The busiest five railway stations named, including Gobowen

Office for Rail and Road data looks at the number of people entering and exiting every train station in the country, including the 16 stations for which data was collected in Shropshire – which exclude those in Telford & Wrekin.

Its figures show Liverpool Street in London overtook Waterloo as the most-used station in Great Britain, which the ORR attributed to the opening of London’s latest train service, the Elizabeth Line.

Waterloo had been the busiest station in the country in all but one of the previous 18 years, but it even dropped to third in the year to March behind Paddington, also on the Elizabeth Line.

But what about in Shropshire? Here were the most used stations in the year to March.

The Top Five Stations

1. Shrewsbury

With 1.8 million entries and exits into the station in 2022-23, Shrewsbury station topped the charts as the busiest train station in Shropshire.

2. Ludlow

This was followed by Ludlow station, which saw people enter and exit 235,000 times last year.

3. Gobowen

In third was Gobowen – 195,000 entries and exits were recorded there.

4. Shifnal

Just behind on 142,000 entries and exits was Shifnal.

5. Whitchurch

And rounding out the top five was Whitchurch, with 116,000 entries and exits.

Elsewhere in Britain

The busiest stations outside London were Birmingham New Street, Leeds and Manchester Piccadilly.

Glasgow Central was the most used station in Scotland, and Cardiff Central topped the list in Wales.

The least used station that was open throughout the whole year was Denton in Greater Manchester, with 34 entries and exits.

Teesside Airport station in Darlington recorded two entries and exits, but its once-a-week Sunday service was suspended in May 2022 after the platform was judged to be unsafe.

In total, there were 2.5 billion entries and exits across Great Britain in 2022-23, a significant increase from 1.8 billion the year before, but still below the 3 billion entries and exits in 2019-20, before the coronavirus pandemic.

What they said

Michael Solomon Wiliams, campaigns manager of the Campaign for Better Transport, said: “It’s encouraging to see that station usage is on the rise, but to continue this upward trend and surpass pre-pandemic numbers, rail needs to be better value and more reliable.

“Instead of implementing another record-high increase, the Government should freeze rail fares as it has fuel duty and make green public transport cheaper”.