News

By Cedric Johns BOSSES at Locomotive Services Limited are celebrating having been granted a train operating licence for the operation of excursion passenger trains on the network’s main line. This means that Locomotive Services Ltd has now secured the three main approvals needed to operate. These are the ORR safety certificate, Network Rail access agreement…

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SECTIONS of what may be the world’s oldest standard gauge railway to be discovered have gone on show. As reported in issue 180, an excavation in the summer of 2013 at the site of the former Neptune shipyard in Walker, Wallsend, near the Roman fort of Segedunum on the banks of the River Tyne, unearthed…

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THE Great Western Society is to send two locomotives and GWR steam railmotor No. 93 – to Old Oak Common for what will be the GWR ‘mega shed’s’ last-ever open day. As part of main line developments in west London involving Crossrail, the Great Western Main Line and, eventually, High Speed 2, the famous shed…

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By Paul Appleton THE layout of the Severn Valley Railway’s Bridgnorth station yard, familiar to visitors and relatively unchanged since public heritage era trains first started running in 1970, is set to change massively under Phase 2 of the Bridgnorth Development Plan. For the past 50 years, the exit route from the station’s overflow car…

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THE Vale of Rheidol Railway will be running a special event to celebrate 95 years of the GWR on September 16-17, on the theme of Roaring Twenties and Thirties. The line’s 2-6-2Ts Nos. 8 Llywelyn and 1213 Prince of Wales will be hauling traditional Great Western rolling stock on a four train service. Re-enactors will…

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SERVICES on the Snaefell Mountain Railway have been halted on health and safety grounds. The Health & Safety at Work Inspectorate suspended services on the Isle of Man 3ft 6in gauge line on August 10, in the wake of an incident in which brakes failed on a tram six days earlier. After a tram came…

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MORE than four decades after it closed to passengers, a train has run into Slaggyford station on Cumbria’s Alston branch again. The 2ft gauge South Tynedale Railway celebrated the accomplishment of a major goal on the morning of Monday, July 24, when it opened its 11/4–mile northern extension from Lintley. The extension was opened by…

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By Geoff Courtney A fascinating photograph of a brand-new Class 31 diesel more than 550 miles from home, wheel-to-wheel with a still operational 73-year-old steam loco, has been unearthed by former Stratford driver Dave Brennand, whose new book on London’s East End steam was featured in the June issue of Heritage Railway. The photograph shows…

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STEPHENSON’S Rocket is to return to the city of its birthplace for the Great Exhibition of the North in 2018. Rocket’s owner, the Science Museum, where the locomotive is on public display, has confirmed that it will be loaned for the showpiece event in Newcastle-on-Tyne and Gateshead. Built in 1829 by Robert Stephenson and Company…

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