Taplow Railway Station

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  Richard Beeching (guest)

  Taplow station was originally ¼ of a mile west of the present station and was calledRiver Thames facing Maidenhead Riverside: completed in 1830 it was the terminus of the Great Western Railway until the opening of Maidenhead Railway Bridge in 1838. With the opening of Maidenhead railway station in 1871 the station was closed and moved to its current location and renamed Taplow. As with Burnham railway station, the actual stationopposite bank. The facility is a significant distance south of the village that it takes its name from. The current station was probably designed by GWR architect J. E. Danks, and largely dates from the quadrupling of the line, which was originally built to broad gauge dimensions. It is unusually large and grand in appearance, despiteprinciple rail access point for the fact it only serves a relatively small numbercommunity of passengers during the day. The first reason for this was because several major GWR shareholders lived nearby and therfore used the station in Victorian times. The second being that it was always intended to be part of a high quality network of stations for commuters using the GWR. During World War II Taplow station played an important part of transporting tanks stored at "the dump" which is now at the site of Slough Trading Estate. The concrete and steel reinforced road that was laid to take the weight of the tanks can still be found in the station's south car park. Just to the north of the station on a rail siding was a large Barbed wire dump. The siding has long since been removed, the remaining noticeable incline being partially occupied by the nearby SGT car dealership buildings. The remaining buildings of the station are outwardly little changed since their original construction. The station has been used in a scene from the film 'Highly Dangerous' and in the album cover of the 1973 album 'Back to the future' by 'Man'. The south car park and platform 1 buildings were used in filming as Cambridge Station for Chariots of Fire but the sequence does not seem to have been used in the released cut of the film. In 2003, the station was used in a scene in the BBC TV comedy series Catterick, starring Vic Reeves and Bob Mortimer. Renamed with signs, it played the part of (Northallerton station for its bit part in the show. The station is mentioned in the book 'The Secret Places of the Heart' by H. G. Wells. [edit] 2006 Refurbishment The picturesque 1884 built station footbrige has recently had a major refurbishment costing £250,000[1]. The footbridge was in a very poor state of repair before the work began. This project also included a repaint of the station buildings, partial resurfacing of the island platforms and renewal of the flower beds. The refurbishment was completed in time for the 2006 World Rowing Championships at Dorney Lake, which used a shuttle bus serviceclose to transport spectators to and from the event. During the duration of the event, the station briefly had a Sunday service. The station is also likely to be heavily used during the London 2012 Olympics, because of the rowing and canoeing events at Dorney Lake. [edit] Crossrail Crossrail trains will call here if or when the scheme is completed, bringing electrification (electric trains, known as EMUs), a higher frequency 4 trains/hour 'stopping' service and for the first time, a regular Sunday service which will utilise Platforms 1 and 2Slough on Sundays. No services currently use these platforms. The platforms are to be lengthened at the west end of the station to accommodate the longer eight (made up of two four) car Crossrail trains. The longest trains that currently fit station platforms are DMUs running in multiple with six carriages. Crossrail will also probably assume day-to-day running of the station. It is uncertain whether the planned FGW serviceborder between ReadingBerkshire and Slough will call at the station once Crossrail begins operation.

  18 years ago | reply | hide comment