and other segments of our service. “Normal” should be three, four or more on what should be Northern’s top link, and on other Calder Valley trains such as Leeds-Chester.
Hadrag received an encouraging initial reply from Northern Trains on our shopping list of urgent needs for Halifax station. We also had a good opening conversation with West Yorkshire Combined Authority (WYCA) people who were at a recent stakeholder conference run by Northern, followed by a written response.
Key demands are summarised in the table below. Hadrag’s six-page report is based on observations at the station by Hadrag’s secretary Peter Stocks, and chair Stephen Waring.
| Improved safety all areas | Traffic and tripping hazards on approach bridge. Crowding on platform. Stairway needs clear one-way system and central handrail. Narrow section of P2 curves the “wrong” way. Hazard when passing crowds. People need to move along. |
| More information screens | Existing one on P2 invisible from most of platform. Needs coordinating with where passengers are asked to wait. Additional info screens (3 or 4 extra are needed) at S end of platform showing both next trains info and list of next few trains. Maybe one outside station entrance. |
| Better toilets | Present single unit is modern in a sense but vary basic. We suggest replacing with modern unit at station entrance or improved facility next to waiting room. |
| Better access – lift | Compares unfavourably with other stations. Out-of-service periods have caused lack of confidence. Lift needs to be replaced for reliability and modern feel. Could alternative ramped access be provided? |
| Staff roles | Best part of station is ticket and information office – staff roles much appreciated. Welcoming, human presence. Shop is also strong feature. |
The thing was – every time you visited the station you seemed to spot something else. In the end we had to “freeze” our thoughts and get on with submitting to Northern (who operate the station), track authority Network Rail, West Yorkshire Combined Authority, key stakeholder Calderdale Council and Kate Dearden MP (Halifax).
Of course there has been some history to all this. Some years ago there was a series of consultations on a station “gateway” project. That would have created a new entrance, new pedestrian approach bridge, and car parking (including disabled) at ground level. There would have been lifts so passengers could get “up and over” to and from their trains. Hadrag successfully argued bridge access should be retained to facilitate foot access from town and bus stops.
But little as far as we could see was proposed to improve surroundings for train passengers down on the platform. There was talk of Northern replacing the existing lift, as well as providing new lifts to get up from ground-level entrances. A new ticket office was proposed but on the ground floor in the new entrance building, not too convenient for people arriving on foot. New toilets were also to be on the ground floor.
After the pandemic, bodies such as WYCA found themselves short of funding as that snap of inflation took bite. And the Halifax station gateway project was “paused” (not quite cancelled), meaning an indefinite wait for further progress. (Elland station has been paused getting on for 30 years!)
Hadrag says we cannot be expected to wait for a revived “gateway” scheme. We need a new project that can be done in easy and affordable early stages focusing on items that will directly benefit train users. Our table sums up what we have in mind.
We highlight the need to improve safety. Manoeuvring past crowds of people waiting on the narrow part of Platform 2 can be frightening. (Some of us have taken to shouting “excuse me please”!) But this problem could be addressed if P2 trains were to stop further back where it is wider. Signs and announcements could politely direct people to move along.
An exit from the waiting room to the wide south end of the island platform would help. This would mean moving the passenger toilet recently refurbished been but you’d be skilled to spot the difference. Would a modern unit at the station entrance be better?
The glazed platform level sliding doors have never worked. They are out of keeping with the 19th century architecture and need to be removed and the whole area tidied up.
The station entrance becomes very congested. The interaction between pedestrians arriving from the direction of Halifax Piece Hall and cars steering onto the station forecourt is a hazard.
The best thing about the station is its ticket office, staffed by excellent people, friendly and helpful in a way that online sources, vending machines or the dreaded AI can never be. Staff must be retained, whatever hi-tech ticketing solutions arise. Halifax station boasts a footfall getting on for 2 million a year. Booking office staff can help in all sorts of ways. So let’s value them. Human contact makes rail journeys better.
“Halifax Railway Station” by David Ward is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0.
We tried out the toilet at Brighouse station, still in operation after the big September blockade when you couldn’t see parked cars for buses! The single-unit all-gender loo is on the eastbound (Leeds via Dewsbury platform).
