Hanley railway station
Hanley railway station served the town of Hanley in Stoke-on-Trent, England. It was built by the North Staffordshire Railway as part of the Potteries Loop Line. The first station opened in 1864, and when the line reached Burslem, a new passenger station opened at Trinity Street on 1 November 1873. The original station remained open for goods traffic.
In 1923 the North Staffordshire Railway became part of the London, Midland and Scottish Railway, and after 1948 it came under British Railways. The Blitz in 1940 damaged the station’s roof and a wooden passenger bridge.
Diesel trains arrived on the line in the late 1950s. The Beeching Report of 1963 proposed closing the Potteries Loop Line, and Hanley closed to passengers in 1964 and to goods in 1966. The buildings were demolished about a decade later.
The North Staffordshire Railway Preservation Society saved a water gauge from the site and kept it at Cheddleton on the Churnet Valley Railway. Today only a few remnants remain, including embankments and part of a wall behind the car park. The railway-owned warehouse on Clough Street has been turned into a furniture shop.
Hanley railway station also appeared in the 1952 film Hunted. Arnold Bennett, who was born in the area, referenced Hanley in his novels Anna of the Five Towns and The Old Wives’ Tale, where Hanley is renamed Hanbridge.
This page was last edited on 3 February 2026, at 14:09 (CET).