Daresbury Station was situated on the Birkenhead, Lancashire & Cheshire Joint Railway’s (BLCJR) Warrington and Chester line which opened on 31 October 1850.

Daresbury Station opened as Moore after the village in which it was located on 18 December 1850. The station was located in a cutting on the south side of a road overbridge which carried Runcorn Road over the line. The BLCJR was a double track railway so Moore was provided with two platforms which were linked to Runcorn Road by sloping footpaths and steps. The main facilities were located in stone built buildings on the down platform (Warrington direction). Waiting facilities were provided on the up platform (Chester direction).

At the time of opening the Station was served by trains that ran between Warrington and Chester and onward to Birkenhead.

On 1 August 1859 the BLCJR became the Birkenhead Railway but within a matter of months it was taken over jointly by the Great Western Railway (GWR) and the London North Western Railway (LNWR) as the Birkenhead Joint Railway on 1 January 1860.

In April 1861 the new company renamed the station as Daresbury which is a small village about 1 mile distant from Moore. The reason for the renaming was probably to avoid confusion with another station in Moore which was located on the LNWR's main line between Crewe and Preston. The GWR used the line through Daresbury as a means of access to Manchester via Warrington and lines belonging to the LNWR. Daresbury Station itself however remained very much a local facility served mostly by local stopping trains.

In July 1922 there were nine up and seven down trains Mondays-to-Fridays as shown in the table below. There were two trains in each direction on Sundays.

In 1923 the LNWR share in the joint line passed to the London Midland and Scottish Railway (LMS) who absorbed the former company as part of the ‘Grouping’ of the country’s many railway companies into four large organisations. The GWR retained its own identity.

In the summer of 1932 Daresbury Station was served by only seven trains in the westbound direction on weekdays. All of them went to Chester General with the first departure being at 7.35am and the last at 8.52pm. In the eastbound direction there were six trains. Four of them went to Warrington Bank Quay and two to Manchester Exchange. The first departure

After 1 February 1943 Daresbury had been the only station to serve the residents of Moore as the former LNWR station had closed on that date. Despite this the sparse train service provided to Daresbury station did not generate much income and it did not survive long after nationalisation of closing to passengers on 7 July 1952. The station continued to handle goods until the 1 June 1965.

Tickets from Michael Stewart and route map by Alan Young.

Sources:

• Bradshaws Rail Times July 1922, Guild Publishing 1986
• British Railway Companies, C Awdry, Guild Publishing 1990.
• British Railways (London Midland Region) Summer Timetable 1948
  
• LMS Summer Timetable 1932
• Railway Passenger Stations in Great Britain a Chronology - M Quick - Railway and Canal Historical Society 2009

To see the other stations on the Chester - Warrington line click on the station name: Mickle Trafford, Dunham Hill, Halton & Norton