It is bigger and better than the recently refitted passenger toilet at Halifax station. To get in (remember Brighouse is normally unstaffed) you press an intercom button; someone (somewhere) answers and the door unlocks. Fittings inside are disability compliant, as you would now expect. Round the back there is a big tank of water, and a waste pipe for the sewage.
It’s a welcome installation. How many station users know about it? Could it be better signposted?
Hadrag’s been busy since our 40th anniversary meeting in Brighouse (June). We’ve called for an action plan on Halifax station, not an indefinite wait for revival of a shelved “gateway” scheme. We want all present trains to call at Sowerby Bridge.
And we’ve reiterated ambitions for Bradford-Calderdale-Sheffield trains: Brighouse to Sheffield little more than 50 minutes – capacity permitting! Projects that will deliver in our lifetimes must be prioritised over very long-term plans for new lines. Could recent trains Halifax-Leeds via Brighouse be another easy model to take forward? Read on for more on all that.
Latest station footfall statistics are just out – more analysis to follow in Spring issue. Among Calderdale’s top 5 stations, Halifax comes top with 1,803,014 passenger comings and goings in year ending March 2025, just a little below pre-pandemic best. Sowerby Bg, Hebden Bg and Todmorden now exceed pre-pandemic performance with Brighouse just a little behind.
If you want to do your own analysis see link to table-1415-time-series-of-passenger-entries-and-exits-and-interchanges-by-station.ods in the ORR statistics.
We just wish Northern could get our trains running on time. York-Blackpool, marred by lateness, cancellations and lack of carriages should be a premier service. It’s not all Northern’s fault: delays get knocked on from other train operators and Network Rail – including climate events. The Hadrag Survey recorded some of the best performance 30 years ago. Train running and overcrowding now feel as bad as ever. Again more in next issue – meanwhile, read on and join us!
“Halifax- Station and Horton Street, from Beacon Hill (2577872319)” by Tim Green from Bradford is licensed under CC BY 2.0. To view a copy of this license, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/?ref=openverse.
Massively successful Friends of Brighouse Station (FoBS) gathered on silver jubilee day, 28 May 2025 to do a morning’s work on the station before a celebratory lunch at the pub nearby. The group focuses on looking after the station – not doing things the railway should be doing but providing floral displays, high-quality posters and a wildlife garden. Local businesses provide sponsorship.
And campaigning, is for others, we were firmly told! Station adoption groups make the railway a more attractive place better for all who travel by train.
Hadrag, formed in 1985, campaigned over 15 years with other groups like West Yorkshire Transport 2000 for Brighouse reopening. The late James Towler, who chaired the regional rail users’ consultative committee, also chaired our public meetings in Brighouse.
Work has started on changes to Brighouse station where more space is needed for rail-replacement buses as diversions gather pace on the TransPennine route upgrade. A small number – about three we heard – will be lost to create a better, more convenient area for people to wait and board rail replacement buses. We guess there’ll be some inconvenience over the summer whilst the work is being done including remarking of car park. Also promised are more space to wait for trains on platform 2 (westbound) using available space for widening; platform zoning markings; painting of access ramps.
And there is to be a toilet pod on platform 1 (eastbound). So expect digging to create drains. We gather the facility will be permanent!
Work has started on changes to Brighouse station where more space is needed for rail-replacement buses as diversions gather pace on the TransPennine route upgrade. A small number – about three we heard – will be lost to create a better, more convenient area for people to wait and board rail replacement buses. We guess there’ll be some inconvenience over the summer whilst the work is being done including remarking of car park.
Here’s the shot from 2022, last time we met in Brighouse. TransPennine Express wasn’t stopping, but now, whenever route upgrade works close the Huddersfield line, they do! So you can, at a TPE price, and when the engineers deem it, get from Brighouse on a train through to Newcastle, York, Liverpool or Manchester Airport. Buses provide a replacement link for Huddersfield, which will happen more when big work starts remodelling the centre-piece of the Pennine upgrade with four tracks to Dewsbury. Sometimes Brighouse does less well. When the Dewsbury route is blocked our Northern “valley bottom” trains Manchester-Brighouse-Leeds trains go via Halifax and Bradford; Brighouse gets a bus link. (Northern crews from the North West, we understand, do not know the route via Wakefield.)
