One of the most important factors in encouraging industrial growth in the area was the opening of the Blisworth to Peterborough Railway (the Northampton and Peterborough Railway) in 1845. Operated by the London and North Western Railway Company (LNWR), it became a very busy line with stations at Billing Road, west of Cogenhoe, and Castle Ashby (Castle Ashby & Earls Barton railway station), east of Whiston. Many local men worked on the line as plate-layers, signalmen and porters, and the busy goods yard at Billing dispatched agricultural produce and boots and shoes out to the larger centres and accepted coal, fertiliser and many other goods for local customers.