Hartwell railway station

Hartwell railway station is a commuter railway station on the Alamein line, serving the eastern Melbourne suburb of Camberwell in Victoria, Australia. Hartwell is a ground-level unstaffed station, featuring an island platform with two faces. It opened on 7 May 1906, with the current station provided in 1938.

Initially opened as Hartwell Hill, the station was given its current name of Hartwell on 1 August 1909. It is the only station on the Alamein line to have an island platform.

History
When Hartwell station opened, it was served by a train consisting of a locomotive and one or two carriages, dubbed the Deepdene Dasher, which operated between Ashburton and Deepdene. After the line from Camberwell to Ashburton was electrified in 1924, Hartwell was served by electric trains on the Ashburton line, which was extended to Alamein in 1948.

Hartwell is named after one of the early estates in the area, Hartwell House, the residence of James Irwin who, in the mid-1850s, owned and operated Irwin's Hotel, which was on the corner of Norwood (now Toorak) and Wattle Valley Roads, and was demolished about the time the railway line was built. In the 1850s, Hartwell was a small hamlet named after the nearby Back Creek. Minutes of meetings from the Boroondara District Roads Board noted that "c/- Irwin Hotel, Back Creek" was used as a polling station.

The station building was originally at Walhalla, the terminus of the Walhalla line, but was moved to Hartwell in December 1938, six years before the Walhalla line closed in 1944. Until the Alamein line was converted from single to double track in 1954 (to Ashburton) and 1955 (to Riversdale), Hartwell was the only crossing loop on the line.

On 27 December 1948, an Alamein-bound train was derailed at the Flinders Street (up) end of the station, near a set of points. While the track was blocked, a shuttle service was provided between Hartwell and Alamein, but passengers going beyond Hartwell had to take trams.

Platforms and services
Hartwell has one island platform with two faces. It is served by Alamein line trains.

Platform 1:
 * weekday all stations and limited express services to Flinders Street; all stations shuttle services to Camberwell

Platform 2:
 * all stations services to Alamein