West Calder railway station

West Calder (Scots: Wast Cauder, Scottish Gaelic: Caladar an Iar) is a village in the council area of West Lothian, Scotland, located four miles west of Livingston. Historically it is within the County of Midlothian. The village was an important centre in the oil shale industry in the 19th and 20th centuries. West Calder has its own railway station. The surrounding villages that take West Calder's name in their address - Polbeth, Addiewell, Loganlea, Harburn and Westwood - outline the area that this village encompasses, and they all have played an important part in the history of the village as well as West Lothian. The village is a 10-minute drive from Livingston, which is host to two large shopping centres. The village lies along the ridge above the Calder burn.

West Calder High School is a secondary school in West Calder, West Lothian, Scotland. The current school building was opened in 2018.

Five Sisters Zoo is a privately owned zoological park located in Polbeth, West Calder. The zoo was founded by Brian and Shirley Curran and originally operated as an attraction within their garden centre on the same site. The zoo officially opened in 2005 when it was granted a licence to display wild animals to the public. The zoo is named after the Five Sisters shale bings located to the north of West Calder. Since 2012, the zoo has worked with Belgian rescue shelter Natuurhulpcentrum to rehome rescued animals including brown bears, lions and an asiatic black bear. The zoo was named the ‘Best Family Day Out’ at the 2024 Scottish Entertainment and Hospitality Awards. The zoo is a member of the British and Irish Association of Zoos and Aquariums (BIAZA).

Polbeth (G. Poll - pool beithe - birch tree "birch pool") is a former oil shale mining village located about a mile from West Calder, and not far from Livingston, West Lothian, Scotland.

Burngrange is an area of the Scottish village West Calder. Situated at the far west of the village it mainly consists of housing constructed for the areas mining industry in the early 20th century. On 10 January 1947, Burngrange was witness to its worst underground mining disaster, in which 15 miners perished.Burngrange Shale Mine was situated 16 miles south-west of Edinburgh in the Parish of West Calder in the County of Westlothian. It was owned by Young's Paraffin Light & Mineral Oil Co., Ltd., which at the time was a subsidiary of Scottish Oils Ltd and was one of a group of 12 mines working the oil shales in the Counties of Midlothian and West Lothian. The Report on the causes of, and circumstances attending the Explosion and Fire which occurred at Burngrange Nos. 1 and 2 (Oil Shale) Mine, Midlothian, can be found at.David Brown was awarded the Edward Medal (later the George Cross) for his actions on the day. He was an overman at the mine.James McArthur was awarded the King’s Commendation for Brave Conduct. He was a miner who voluntarily became a member of the rescue team.

Seafield is a small village in West Lothian, Scotland. Seafield lies 1+1⁄4 miles (2.0 km) east of Blackburn, 2 miles (3.2 km) southeast of Bathgate (grid reference NT007660) and 3 miles (4.8 km) west of Livingston. The village lies between the River Almond to the south and the M8 motorway to the north. Seafield has many good community amenities such as a primary school, community centre, shop, hotel, bowling club and annual Gala day. It is also home to Cola P, creator of the Gobble. The band is currently defunct.Situated just outside Seafield is Blackburn House. This is an A-listed building built in 1772 by George Moncrieff.Seafield grew principally to provide housing for coal and oil-shale mine workers, with three poorer-quality rows north of the road demolished but two later, well-built terraces of miners' rows on the south side now restored in the centre of the village. The oil-shale works north of the village were cleared by the 1960s, leaving a large oil-shale bing (tip). The County Council then used the works site and the adjacent peat moss as its main domestic refuse tip until the 1980s. This generated serious water pollution problems, aggravated by outflow being east towards the New Town of Livingston. One of the last large-scale Scottish Enterprise-led land reclamation schemes, in the 1990s, utilised the spent shale (which is inert, having been retorted at high temperature) to blind over the tip, with full pollution control measures. Seafield Bing itself was remodelled to a design brief by West Lothian Planners, to resemble the natural basalt sills and lava flow landscapes of the Bathgate Hills and Fife, with a serrated crestline, and a proper summit now estimated at 198m asl in height, and renamed with approval of the Community Council "Seafield Law", appearing thus on latest Ordnance Survey maps. The wooded setting is a popular local recreational area.

HMP Addiewell is a prison located near to the village of Addiewell in West Lothian, Scotland. HMP Addiewell is operated by a private company, Sodexo Justice Services and contracted to the Scottish Prison Service. The prison holds adult males who have been convicted as well as those being held on remand.

