The wait for new station is over
A NEW station for the Cambridgeshire town of Soham opened on December 13, some 56 years after the original station closed.
The single-platform station – located on the Ely to Bury St Edmunds line and served by Greater Anglia – cost £18.6 million, funded by the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Combined Authority, including £1 million in Government Local Growth Deal support.
The station has been constructed over 12 months by Network Rail and its contractor, J Murphy and Sons Ltd, close to the site of the original, which was closed in 1965 in the wake of the Beeching recommendations.
The project has been completed five months ahead of schedule, allowing the station to be brought into use in time for the December 2021 timetable change, rather than the originally planned May 2022 timetable. Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Mayor Dr Nik Johnson unveiled a commemorative plaque for the reopening of the station. He said: “Congratulations to everyone involved in this great enterprise.
“Cooperation and partnership have created a benefit of lasting value for this community and its future generations, opening a door into opportunity. “We need more greener, clean public transport for the public good – and this new station is proof that, together, we can make it happen.” Lucy Frazer, MP for South East Cambridgeshire, said: “This project is a fantastic example of the quick delivery of public transport infrastructure that will benefit this local community. “I believe it can act as a springboard for enhancing rail services in our area by helping us make the case for reinstating the loop near Newmarket, which could provide a direct rail service between Ely, Soham, Newmarket and Cambridge.
“I have campaigned for this station since before I was elected, and I am delighted that it has now come to fruition.”
A second plaque was unveiled by Ellie Burrows, Jamie Burles, and Network Rail chairman Sir Peter Hendy.
It is dedicated to the memory of the four railway workers caught up in the Soham rail disaster on June 2, 1944, when an ammunitions train carrying bombs during the Second World War caught fire and exploded as railway workers were detaching the blazing wagon from the rest of the train. Relatives of the railwaymen involved were present to see the dedication unveiled.
Preserved 47579 on the Mid-hants Railway carries the name James Nightall G.C., dedicated to the fireman of the train, who was killed in the Soham explosion of 1944.