Index
- Liverpool to Wigan Home
- Liverpool Exchange
- Great Howard Street
- Sandhills
- Kirkdale
- Rice Lane
- Fazakerley
- Kirkby
- Kirkby Royal Ordnance
- Rainford
- Rainford Junction
- Upholland_1st
- Upholland_2nd
- Orrell
- Pemberton
- Wigan LYR 1st
- Wigan LYR 2nd
- Wigan Wallgate
Kirkby Royal Ordnance Factory known as Simonswood
(1940 - 1946)
A station was opened to serve the Kirkby Royal Ordnance Factory on December 9 1940. It was on a branch from the Liverpool Exchange and Wigan Wallgate line which was opened by the
Lancashire & Yorkshire Railway (LYR) as part of the Liverpool and Bury Railway on November 20 1848
Britain entered the Second World War on September 3 1939 and work began on the Kirkby site at the end of that year. A complex of a thousand buildings was laid out which included 18 miles of road and 23 miles of railway. Transporting the workers to the remotely located ordnance factory was a problem and to facilitate travel to and from the site, the Kirkby Royal Ordnance Factory station was opened
The station consisted of a single-island platform that had precast concrete faces backfilled with cinders. There were six flat-roofed timber shelters spaced along the length of the platform to protect the workers from inclement weather. Passenger train services were unadvertised and provided purely for the munitions workers. The name Kirkby Royal Ordnance Factory was not used on destination boards as the site was subject to intense secrecy; instead the trains were shown to be running to Simonswood
The factory continued to expand with the workforce reaching a total of 23,000. Vast quantities of munitions went out by rail, and by the close of hostilities Kirkby had produced 10% of all of the ammunition used by Britain during the Second World War
Kirkby ROF was designated as a wartime-only Royal Ordnance Factory and closed in March 1946 and the factory site was taken over by Liverpool Corporation who developed it as an industrial estate continuing to use the lines for transporting goods to factories
Britain entered the Second World War on September 3 1939 and work began on the Kirkby site at the end of that year. A complex of a thousand buildings was laid out which included 18 miles of road and 23 miles of railway. Transporting the workers to the remotely located ordnance factory was a problem and to facilitate travel to and from the site, the Kirkby Royal Ordnance Factory station was opened
The station consisted of a single-island platform that had precast concrete faces backfilled with cinders. There were six flat-roofed timber shelters spaced along the length of the platform to protect the workers from inclement weather. Passenger train services were unadvertised and provided purely for the munitions workers. The name Kirkby Royal Ordnance Factory was not used on destination boards as the site was subject to intense secrecy; instead the trains were shown to be running to Simonswood
The factory continued to expand with the workforce reaching a total of 23,000. Vast quantities of munitions went out by rail, and by the close of hostilities Kirkby had produced 10% of all of the ammunition used by Britain during the Second World War
Kirkby ROF was designated as a wartime-only Royal Ordnance Factory and closed in March 1946 and the factory site was taken over by Liverpool Corporation who developed it as an industrial estate continuing to use the lines for transporting goods to factories
