Tag: Brighouse

Brighouse station toilet!

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?

Autumn-Winter 2025-6 Update: Hadrag’s been busy

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.

Adopters in Celebratory Mood!

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!

Brighouse Benefits, We Hope, From TRU Work

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.

Patience needed!

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.

Tale of three stations (going on four) and wider view along line

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:

  • The direct hourly trains Manchester-Brighouse-Dewsbury-Leeds should run seven days a week…
  • …and on Mondays-Saturdays these direct Leeds trains should be twice hourly, one of them fast Brighouse-Leeds, target journey time 20 minutes. And we think one of these could come from Preston or Blackpool via Blackburn doubling the popular “Roses Rail Link” that runs Blackpool-York via Halifax and Bradford.
  • The hourly Halifax-Huddersfield route would also be more attractive if it ran more frequently, an alternative to slow local buses.
  • An attractive new service could be Bradford to Sheffield via Halifax, Brighouse, Barnsley and Meadowhall. A short “mothballed” curve near Horbury-Crigglestone would need to reopen. Brighouse-Sheffield could be about 55 minutes, Elland-Sheffield just short of an hour – very attractive indeed.

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.

Onward up the line

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!

Halifax, nervous of lift…

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!

… and Elland, coming soon

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&gt;, via Wikimedia Commons

Blockades, diversions and buses

September’s blockade Rochdale-Manchester to replace a bridge over the M62 was not much fun for Calder Valley line users. Services north of Rochdale were cut to just two per hour: one to Blackburn and Manchester, one to Leeds via Halifax. Reliability was less than 100 per cent. The Leeds-Brighouse-Manchester service was cut back to Hebden Bridge, with less than perfect onward connections. Blackpool trains were largely unaffected. Replacement buses both fast(ish) and all-stations ran beyond Rochdale. More extensive diversions happened at weekends. Halifax station was deserted on one Saturday! So we asked Northern: Why did the CV line service have to be cut to the extent it was?

“Traincrew availability and what we can reliably cover. We had no West crews in the mix, so everything had to be crewed from East depots. We maintained a regular service between Halifax & Leeds by extending the Huddersfield to Bradford service through to Leeds. Diagram numbers were at maximum capacity so there was no more capacity to use to extend the other service to Rochdale.”

Hadrag further responded: “We understand the difficulty. We still feel more could have been done to give a better service. Was consideration given to running train empty stock or coupled to the McV-Blackburn- Rochdale trains that did run in order provide staff and crews to work more frequent trains to Halifax, Bradford or Leeds? Do your train planners need to think more creatively?” – jsw

We also mentioned and received answers on:

  • people missing the bus connection: “… It was recognised that connections could be improved”;
  • ticket acceptance via TPE (Huddersfield) – only for journeys from Bramley/Leeds; if you went that way via the Bradford-Hud trains it was (and is) a higher fare than via Hebden Bridge;
  • lack of clarity where buses were going i.e. non-stop to Rochdale, all stations to Rochdale or sometimes at weekends to Hebden Bridge. There were staff on hand to help people, as indeed there were at Rochdale;
  • inconvenient locations of screens at Manchester Vic. Main screen is near the barriers (not above them) and difficult to spot by passengers coming from station entrances and bus pick-up point.

Of course we saw no printed timetables. Worth adding staff at the bus stops were very helpful but had to scroll their phone screens to find times. It’s as though the railway does not want you to see a timetable.

Brighouse line idiocy?

This last bit we could hardly believe, having asked about future engineering work affecting Brighouse. When the line through Huddersfield is blocked Brighouse gets a good service with TransPennine Express trains stopping. But when the Dewsbury line is blocked the Wigan-Manchester-Leeds trains are diverted via Halifax running just a few minutes in front of the Manchester-Leeds fast. A bus runs from Halifax, all stations via Brighouse and Dewsbury. Brighouse to Leeds takes at least 65 minutes – significantly more at peak times. Obviously the direct line is blocked, but TPE run their trains via Healey Mills, Wakefield and Normanton. That diversion does not take too much longer than the direct train, and a lot less than the replacement bus, so could Northern’s Brighouse trains be diverted via Normanton instead of Bradford, maintaining a decent train service for Brighouse and Mirfield?

Reply: “There is limited traincrew route knowledge to run via Healey Mills as very few drivers at Leeds now sign it, and Manchester, Huddersfield, and York crews don’t sign it. This means that diverting via Bradford is the only option. We are not in the position to start a major route learning programme from our traincrew given all of the traincrew training demands we have on the network at the moment, with new rolling stock being introduced and new train services operated from the December timetable change.”

Our response: “We find this ridiculous, but maybe understandable in the present system. Northern used to operate an hourly service Hud-Mirfield-Wakefield-Castleford before the pandemic. (We are told this service used Northern’s Huddersfield crews, which seems sensible. After the pandemic that service was suspended so maybe route knowledge was lost although limited services were run by Northern Huddersfield- Wakefield-Castleford for a time.) We note that TPE regularly runs empty trains via diversionary routes such as the Calder Valley line. The obvious question is why has Northern not run similar trains to maintain route knowledge, for example over the line from Mirfield through Healey Mills to Wakefield? And why were these crews (for Manchester-Brighouse-Leeds route) not trained on this obvious diversionary route in the first place? It should be noted that the replacement bus services Bgh-Leeds take more than an hour, some significantly more.”

• Enough said?!

TRU Works: Raw Deal for the Brighouse Line

On the Calder Valley line, Brighouse had fastest passenger growth, percentage-wise, for more than 10years before the pandemic. It’s a station with massive potential, but services are now being disrupted for work on the TransPennine Route Upgrade (TRU). The present timetable, June to December, has several dates when services change. When TRU work is happening at Huddersfield, Brighouse is used as a railhead and there are bus replacements for Northern Huddersfield-Halifax trains, plus shuttles Brighouse-Hud for TPE passengers. It is good to see lots of intercity passengers using Brighouse station, but they do not always have an easy time (more on that later).

