Bushey railway station is a London Overground and National Rail station. It serves the towns of Bushey and Oxhey and is situated on the Watford DC Line, 5 miles (8.0 km) north of Harrow & Wealdstone. The station was renamed from "Bushey & Oxhey" to "Bushey" on 6 May 1974, even though it is actually sited in the neighbouring town of Oxhey, and the nearest part of Bushey (Bushey Village) is over 1 mile (1.6 km) away. Even so it was late in the 1980s before signage at the station reflected this change.
During the war years of 1939-1945 the station was often known as "Ampersand railway station" - this was due to a typically bureaucratic application of emergency regulations. To hinder enemy troops in the event of an invasion it was ordered that all station names should be painted out on station name-boards, and this was interpreted at Bushey & Oxhey to mean the words 'Bushey' and 'Oxhey' but not the '&'. For the duration of the war, therefore, the station bore the designation '&'.
The London and Birmingham Railway, the first mainline railway in the United Kingdom, first ran (non-stop) through here on 20 July 1837.
London Underground's Bakerloo line trains served the station from 16 April 1917 until 24 September 1982.
On 16 February 1980, faulty trackwork caused nine coaches of an express Euston to Manchester passenger train to derail as it passed through the station. Three coaches were overturned and 19 passengers were seriously injured. The track required extensive repairs and did not reopen fully until 25 February 1980.
On 20 April 1980, a passenger train heading for Bletchley derailed immediately before Bushey station after hitting track maintenance machinery. The leading bogie of the Class 310 EMU derailed, but the train remained upright and damage was slight. One member of the track maintenance team sustained a broken pelvis.
On 8 August 1996, the Watford rail crash occurred around 1 mile (1.6 km) north of the station.
The local London Overground DC service that loops to the west to serve Watford High Street before Watford Junction makes platforms 1 & 2 curved away and apart from the mainline route. There are four mainline platforms; one serving the down (northbound) fast (platform 3), two for the up (southbound) fast and the down (northbound) slow lines (platforms 4 & 5) forms an island platform; one serving the up (southbound) slow line (platform 6). Platform 3 is accessed via the stairway for platform 2 and is fitted with a remotely operated gate to prevent access when the platform is not in operation because it (platform 4 also) is only used during engineering works on the slow lines.
Between 2000 and 2007, the West Coast Main Line rail link to London for the Virgin Trains network had been the only source of building work at the station, where a storage yard and redundant buildings were converted into a high-voltage substation to supply the significantly higher current required for the new, higher speed, Pendolino trains.
Platforms 3 and 4 have been brought back into use for the December 2011 timetable, which marks some services as "front four coaches only for Bushey", allowing an improved late evening and weekend connection with London. Prior to this reinstatement, engineering works frequently meant that late-evening London Midland services were unable to stop at Bushey as a northbound platform was not available, it being overgrown after having fallen into disuse many years earlier and boarded off following its partial destruction during the crash of February 1980 when the locomotive and leading two coaches passed through the station before coming to a stand having destroyed the platform face.
Starting in December 2007, Transport for London began a significant upgrade programme at the station. During the following four years, the underpass was relined with plasterboard walls and corrugated steel ceilings and repainted. The doors and windows were repainted, and the orange railings replaced the old green and blue railings.A non-slip surface had been added to areas of the floor and all of the stairways. Extensive CCTV was installed throughout and signage was changed to London Overground standards (allegedly "temporary" (see Gallery), as at other Overground stations). The alleyway linking the entrance of the station to Kingsfield Road was upgraded, replacing the repeatedly vandalised wooden fences with metal palisade. The bicycle shed was moved from the front of the station on Pinner Road to the Eastbury Road entrance. The space at the front was converted to a shop and newsagents.
Bushey is on the London Overground "DC lines" between London Euston and Watford Junction and the London Midland services between London and Tring.
As of 2009, London Overground is operating their new trains, British Rail Class 378s, on this service. A camera system monitoring the platform is now in use for train drivers on platform 2. This is due to the curvature of the platform (see above) preventing the driver seeing the whole train from the cabin window or the previous mirror.
For London Overground services, Monday to Sunday daytimes there is a train every 20 minutes calling at all stations to London Euston (southbound) and Watford Junction (northbound). Early morning and late night sees a half-hourly service in each direction. A more frequent service was introduced by London Overground from 22 May 2011.
For London Midland services, Monday to Saturday daytimes the half-hourly service to London Euston and Tring stops at Bushey. There is also one train to and from Crewe on weekdays.
London Bus Routes 142, 258 and non-London Bus Routes serve the station.