Early years The station was opened as
Heysham Harbour by the
Midland Railway on 11 July 1904. It was relocated to an adjacent site on 4 May 1970, and served boat trains for
Belfast until the closure of the ferry route in April 1975. The train service was withdrawn on 6 October 1975, Stock for the line was built at the company's works and power was provided from their power plant at the harbour. Services ran to Morecambe on 13 April 1908 and by September extended to the
LNWR main line station at . With two reversals required en route and a relatively short journey between termini, the units were well suited for the busy route, which operated on a half-hourly frequency for much of the day. Long-distance express trains routed by way of the former
"Little" North Western Railway main line from via also used the station. The most notable was a daily through train to/from
London St Pancras via connecting with the ferry to Belfast. After the
1923 Grouping, the station and port came under the control of the
London, Midland and Scottish Railway. The company developed traffic but made alterations to the passenger services, replacing the St Pancras service with one from
London Euston via and the
West Coast Main Line and added a second regular boat service to and from
Manchester Victoria. Services ran to and from Leeds and through carriages were provided for St Pancras passengers in summer until the onset of World War II. The station was host to three
LMS camping coaches in 1934, 12 in 1935 and 36 from 1936 to 1939.
Decline and withdrawal of passenger services Nationalisation in January 1948 saw the
London Midland Region of British Railways take over the running of the line.
British Railways withdrew the old Midland EMUs in 1951 and, two years later, replaced them with three elderly ex-LNWR sets formerly used on the
West London Line service between Earls Court and
Willesden Junction (a fourth set was added in 1957). The overheads were dismantled the following year, after the Midland line was closed to all traffic between Morecambe, Lancaster and . Freight traffic continued although from June 1967, it operated via Morecambe, where all trains had to reverse. A further change to traffic patterns came about in 1968, when ferry operator
Sealink announced its intention to convert the two ships operating out of the port on the Belfast route to "roll-on/roll-off" car ferries rather than conventional passenger ships. After the work was completed, all that remained was the single line from Morecambe running into the one active platform and a private siding connection laid in the early 1970s into Heysham power station. Much of the land occupied by the old goods yard and disused platforms is used by the Port of Heysham's owners,
Peel Ports as secure parking for HGVs waiting for ferries. The branch handles occasional freight trains operated by
Direct Rail Services from the reprocessing plant at
Sellafield to
Heysham nuclear power station. They usually run once or twice-weekly and use the siding that diverges from the main running line a short distance east of the station. Access is by means of a ground frame unlocked and operated by the train crew and the trains are usually worked with a locomotive at each end to avoid the need for run-round moves when it reverses at Morecambe and for security reasons. ==Facilities==