IMAGES TAKEN NEAR TO
Whitebeam Close, EPSOM, KT17 3AU

Cul-de-sac off Fir Tree Road, completed in 2017.

Cul-de-sac off Fir Tree Road, completed in 2016.

c1930s housing in Fir Tree Road, although the road itself significantly predates any development, being shown on the 1871 1:10,000 map.

This shows the small car park provided south of the platform. With a much larger car park free of charge, and a better rail service, the station could attract park-and-ride from quite a large area.

A relatively modern stone clad building in keeping with the newly built housing around it. The station shares its building with the Railway Children Kindergarten.

Footpath connecting Fir Tree Road and Rose Bushes.

There was also a station building nearer the line but has since been demolished.

The building straight ahead, blending in well with the 1980s executive homes on this estate, is in fact Epsom Downs station - it also incorporates a children's nursery. The branch from Sutton was opened in 1865 and at first prospered as the closest station to Epsom racecourse, but that role was usurped by the Tattenham Corner branch in 1901. Since then, the line has had a purely suburban role serving the important town of Banstead but ending nowhere in particular. In 1989 the line was cut back to make way for new housing development, which at least must have offered the prospect of additional commuter traffic.

This small building looks as if it might have been intended as a station house: in fact it has never been used as such, but is a kindergarten.

Pretty typical of the many residential streets in this outer suburban area - though this links the A240 at Drift Bridge with Epsom Downs, and thus carries a certain amount of through traffic. The view is NNE from a point not many yards north of Mimosa Close (newly built, and not yet plotted by the OS at the time of writing).