Sleaford railway station serves the town of Sleaford in Lincolnshire, England. It lies on the Peterborough–Lincoln line. The station is south of Lincoln Central. The station is now owned by Network Rail and managed by East Midlands Railway who provide all rail services. History Early proposals The Sleaford Navigation, which canalised a 12.5-mile stretch of the River Slea from its junction with the River Witham to Sleaford, opened in 1794. It facilitated the export of agricultural produce to the midlands and the import of coal and oil. Mills sprang up along the river's course and the Navigation Company's wharves were built near its office on Carre Street in Sleaford. In 1827, the River Witham Navigation committee investigated the possibility of a railway allowing Ancaster stone to be transported to the Sleaford Navigation. The cost of doing so and competition from other quarries meant that their plans came to nothing. An 1836 scheme envisaged a railway between Nottingham and Boston which would have stopped at Sleaford, but the plans never left the drawing board. Another attempt, the Eastern Counties scheme, unsuccessfully tried to build a railway between Lincoln and Cambridge, with a branch to Boston via Heckington and an extension to Sleaford. After protests from the Sleaford Navigation company, the necessary Bill never passed. In 1845, the Ambergate Company designed a railway from Ambergate to Nottingham, with branches to Boston, Spalding, Grantham and Sleaford. A Bill to that effect passed through the Houses of Parliament in 1846, but the railway only reached Grantham. In the meantime, the more ambitious Great Northern Railway from London to York was also endorsed by an Act of Parliament; it passed through Grantham and a loop line from Boston to Lincoln was operating by 1848, yet its planned extension between Boston and Sleaford was not sanctioned. The railways arrive A new plan emerged in 1852 and was presented before Parliament the following year. The Sleaford, Boston and Midland Counties Railway would pass through Boston, Sleaford and Grantham. The proposals met with considerable support from businessmen in Sleaford, including a number of Navigation officials; they envisaged it as a mode of transporting coal and stone. The Bill passed in August 1853. Constructed by Smith, Knight & Co. under the supervision of the engineers W. H. Brydone and Edward Harrison, the line between Barkston, near Grantham, and Sleaford opened on 15 June 1857. An elaborate set of celebrations