In this tenth blog post of my Every Station series, I am visiting stations between Preston and Ormskirk, beginning to focus more on Lancashire. I took the train from Liverpool Lime Street to Preston, as it is much quicker and more direct than going via Ormskirk. This allowed me to start my adventure from Preston rather than Ormskirk itself.

Our first station is Preston, which I will be visiting several times over the next few weeks. We will travel from Preston to Colne via Blackburn, Rose Grove, and then onward to Colne. The Ormskirk train also runs through to Colne and back, but it sometimes continues to Blackpool South, another line I will be revisiting soon.

Starting from Preston, I board a Class 156 heading towards Ormskirk. Initially, I planned to alight at Burscough Junction, but I decided instead to get off at Rufford. From there, I will continue to Croston and then return to Burscough Junction. I particularly like Rufford station because it retains its original charm with two platforms and also functions as a passing loop for the line.

From Rufford, I head back up the line towards Preston, but I get off at Croston Station. It’s a rather charming little station with a disused platform and a station building that now serves as a house. I find it intriguing to imagine what it would be like living alongside the railway.

From Croston Station we then make our way to our penultimate station of Buscough Junction, I have also visited the other Buscough station on the line from Southport towards Wigan Wallgate which you can find here, that line was rather spectacular with the views from the window on the train. The line from Preston – Ormskirk is also known as the West Lancashire line too.

Finally, we take the bus from Burscough Junction towards Ormskirk via Burscough Bridge station. This service is operated by Preston Bus using relatively new Enviro 200 MMC single-decker buses on the 312 route. The service itself continues from Ormskirk to Chorley on the 311 route, which I may explore in the future when visiting stations from Bolton to Preston.

Upon arriving at Ormskirk Bus Station, it was pouring with rain, which was quite unfortunate. Thankfully, I had my raincoat with me, so I could stay dry. At Ormskirk Station itself, you can see a lot of history. It used to be the end of the line for services from Rainford and St Helens, but sadly, that is no longer the case.

We have finally reached over 100 stations, which is quite impressive to me. I still need to revisit around 40 stations in Cornwall and also tick off stations in Devon, London, and the West Country. For now, I will be focusing on Merseyside, Cheshire, and Lancashire. Please consider subscribing to follow me on my journey.