The World's First Railway Station
Heighington, County Durham, the cradle of the railways
16 September 1825: 200 years ago at Heighington in County Durham, George Stephenson’s Locomotion No.1 was placed on the rails. It was a momentous moment. Every wheel that has turned on railways around the globe ever since, owe their heritage to that September day in County Durham.
Two years later, in 1827 a passenger station at Heighington opened, making it the world’s oldest railway station. At the time the concept of a railway station had not been fully worked up, the building was an office and tavern, a place for passengers to shelter whilst awaiting a train and where goods were delivered and loaded.
It is quite something that an unassuming station on a County Durham branch line has such a central place in the history of railways. Sadly, no one has thus far found a way of truly cashing in on Heighington’s rich history.
The former station building later became a public house, unfortunately this closed in 2017 and a restoration campaign is seeking to save the building for posterity. Yet, the unassuming flagstones outside the building are probably the world’s first railway platform.
Step off a packed Anglo-Scottish express at Darlington and it is a mere 11 minutes to Heighington. Catch a Bishop Auckland bound train, onto the tracks of the Stockton & Darlington Railway. It is a line packed with history.
Within minutes you are at North Road, Darlington’s original station. Although reduced to a single platform, the station retains its overall roof; although bizarrely passenger trains do not stop beneath it, instead they pause in the open air on the eastern end of the platform. The surviving station building houses the Hopetown, Darlington Railway Museum. The museum’s exhibits are devoted to the former North Eastern Railway, but have a particular focus on the Stockton & Darlington Railway and the railway industry of Darlington.
Amazingly, history is still being made on this line. Newton Aycliffe is the site of the Hitachi factory where the LNER Azuma trains that operate today’s Flying Scotsman were made. Soon after the train arrives at the world’s first railway station, Heighington.
From there it is a mere 7 minutes to the railway town of Shildon. The town is home to an outpost of the National Railway Museum, appropriately the pioneering engine Locomotion is here on public display. It is at the Locomotion Museum.
Well, what else would they call it!
Locomotion, photographed by Gavin Morrison when the engine was on display at Darlington station
In my recently released book, On the Tracks of the Flying Scotsman, there is much more about this historic branch line and the railway crossroads of Darlington. The book is now on sale at all good book shops.
Over the coming year I’ll be travelling the length of the route, giving talks on the journey and indeed my own journey, from signalman to author. If you have a bookshop, organise speakers at your local venue or run a literature festival, please get in touch.
Have rail pass, will travel!