Great Horton

Great Horton is a ward of the City of Bradford, West Yorkshire, England, with a population of 17,683 at the 2011 Census. Great Horton is west of Bradford and east of the village of Clayton and also includes Scholemore, Paradise Green, Lidget Green and Pickles Hill. Horton Bank Bottom, Horton Bank, and to some extent itself extends into neighbouring wards.

Nearby Places View Menu

704 m

Great Horton railway station

Great Horton railway station was a railway station on the Queensbury-Bradford section of the Queensbury Lines which ran between Bradford, Keighley and Halifax via Queensbury. The station opened for passengers in 1878 and closed on 23 May 1955 but remained open to goods with full staff until 28 June 1965 before it was closed, then demolished and the branch line tracks ripped up. Due to the relatively steep inclines, tunnels and a viaduct, the Queensbury Lines were also known as "the Alpine Route". More information about the geographical setting and history of the Queensbury Lines is available at the Lost Railways West Yorkshire website. The branch line through Great Horton was originally a land route connecting Bradford to Halifax for the transport of cloth to Manchester and elsewhere. Mail and stage coaches also used this route. An 1871 map of Bradford shows the Great Horton area as simply farmland, fields and footpaths with the Horton Beck slightly north of the station site running through this shallow valley eastwards and down towards the city centre. Clearly, this branch line and Great Horton Station, built shortly after, were instrumental in the economic development of this portion of Bradford and points west. The passenger station served the neighbourhoods of Great Horton and Lidget Green until service to and from Bradford town centre by more convenient and accessible electric trams, later trolley buses, along the parallel roads of Legrams Lane and Great Horton Road lured passenger traffic away from the station. A July 1947 timetable for passenger service from Bradford Exchange Station to Halifax via the Queensbury Line shows no less than 18 scheduled passenger trains passed through the station in the course of a weekday. Besides passenger and parcels service from the station platforms, adjacent sidings and trackwork also served a general purpose goods shed, a coal tipple (or coal drops), the Horton Iron Works casting foundry, a number of nearby weaving mills for textile manufacturing, and others. Three significant textile mills were located a short distance from the station, including Kellett, Woodman & Co. Westcroft Mill, Worsted Mills, and Cannon Mills, currently re-purposed as a shopping village. Freight operations during the 1950s included general goods and cargo as well as coal used as fuel by nearby households and industries. During the colder heating season a daily train delivered about a dozen wagons loaded with coal to the coal drops. The approach from Bradford was a rather steep incline and the steam engine would often struggle to find traction on the slippery rails, damp from the then-frequent morning fog. The engine would pull up beyond the Beckside Road bridge, then coast the wagons back down the slight incline to the coal drops on the south side of the station complex. Various specialized types of sand of varying colours, textures and consistency were delivered to the casting foundry on the north side of the station complex, which had bunkers or drops to receive and store the sand needed for mould-making for casting large iron and steel parts. Other freight operations entailed the receiving of general freight and cargo. A large number of empty barrels used for oils and chemicals, probably at the worsted weaving mills, ended up being stored in small mountains alongside the tracks on the northern side. Wagons being delivered or picked up from these sidings were shunted on an as-needed basis. Operations were complex enough to warrant a dedicated signal box, which was located on the west-bound or Clayton platform side, across from the main station building. A metal overpass allowed passengers to cross over to or from the main station house to the opposite platform. In earlier days, access was also possible directly via metal stairs from the Beckside Road bridge to the station overpass below. A map showing the layout of the station complex is shown on p.21 of "The Queensbury Lines". During the late 1950s, the line was used to train operators of DMUs (Diesel Multiple Unit) which made practice runs on the line to and from Bradford. No sign remains of the former station, platforms, signal box, or tracks. The site has been re-purposed for modern-day commercial and shopping use, with Cannon Mills now known as Cannon Mills Shopping Village. Interest in this and other stations along the Queensbury Lines is maintained due to the support for continuing steam locomotive operations of the nearby Keighley and Worth Valley Railway historic preservation association. The Queensbury Lines also have a lot of interest for railway fans and historians due to the variety of grades, cuttings, tunnels, and a long viaduct, all within a relatively short distance of each other.

Dixons Kings Academy

Dixons Kings Academy is a mixed free school for pupils aged 11 to 16 located in Bradford, West Yorkshire, England. The school opened as the Kings Science Academy in September 2011 and was one of the first free schools to open in England. It cost £10,451,327 to build and, pays an annual rent of £296,000 The school was founded by Sajid Hussain Raza, the school's first principal, who was convicted of fraud in August 2016 The school "comes closest to David Cameron's vision of what a free school should be." The school leases the land from Alan Lewis, vice-chairman of the Conservative Party. It is on a 20 year lease.

1.1 km

Clayton, West Yorkshire

Clayton, or Clayton Village, is a civil parish in the City of Bradford metropolitan borough in West Yorkshire, England, situated 3 miles (4.8 km) to the west of Bradford city centre. It is listed in the Domesday Book, meaning that it dates back to at least the 11th century. It was privately owned from 1160 to 1866. It was noted for its clay. More recently, Clayton was a key location in the British and international wool trade, being the home of the British Wool Marketing Board headquarters. The old building was demolished and converted into housing in the late 1990s. The village re-acquired civil parish status with a parish council in 2004. The main street of the village – Clayton Lane – which runs alongside the park, includes several traditional pubs, a popular crawl route for many residents. Starting at the top of the lane is the Fleece, moving down past the Royal Hotel to the Albion and the Black Bull – the oldest pub in the area.The Fiddlers Three and the Quarry Arms have now shut down. There are also several shops, churches and a nearby golf club and reservoir at Clayton Heights (now designated as a Country Park) with views of the city of Bradford and the village of Thornton across the valley.

Thornton View Hospital

Thornton View hospital was an 82-bed geriatric hospital near Clayton, West Yorkshire, on the site of the North Bierley Union workhouse.