A circular walk from Derry ~ Londonderry station, distance - 1.7 miles.
Londonderry once had four railway stations but now just has the one station and the one route from Belfast via Coleraine.
- Waterside - Belfast & Northern Counties Railway, 5'3"
- Victoria Road - Donegal Railway, 3'
- Foyle Road - Londonderry & Enniskillen Railway, 5'3"
- Graving Dock - Londonderry & Lough Swilly Railway, 3'
Remains of a few of the station can be seen on a circular walk via the Craigavon Bridge and the Peace Bridge.
Londonderry Waterside
Arriving by train we naturally started at the surviving station. Londonderry Waterside was opened in 1852 and rebuilt as the current building in 1874, however this was abandoned between 1980 and 2019 in favour of a simple island platform with canopies and a small station building following terrorist attacks on the original station in the 1970s. In 2019 the station returned to its original site but with the platforms outside the train shed which is now in use as a concourse. More information about the station can be found on the Wikipedia article.
Below - One of Translink's newly formed 6 coach CAF units alongside the original train shed.
Below - The entrance to the refurbished former Waterside station.
Below - The smaller station that was in use alongside the original station between 1980 and 2019 seen in 1997 with the Craigavon Bridge in the background.
Victoria Road
The former station of the narrow gauge Donegal Railway can be found on the corner of Victoria Road and the Craigavon Bridge. The station was in use between 1900 and 1955. In 1906 the Donegal Railway was taken over by a joint operation between the Great Northern Railway of Ireland and the Midland Railway's Northern Counties Committee (who also operated the broad gauge trains at Waterside), becoming the County Donegal Railways Joint Committee.
Following closure the site has been in various retail and industrial uses, industrial units were built on the site of the platforms. In the 1970s a preservation group had a few items of stock alongside the former station and a small museum in the station buildings for a short time. Along Victoria Road a railway office building and the former goods shed survive. More information about the station can be found in the Disused Stations article.
Below - The former passenger entrance to Victoria Road station.
Foyle Road
Crossing the River Foyle on the Craigavon Bridge (originally the Carlisle Bridge) brings us to the site of Foyle Road station. The bridge has two decks and originally a dual gauge railway track ran on the lower deck, lines connected all four termini along with the waterfront to get goods to the relevant railway system. Carlisle Bridge replaced an earlier wooden bridge slightly to the east, the line in to Foyle Road terminated close to the original bridge so the station was on the east side of the current bridge. Nothing remains of the station which closed in 1965 and the site is now a car park.
On the west side of the bridge a preservation scheme was established at the goods yard site from 1989. The Foyle Valley Railway had a museum in modern buildings designed to look like railway goods sheds and ran a stretch of line to the border with the Republic of Ireland just outside Derry. The line was 3ft gauge rather than the 5'3" broad gauge that was originally in use at the site. The line suffered from vandalism and another scheme was established at Fintown. The museum was reopened by a disability charity, though at the time of our visit was not open.
More information about the former station can be found on the Disused Stations article.
Below - Nasmyth & Wilson loco on static display next to the Foyle Valley Railway Museum. Note the water tower in the background, the only surviving original railway structure of the Foyle Road station site.
Below - Remaining track of the heritage railway scheme that operated here in the 1990s. The trackbed is now a cycle route.
Below - A view of the museum site in 2000 when the track was still in situ. A new office block has since been built in front of the shed building.
Graving Dock
A further station was situated on Strand Road some distance to the north of the centre of the city. This was Graving Dock station of the Londonderry and Lough Swilly Railway. It closed to passengers in 1948 and to goods in 1953. Nothing remains of the station and the site is now part of the car park of the Lesley Retail Park. With nothing to see there we returned to the surviving station via the Peace Bridge. On the south bank of the river a former army barracks is being redeveloped as a Ebrington Square, incorporating many of the historic army buildings. Amongst the buildings repurposed for leisure use we found a microbrewery.
Below - Looking across the River Foyle to the surviving station.
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