When the direct line through Dewsbury to Leeds is being worked on, Northern’s Wigan-Manchester- Brighouse-Leeds trains are diverted via Halifax and Bradford, with a bus link Halifax, Brighouse and intermediate stations to Leeds. Leeds-Brighouse takes 65 to 75 minutes on the replacement bus, compared with 35 min on the train. Passengers from upper Calderdale and beyond to Brighouse, Mirfield, Dewsbury etc have to change at Halifax, again with significant journey time penalty. We thought it would be better to divert the Brighouse “valley bottom” service via Wakefield. This would maintain a service for Brighouse and Mirfield.

So we raised it with Northern and TPE contacts and received a prompt reply. The situation is “quite complex”, with both paths (fitting trains in) and platforms at Leeds. Capacity is reduced by freight paths as well as diversions of TPE trains. (We could interpret this as meaning TPE expresses have the advantage over Northern stoppers.) HADRAG may not be quite ready to give up on this. We support the work being done on the TP upgrade. But this work will go on for some time, and it seems wrong that Brighouse passengers are being penalised.

Our email also mentioned the confusing situation with replacement bus stops. The buses stop outside the Brighouse station car park. There are some small, not terribly prominent arrow signs supposedly directing people to the buses. Unfortunately the ones from the westbound platform send you up the steps (though the ramps could also be used) and the along to Huddersfield Rd where there is a bus stop but for service buses, not the rail replacements. People have missed the onward transport because of this. Staff posted on the station do a good job helping people. We gather whenever the bus is due staff go up to collect passengers from the wrong bus stop and bring them to the right one. Could you make this up?

There have been problems with vandalism of the arrow signs, which are fixed to lamp posts using that ultra- modern fixing, the cable tie. Northern/TPE are “considering more permanent signage”.

Finally we mentioned the West Yorkshire Combined Authority rail strategy and the need for progress to deliver a better service for Brighouse – and indeed Elland. How does this fit in with plans post-TRU? What about capacity of the 2-track Dewsbury route, with potential of a fast (limited stop) journey of 20 minutes Brighouse-Leeds? The answer was that Northern and TPE are working with “partners in WYCA, the TRU programme and wider industry to understand what can be delivered in terms of future service patterns”, with a reference to “lots of moving parts”.

Recent TPE Diversions — no calls for Brighouse!

TransPennine Express trains were diverted via Brighouse and the Calder Valley line for a month before Easter. Work was being carried out remodelling junctions at Stalybridge, a track layout that had previously been upgraded not much more than a decade ago. The effect is higher speed limits on the route towards Victoria as well Piccadilly. Which is logical since trains that don’t stop at Stalybridge are the “fast” ones to Victoria! A year ago

when the Huddersfield route was closed for engineering work the diverted trains called at Brighouse, providing an additional useful service for the town on our line as well as an alternative railhead for Huddersfield passengers. Improvements to Brighouse station had been made with more space for larger crowds to wait. This time all the diverted trains have run through Brighouse without stopping. Brighouse was the Calder Valley line station with the biggest percentage growth over more than 10 years pre-pandemic. So why is it being side-tracked by TPE now? We shall ask!

Header Image: “Enterprising Nova (i)” flickr photo by JohnTurner1955 https://flickr.com/photos/johngreyturner/48583347201 shared under a Creative Commons (BY-NC-ND) license

Come to our meeting in Brighouse!

HADRAG annual meeting will be in Brighouse at the end of June open to all rail users – actual and would-be – at our first in-person meeting since lockdown. Focus will be on community rail, with a new partnership now spanning the Pennines across Rochdale and Calderdale districts.

We look forward to welcoming as speaker Karen Hornby, former rail professional and newly appointed community rail partnership (CRP) officer for the Calder Valley Line. The CRP wants to work alongside station “friends” groups such as those at Brighouse, Sowerby Bridge and Mytholmroyd. They have transformed their stations and continue to work magnificently.

Saturday 25 June
Doors Open 12.30 for 12.40 Start
St John’s Community Hall, St. John Street, Gooder Lane, Rastrick, Brighouse, HD6 1HN

(We’ll finish for 2.30pm)

Community rail will be main theme at HADRAG’s annual general meeting, on Sat 25 June. The Calder Valley Line now has a community rail partnership (CRP) with the backing of Calderdale and Rochdale councils. Our speaker Karen Hornby is the partnership’s officer. Karen has a history of working in rail, having recently stood down as Network Rail head of performance and customer relationship based in Manchester. Karen was responsible for budgets at four of Network Rail’s managed stations.

As rail recovers after the pandemic, the CRP will have a vital role in raising the profile of our line, from Brighouse and Halifax to Rochdale and beyond. This builds on – but does not replace or compete with – the success of station “friends” and partnership groups. Those groups have done such a fantastic job at Brighouse, Sowerby Bridge,  Mytholmroyd and elsewhere. The CV Line CRP must build on that success as it raises the profile of the whole line involving businesses, and wider community groups and building a whole-line profile. CRPs already co-exist to mutual benefit with station groups on other lines – Bentham, Mid-Cheshire, Lancashire and elsewhere. For example http://thebenthamline.co.uk/about_us/ .

Venue

This year’s venue is the community hall behind St John’s church just off Gooder Lane. It is less than 5 min walk from Brighouse train station. Bus 563 from Halifax and Elland goes past, and routes 548/549 Halifax-Rastrick & 363 Bradford-Huddersfield are close by. And of course there is the train, accessing up and down the valley, plus Bradford, Halifax and Huddersfield