A day for photographers, railway enthusiasts, and everyone with an interest in transport history; the sound of clanging buffers and hard-working engines will be filing the air on February 12.
In the days before the motorway network and heavy goods vehicles changed our country forever, almost everything went by rail. From coal to bricks, from steel to farm animals, the train was the fastest and most efficient method of transport.
Steam hauled freight trains will be running all day alongside our normal passenger train service.
Trains of vintage waggons will be thundering up our famous steep gradients, filling the crisp winter air with smoke and steam. A powerful image for any photographer and a great spectacle for all, freight trains will be running from 10.15am
The first passenger train leaves at 11am from Andrews House station.
The almost lost art of shunting will also be demonstrated throughout the day using our vintage 1933 built Armstrong Whitworth diesel electric. A great spectacle to watch as a shunter uses his wooden shunters pole and wooden brake stick to carefully position historic waggons in wonderfully atmospheric Marley Hill shed yard.
Locomotives in action (subject to availability):
Sir Cecil A. Cochrane Built by Robert Stephenson & Hawthorns, Forth Banks Works, Newcastle, 1948
This locomotive spent its working life at the Redheugh Gas Works of the Newcastle & Gateshead Gas Co, it is named after a chairman of the company.
Renishaw Ironworks No. 6 Built by Hudswell, Clarke, Railway Foundry, Leeds, 1919 A locomotive built for the iron industry, it worked both at the ironworks and at the iron ore mines of the Renishaw Ironworks in the midlands.
A Reyrolle & Co Ltd No. 2 Built by Armstrong Whitworth, Scotswood Works, 1933 This pioneering diesel locomotive was used as a demonstrator by its builders until it was bought in 1937 by A Reyrolle & Co for use at their Hebburn works. Here it worked between two different plants in the town over the Newcastle to South Shields railway line.
