Ipswich railway station is on the Great Eastern Main Line in the East of England, serving the town of Ipswich, Suffolk. It is 68 miles 59 chains (110.6 km) down the line from London Liverpool Street and, on the main line, it is situated between Manningtree to the south and Needham Market to the north.

Ipswich is also the terminus of the East Suffolk Line to Lowestoft, a branch line to Felixstowe and a branch line to Ely, Cambridgeshire. Its threeletter station code is IPS.

The station is operated by Greater Anglia, which also operates all trains serving it, as part of the East Anglia franchise.

The Eastern Union Railway (EUR) opened its first terminus in Ipswich, called Ipswich Stoke Hill, in 1846 on Station Road at the other end of the current tunnel, close to the old quay for the steamboats and the aptly named Steamboat Tavern. The Ipswich Steam Navigation Company had been formed in 1824/25 during a period of "steamship mania" and briefly offered services from the quay between Ipswich and London calling at WaltonontheNaze.

The current station is just to the north of Stoke tunnel, which was constructed by the Ipswich & Bury Railway as part of the Ipswich to Ely Line opening as far as Bury St. Edmunds in late 1846.

The station was resited to its present location in 1860. Some sources suggest that the main building was thought to be principally the work of Peter Bruff, who had certainly started the structure.

Architect Sancton Wood(18161886) won a competition to design the new station and it may have been his design.

However the architectural series started by Nikolaus Pevsner states:

“The present station opened in 1860. By Robert Sinclair, the Eastern Counties Railway’s engineer, although Gordon Biddle suggests the design may have been Peter Bruff’s. Called ‘graceful and pretty’ in the Handbook of 1864. Perhaps it struck people as that when it was new. White and red brick, with roundarched windows, low and spreading. The buildings on the island platform, added in 1883, are much more ornate, with carved keystones, terracotta roundels and ironwork by Matthew T Shaw & Co, Millwall.”

As built in 1860, the station had a single main through platform with some shorter bay platforms at the north end. When the new station was completed, a new road (Princes Street) linking the station to the town was also opened.

By the 1860s, the railways in East Anglia were in financial trouble and most were leased to the Eastern Counties Railway (ECR). Although they wished to amalgamate formally, they could not obtain government agreement for this until 1862, when the Great Eastern Railway (GER) was formed by the amalgamation. The island platform at Ipswich was added by the GER in 1883.

In 1883 an island platform was opened (today's Platform 3 and Platform 4) to improve operations at the station. Many of the original platform buildings exist today and close inspection reveals the heads of what are believed to be Greek Gods incorporated into the design.

Ipswich engine shed (later shed code 32B) opened in 1846 and was at the south end of Stoke tunnel. It was the thirdlargest shed in the Great Eastern area during the steam era, after those at Stratford and Cambridge.

At the beginning of World War I, soldiers of the Norfolk Yeomanry regiment were deployed to Ipswich to guard key railway bridges in the area. They were relieved by the 9th field company Royal Engineers.

In 1923, the GER amalgamated with other railways to form the London and North Eastern Railway (LNER).

On 30 April 1932, the LNER arranged an exhibition of railway stock at Ipswich. The show was opened by Sir Arthur Churchman, of tobacco family fame, and over 16,000 visited the show. The proceeds were divided between the Ipswich and East Suffolk Hospital and railway charities.

Duration of the video: 13:05 15:00

We’ll be seeing services by Greater Anglia & some freight as well in the duration of this video.

I hope you enjoyed the video if you did smash that button and don’t forget to subscribe for more upcoming content that’ll be featured on the channel and feel free to leave any comments or recommendations of stations you want me to do as I’ll try get back to them as soon as possible.

I really enjoy my time that was spent at Ipswich especially with the amount of variety I managed to see in the hours I spent there however I was expecting to see more but due to a earlier broken down train during the day there was disruption ongoing for a certain amount of time at Ipswich but it’s always a good to revisit after a certain amount of time.

My next station isn’t certain of what it’ll be yet as it hasn’t been confirmed but by the time my next video of what my next station is on YouTube there’ll be more details of what station will be after that so until then thanks for watching and I’ll see you in the next video.