Honing Station

I've driven past here a couple of times and thought it looked interesting so today, as I had to drop W at the station in Norwich, I made a small detour on the way home for a look.

Like the North Norfolk Railway where I take most of my steam shots nowadays, the line through Honing was part of the Midland & Great Northern Railway or 'M&GN', which was locally known as the 'Muddles and Goes Nowhere'.  Honing station opened in 1882 and was busy; there was a goods and stock yard (the animal pens can still be seen) but as well as animals, sugar beet, grain, fruit and even manure were transported from here.  Passenger trains ran through from the Midlands to Great Yarmouth avoiding Norwich, and during the 'Wakes Weeks' when factories closed down and sent all the workers on holiday, up to 80 trains a day would steam through the station.  The increase in car ownership and the start of foreign holidays affected the traffic and the line closed in 1959, even before the Beeching cuts of the 1960's.

What remains of the station has been preserved by local volunteers and is interesting to see.  On the platform to the left is a waiting room; the front wall has gone but otherwise it is largely intact.  To the right, the remaining walls of the station buildings are only around a foot high but you can plainly see the remains of the parquet flooring in the waiting room and ticket office, the tiled floor and fireplace in the Porter's office, and even the remains of the 'Elsan' chemical toilet in the Gents!  The track has long since gone but the trackbed forms part of the 'Weavers Way', a 61 mile walking trail between Cromer and Great Yarmouth.