Watford has been feeling the impact of cuts to its bus services in recent years. Now, a group of locals say that the Hertfordshire town’s transport system needs expanding, and have started a petition asking the council to commit to reopening a long-disused train station.
Watford West was last used as a railway station in 1996, nearly 30 years ago. It continued as a bus stop until 2003, when it was shut completely. In the subsequent decades it became rusty and overgrown, then was cleared in preparation for the ultimately doomed Croxley Link.
In 2025, Watford West is back in the hands of nature, but that could soon change. The petition, titled ‘Bring Back West Watford station!’, currently has 435 signatures, having launched in early November.
Campaigners argue that ‘the new station [would] benefit everyone in Watford’. They say that, with the building of new homes and schools, West Watford would be ‘the perfect start for the future of public transport’ in the area. The petition says that the council not making a decision on the future of the station is damaging the community.
The head of the Watford Green Party, Jake Mitchell, is spearheading the campaign. Speaking to the Watford Observer, he said: ‘The fact of the matter is that there are still a lot of areas in Watford, West Watford being one of them, that have been left to decline… Watford transport is in ruins.
‘We need to take action and take it into our own hands and start fixing it’.
According to Mitchell, parents at the local schools have been particularly supportive. The lack of public transport means that most people drive their children to school, causing congestion which makes kids late for school, and parents late for work.
The council has yet to respond to the petition. In the past, projects to improve Watford’s transport links, including the Croxley Link, have come to a halt due to funding deficits, so it is possible that, even with council support, money troubles will get in the way of the station becoming functional anytime soon.
You can read more about the petition here.
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