GNR Shipley the sole survivor

Shipley (Windhill) is the only survivor of the GNR's loop around NE Bradford

During the 1860s, two small railway companies were formed to promote suburban railways in Bradford, the Bradford, Eccleshill and Idle Railway and the Idle and Shipley Railway. Their schemes - and the companies themselves - were taken up by the Great Northern Railway, which built a line looping through the villages to the north-east of Bradford: from Laisterdyke, through Eccleshill, Idle and Thackley to Shipley.
The line was open to goods traffic on 4 May 1874, and to passengers on 18 January 1875.^[1]

The terminus of the new line was called Shipley and Windhill Station. The station was on the north side of Leeds Road, west of the Bradford Canal, and less than 330 yards (300 m) from the existing Shipley Station on the Midland Railway. It was built to the same distinctive pattern as other stations on the line, with a short mitre-roofed tower in the centre.

Passenger service on the line ceased on 2 February 1931, and the passenger station closed, though goods traffic continued on the whole line until October 1964 and as far as Idle until 1968.
The railway line is featured in Simon Ormondroyd's Windhill Tales, based on life in the area in 1964