Brighouse had been top-performing Calder Valley station on percentage footfall growth. So we just can’t wait for things to get back to normal – with potentially more trains. Had Elland been open that could have been the interchange for replacement buses. We still need to be patient on that one – but soon, we hope.
Note view at back. Station Café on Gooder Lane. And now there’s a new one, The Shrub just across Huddersfield Road, as well as the Commercial Inn on the corner.
40 years since we founded Hadrag. 25 years since we got Brighouse station opened. And 10 years since the Northern Sparks task force report by regional politicians and officials gave top priority to full Calder Valley line electrification – part of a programme that was to span the North. Transformation would be complete – just about all lines to be decarbonised by what is still the most energy efficient, and long-run cost-effective way of running a zero-carbon railway. Government ignored the recommendations. We founded the Electric Railway Charter to press for action. Calder Valley electrification is a clear objective of West Yorkshire Combined Authority and Calderdale Council, and we’ve had a good response from the new local MPs. Recently Calder Valley electrification got a mention in Lord Blunkett’s Yorkshire rail report – with a wait measured in decades. We are not holding our breath for the imminent spending review. Batteries are not good enough in the long run but will be part of the transition. Meanwhile dirty diesels continue to trundle noisily along our tracks.
We are delighted that our friend David Hoggarth, strategic rail director at Transport for the North has accepted our invitation to be guest speaker at our 2025 annual meeting.
All train users – actual and would be – will be welcome on the morning of Saturday 28 June in the conference suite at St John’s (community hall), Rastrick, HD6 1HN, 5 minutes’ walk from Brighouse station. Doors open just after 09.30 for 09.50 start. All done before 12.30, so time to enjoy Brighouse gala afterwards! More on back page. We hope to provide refreshments – and maybe a cake to cut!
Saturday 28 June 2025
Conference Suite (far end of Community Hall) at
St John the Divine, St John Street, Rastrick HD6 1HN (5 min walk from Brighouse station).
Doors open 09.30, light refreshments; start around 09.50 (not before); finish before 12.30.
Easy to find! Head south from Brighouse town centre past Sainsburys. At train station (by lights) turn right and go south-west along Gooder Lane. St Johns is on right, so turn into St John Street and head past the community room to conference suite at far end. Buses X63 etc pass rail station and the 563 comes hourly from Halifax via Copley, West Vale, Elland and Rastrick. 548/9 and 571 serve Brighouse bus stn. Short walk from rail station and we expect train service to be normal. Car parking at back of hall/church.
Hadrag may have Halifax in its name, but we have a wider view along the Calder Valley line. Last year our AGM was in Sowerby Bridge. This year we are very close to our silver anniversary station – 25 years since Brighouse opened. Hadrag was founded in 1985 – but one or two of us had already started campaigning not just for station reopening but for a better service all round. So too had other local and regional groups. This writer had a letter in Modern Railways magazine (1983 we think) calling for Brighouse reopening. The line had closed to regular passenger trains in 1970, but those trains were barely a service, intermittent on Bradford-Huddersfield and Sowerby Bridge to York routes – not serving West Yorkshire’s commercial capital, Leeds. (Even if the political capital Wakefield was served.)
So the service that started on Sunday 28 May 2000 service was a great boost: weekdays hourly Huddersfield-Bradford-Leeds, with a morning commuter train from Hebden Bridge to Leeds via Dewsbury returning at teatime. Eight years later the Leeds via Dewsbury trains became hourly and extended in the other direction to Rochdale, Manchester and Southport (now just Wigan). That was the moment of growth, beating other CV stations over a 10-year period, percentage-wise.
Grand Central trains to London started in 2010, now times a day with ambitions to increase.
So although Brighouse has (on Mon-Sat) two local trains an hour on weekdays these are spread over two routes so the practical service is only hourly. Compare that with Hebden Bridge or Todmorden. Brighouse has a similar or bigger catchment population, but a much worse service. So Hadrag says:
We realise of course that much of the above is unlikely to be achieved until the TransPennine Route Upgrade is complete, at least the Huddersfield-Dewsbury-Leeds bit. But we also know increased frequency Brighouse-Dewsbury-Leeds is a West Yorkshire Combined Authority desire, and Bradford-Sheffield via Brighouse gets a mention as a possible aspiration.
