Would you buy a house backing onto a railway line?

[jill5676]

We've seen a house we like, it's not perfect (small third bedroom) but nicely extended downstairs, doesn't need any work, has a big garden, it's in a good catchment area, just outside a big city, and it's close to amenities. It's an expensive area and we've been outbid several times. This one ticks most boxes but it has a railway line at the bottom of the garden. Two trains went past at viewing, it wasn't excessively loud but we could hear them. Obviously in the garden it would be louder.

In an ideal world, we'd not have trains passing, but it's hard to find something in this area as it's one of the few suburbs with excellent schooling. Would you/have you lived on a train line? For info, it's a single track suburban line with no freight trains but commuter trains passing every 15 mins from 6am-midnight.

Yes, it would be a deal breaker for me, because I am sensitive to noise, we currently live on a main road and I hate it.

Need to be seriously reflected in the price. And of course if I had outdoor cats it wouldn't be suitable.

Thanks everyone for your comments, appreciate it. We've decided not to go for it this time. If it had been our dream house or significantly cheaper we might have taken a chance but it's just a fairly average (albeit nicely finished) three bed semi, so we're holding out hope that another one will come up elsewhere.

I've lived close to a railway line since 2001, moved house in the same area. I much prefer living next to a railway line than a busy A road. I love the noise a train makes.

I think you're wise, purely because of your DH's worries. You've both got to be 100% excited and happy with the house purchase. I do hope you'll find something soon

I personally travel all over the UK by train and so I have happy associations with train noise, although I'd worry about works! Road noise is different, no rhythmic noise but far more jarring and jagged (though motorway noise can be got used to in time). I do think loving trains and being excited about them helps me with train noise, which isn't the case for you and your DH. So definitely the right decision

It's not the train noise that would worry me, it would be the vibrations from the trains. They can damage the structure.

Yes, I've always wanted to live near a railway line! I love trains, I'm like a child!

It really depends on how close to the house, how big the garden, and how busy the line was, but I have no objection in theory. It's probably better than constant road noise, even if it's louder for the few seconds it's happening.

We lived with a railway line that ran the length of our house ( sideways on , if you get what I mean ) We were about 5/6 houses away . When we first moved in it was the container trains that woke me up in the early hours ( they went to Harwich ) it was also mainline to Liverpool Street London so was a busy line .

Honestly , it took me about 6 months for them to become the norm and my brain cancel them out .
The worse part was commuters filling up the road with their cars all day but that ended when permits were brought in .

I think you will be fine once you have got used to them.

My mum has lived in a house backing onto a railway line for more than 50 years. We had a great time as kids waving to the train! My dad built a fence so we were more private but we could stand on things to wave over the fence. It's in a great location though with a big, long garden with our allotment next to it and Mum's house directly faces the gate of a park. Growing up we stopped noticed the trains. Even now if i visit, I don't notice at all. In fact, we would only ever notice if the trains weren't running for a day!

I know someone whose house backs onto a little branch line that has old school steam trains on it for tourists. The 'toot toot chuff chuff' noise it makes is just lovely.

Two of my siblings have houses incredibly close to train lines. I always notice now noisy and frequent the trains are.
One if a townhouse with the living room in the middle of the house. You can see people passing on the train.

Fades into the background during the day - I don't hear them any more, BUT when the timetable changes I think we notice? DH and DD have been waking up at certain (same) times during the night lately and I think it's a change in the diesel freight trains going by at those hours.

They always mention hearing work being done during the night too.

I wouldn't mind but my DH would hate the noise and be unable to tune it out.

Depends on what else there was round about, but in the great scheme of things, wouldn't put me off

We have the train at the end of our garden but much lower, the ground slopes quite steeply after our fence. I love it. No one can build there, not overlooked and I like hearing the train. I found it really comforting during covid to hear the train go by (when roads etc empty) as it was proof things were actually still working!

Had a train behind me for two years. Right behind my small garden. Honestly you don't even notice it after a short while. Humans are very good at removing unnecessary information. Ask yourself the last time you could see your nose 😂

Yes. I used to live in a house like that. You get used to it very quickly and you don't even hear the trains.

Definitely not. I know two people who live by train lines and both had gardens infested with Japanese Knotweed. We nearly bought one but luckily the survey was in May and the surveyor spotted the plants encroaching.

It is basically impossible to get the problem solved - the knotweed comes in from the railway embankment and althogh legally the Owner of that land must fix the problem AND pay for your garden to be treated … good luck with that.