The plan was to jointly open both stations between all four railways on 6 December 1853, with what was planned to be a "Railway Fete." However, the first S&HR passenger service arrived at Barrs Ct. on Saturday 28 October, which carried the chairman Mr Ormsby-Gore and engineer Thomas Brassey. As the negotiations and financing of the joint station had taken so long, they arrived at an incomplete facility. Whilst completion of the station would follow shortly after, significant rebuilding would occur later in the nineteenth century, when the current Victorian Gothic buildings, designed by R.E. Johnson, would be constructed. The station opened on 6 December 1853, and the name was simplified to Hereford in 1893 on the closure of Barton station to passengers.