The “main” Calder Valley line runs west from Brighouse. The “Hebble incline” goes up to Halifax at Greetland Junction. Going straight on at Greetland, next stop is Sowerby Bridge. We have for years called for more trains to serve what used to be a key junction station. We knew that West Yorkshire Combined Authority supported the idea of more trains calling and that has been reaffirmed in a recent letter from WYCA rail officer Mick Sasse, representing the views of Mayor Tracy Brabin and transport committee chair Cllr Susan Hinchcliffe. We have had a similar response from David Hoggarth strategic rail director at Transport for the North.
Hadrag argues on the basis of population that all trains that stop at Hebden Bridge should also serve Sowerby Bridge. Sowerby Bridge serves a community as big as Hebden and Todmorden combined, two council wards plus. Think about the Ryburn valley and the south western quarter of Halifax that feeds Sowerby Bridge’s catchment. Yet the impression you might get turning up at the station is that most trains rush through without stopping, which is true for up to half of them. One train an hour to Halifax and Bradford, two an hour to Leeds and Manchester. Through the week, only a few evening-peak York-Blackpool trains stop, though all of them call on Sundays.
So Hadrag’s first priority is to get all of the York-Blackpools calling, all week. The “Roses Rail Link” had started in 1984¹ – eventually to become hourly semi-fast York-Blackpool. These trains already serve places like Church Fenton, Garforth, and – on the Fylde – Kirkham & Wesham. So we argue Sowerby Bridge should be included.
We met Northern trains officials. We recognise their reluctance to introduce extra stops given pressure to improve timekeeping and reliability on this longish route. But we understand timetable revisions, even recasts, are coming up in the next year or so. So, we say, could this not be an opportunity? We have after had short intervals in the past when the “Roses” trains have served not only Sowerby Bridge but Mytholmroyd as well. As they still do on Sundays.
We also say the semi-fast Leeds-Halifax-Manchesters should serve Sowerby Bridge, to give the same service frequency as Hebden and Tod. TfN and WYCA would not be drawn on which should come first. We think it’s obvious!
¹ So things were starting to happen even before Hadrag invented itself in 1985!
We need a better service, more southwards and westwards, not to mention the link promised in 2018 to get people across Manchester (and not just for the airport). If we can’t have services once promised round the new Ordsall curve which has one train an hour at best, how about a service via Brighouse and Huddersfield? And more, faster services through upper Calderdale might be a more cost-effective option than a new fantasy line from Bradford to Huddersfield. At our AGM last year civil engineer Colin Elliff advocated a fast route Bradford-Manchester via a tunnel between Halifax and Rochdale, with both towns served. You never know.
Halifax station is a serious concern. Hadrag secretary Peter Stocks and I looked round and are finishing a report. Hadrag’s committee worries about safety aspects from traffic on the approach bridge, to congestion at the platform edge. Could not trains be directed to stop – and passengers advised to wait – at the more spacious south end of the platform – also more under cover? Platform 2 curves the wrong way (can’t be helped!) and is crowded. But drivers can see the signal at the north end from a fair distance round the curve so we reckon trains could stop further back.
Information screens invisible from much of the useful waiting area need to be replicated where they can be seen.
The lift is vital for passengers who are unable to walk, and highly desirable for those supervising families, with heavy luggage, or with ageing or arthritic joints. We have seen it out of service too many times recently. What are people who need it supposed to do? Even the able-bodied feel nervous.
Finally there is the age-old issue of toilets. Well, toilet (singular), as there is only one, and it is not great. Halifax station annually sees getting on for 2 million passengers. It serves the unique, iconic, magnificent Grade I listed Piece Hall. All those passengers deserve better. Northern, we shall be in touch!
How much longer do we have to wait? With a TV reporter we met residents who’d moved to Elland back in the 1990s thinking there would be a station in 2000. Elland had passenger numbers predicted as good as Brighouse, maybe better. It was shelved then because of costs and competing projects – look at the latest designs in the present £25M scheme. So now we are what? 26, 27 years late? It will happen.
We shall keep up the campaign for all stations in Calderdale connecting with all points of the compass.
Header Image: Ben Brooksbank, CC BY-SA 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons
Halifax and District Rail Action Group 