Castle Greg is the archaeological remains of a Roman fortlet in Harburn on the Camilty Plantation, approximately three miles south-east of West Calder, West Lothian, in Scotland.The site is less than an acre in size, and lies just off the B7008. It is one of the best preserved Roman earthworks in the country and was first excavated in the 19th century by Sir Daniel Wilson, the interior excavation having taken place in 1852. The remains take the form of two defensive ditches protecting a clearly visible rectangular rampart. Originally, these ditches would have been at least fifteen feet in depth. The rampart behind the ditches still stands up to five feet high in places, though obviously, this would have been far higher when the fortlet was in use. On the rampart stood a wooden palisade, at least ten feet high, with a walkway running the length of the fortlet. There is an entrance through the rampart at the eastern end, over which would have stood a wooden tower attached to the walkway. Very little remains of the flat interior of the fortlet, although it is known that within there would have been two rows of barracks, between which there was a well. There would also have been a stable block. During the 1852 excavation of the interior, pottery was discovered from the well between the two barracks. Castle Greg was a most likely used as a monitoring base for an east–west road running along the foot of the nearby Pentlands, from the Forth to the Clyde Valley. Although the fortlet currently commands no long-distance views, during the 1st century AD, when the fort was in use, the surrounding countryside was not forested, and Castle Greg would have been able to view clearly up to the Fife coastline and the mountains beyond. The name Castle Greg is possibly derived from the Roman name Camulosessa Præsidium, from nearby Camilty, itself derived from Camulos Tref – literally, village of Camulos.

Starlaw distillery (sometimes known as Glen Turner distillery) is a grain whisky distillery located at Bathgate in West Lothian, Scotland. The distillery opened in 2010 and is owned by French drinks group La Martiniquaise, as part of its Scottish subsidiary Glen Turner Company, Along with Glen Moray distillery in Speyside it provides whisky for the company's Cutty Sark and Label 5 blended Scotch whisky brands.The distillery is integrated with a vatting, blending and bottling plant and has a capacity of 400,000 bottles per year. The distillery can produce 25 million litres annually and has 29 ageing warehouses (cellars) across 75 hectares at the distillery to allow for the maturation of over 600,000 barrels.In 2021, plans were submitted to West Lothian Council to extend the distillery site and create 21 new maturation warehouses. However, the planning application was rejected by the council in August 2021, following a list of objections received.

The Almond Valley Light Railway is a 2 ft 6 in (762 mm) narrow gauge heritage railway running at the Almond Valley Heritage Trust site at Livingston, Scotland. The railway operates at weekends between Easter and the end of September and daily during some school holiday periods. There are two stations, both with waiting shelters and run round loops. A small two-road loco shed is provided at the heritage centre end of the line. There is a storage siding here also.

Blackburn House is a category A-listed Georgian house, situated between Blackburn and Seafield near Bathgate in West Lothian, Scotland. The house comprises a compact central Palladian mansion house, with substantial east and west pavilions. The house was built by George Moncrieff in 1772. Moncrieff also founded the small town of Blackburn, for which the House still provides a gateway landmark. The rural setting became transformed by coal and oil-shale mining, with miners' rows built in the adjacent villages. Most of the dereliction has since been cleared, although the conspicuous Five Sisters shale spoil tip survives, as a scheduled monument, still dominating the outlook south from the house.The decay of Blackburn House stemmed from it becoming the farmhouse to a small farm, now no longer viable. The owners were unable to maintain the house, which was abandoned in 1972 for a new bungalow. Blackburn House thus fell into a state of serious disrepair, and was included in the Buildings at Risk Register for Scotland at its inception in 1990. The house could not be sold for private restoration as it stood amidst the working farm buildings. West Lothian Council's newly-established Lowland Crofting scheme provided a solution, with permission for ten new houses granted on condition the house was released, and a third of the farmland put into woods walks and wildlife for community benefit, reducing the farm itself to a smallholding.Restoration was completed in May 2008. Today, the Blackburn House serves as an office, event, and filming location. Blackburn House won the Georgian Group Award in November 2008 for the Best Restoration of a Georgian Country House in the UK.

The Museum of the Scottish Shale Oil Industry was created in 1990, to preserve the history of the shale industry in West Lothian and beyond. It is sited on a former mill at Millfield, near Livingston, Scotland. It is attached to the Almond Valley Heritage Centre, a large farm and play area.