In the Basingstoke of the early 1800s, horse-drawn carriages, coaches and wagons were the main forms of transport of the day, while goods and chattels were conveyed by canal or coach. At the time, there was no rail link from Basingstoke to London, which limited journeys greatly, meaning that people rarely travelled more than a few miles away from their home throughout their lives.

It was not until 1834 that an original proposal from 1825 for a railway linking London and Southampton was revived and the Act for the London and Southampton Railway was passed in parliament.

Although construction of the railway started relatively quickly, progress was slow: the London to Basingstoke line eventually opened on 10 June 1839. A year later, in 1840, the final link between Winchester and Basingstoke was finished, completing the whole route between London and Southampton. A replica of the now defunct Chesil Station in Winchester can be seen at Basingstoke’s Milestones Museum of Living History, which is operated by Hampshire Cultural Trust.

The next phase of railway development to Basingstoke was the addition of a Newbury link. In 1845, the Berks and Hants Railway was commissioned to create lines from Newbury to Reading and Reading to Basingstoke. These opened on 1 November 1848. Additional lines to Andover and Salisbury were completed in 1854 and 1857 respectively.

The passing of the Light Railways Act in 1896 meant that new railways no longer required a specific Act of Parliament before they could be constructed. The Basingstoke and Alton line was authorised under this act and opened on 1 June 1901. However, the line was closed 15 years later due to lack of traffic, but by the 1920s, local pressure led to it being reinstated. The track was re-laid and the line reopened in 1924 with just three trains a day. It was eventually closed in 1936.

Basingstoke was a market town of approximately 4000 people when the railway first opened in 1839. The electrification of many routes from 1967 saw it develop as London overspill town, with a substantial increase in train frequency and commuter traffic to the capital.

Basingstoke’s current station building dates from around 1907. Since then, the station’s entrance and ticket office have been refurbished twice, firstly in 1987 and most recently in 2012, to accommodate the increase in the number of passengers using the rail services as the town has grown in size.