Sleights station was on the initial 6.5-mile (10.5 km) section of the Whitby and Pickering Railway between Whitby and Grosmont.[1] Originally just a simple halt, it opened to horse-drawn traffic on 15 May 1835,[2] with a full public service operating from June 1835.[1] The station platforms and the main building, a mock-Tudor design by George Townsend Andrews, were constructed eleven years later and opened in 1846.[3] The station buildings were extended along the platform in 1912.
The station used to have two platforms for up and down line working,[4] but in common with the other stations between Grosmont and Whitby, this was reduced to single track working in 1984 when the second track was lifted and Sleights signal box closed.[5] Trains now stop at the former Up line platform,[6] where the main station buildings, including the station master's house, are now a Grade II-listed private residence.[7][8] The former down platform used to have a wooden waiting shed and store; this building was recovered by the North Yorkshire Moors Railway and re-erected on the extended down platform at Grosmont.[9]
Behind the down platform was a small goods yard with a single siding. The Up line platform is currently managed and maintained by Northern Trains and Esk Valley Railway, whilst the down platform and derelict signal box are the responsibility of Network Rail.
At one end of the platform, a footpath carries passengers over the River Esk to Briggswath on a small box girder bridge, while at the other the A169 towers over the railway and river on a bridge opened on 26 January 1937.[10] The site of the modern day footpath used to be a level crossing carrying the main Whitby-Pickering road to a stone bridge over the Esk,[11] before this was washed away during floods in 1930.[12] Next to the crossing a 19th-century brick built signal box remains, now unused and boarded up.
^Hunt, John (2004). The North Yorkshire moors railway : a further trip along the former Whitby & Pickering Railway and through to Malton / vol. 2. Kettering: Silver Link. p. 37. ISBN1-85895-236-0.
^Whitworth, Alan (1998). Esk Valley Railway : a travellers' guide ; a description of the history and topography of the line between Whitby and Middlesbrough. Barnsley: Wharncliffe. p. 33. ISBN1-871647-49-5.
^ abStations in Middlesbrough, Redcar and Cleveland, and Stockton-on-Tees are considered part of North East England, while stations in the unitary areas of York and North Yorkshire are considered part of Yorkshire and the Humber.
^Stations in North Lincolnshire and North East Lincolnshire are considered part of Yorkshire and the Humber, while all other stations are considered part of the East Midlands.
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