- 2 days ago
- #realityinsighthub
Britain's Favourite Railway Stations (2026) Season 1 Episode 1
Britain's Favourite Railway Stations
#RealityInsightHub
🎞 Please subscribe to our official channel to watch the full movie for free, as soon as possible. ❤️Reality Insight Hub❤️
👉 Official Channel: />👉 THANK YOU ⭐❤️❤️❤️⭐
Britain's Favourite Railway Stations
#RealityInsightHub
🎞 Please subscribe to our official channel to watch the full movie for free, as soon as possible. ❤️Reality Insight Hub❤️
👉 Official Channel: />👉 THANK YOU ⭐❤️❤️❤️⭐
Category
😹
FunTranscript
00:01I'm Si King, and I've always loved transport, especially bikes and trains.
00:08Here in Britain, we have every reason to be proud.
00:12This is where the railway was born 200 incredible years ago.
00:18Change the points. 26 bus, it's all happening here.
00:23But for too long, the real stars of the story, our railway stations, have been overlooked.
00:29I'm never going to look at a train station the same way again.
00:32It's where adventures start and end, where lives change, and where extraordinary human stories unfold.
00:40The camaraderie you have with the passengers, I love that.
00:44I'm joined by architect Damien Burrows and transport historian Siddy Holloway.
00:51Together, we'll uncover their hidden history.
00:54Oh, wow. This is a site you don't see very often.
00:58Stunning architecture.
01:01What an explosion of light and engineering.
01:05And meet the people who keep them alive.
01:08Volunteers, families who've worked the rails for generations, and their communities.
01:13I haven't been to many train stations where I've ended up harvesting fresh veg.
01:20From glorious coastlines to soaring peaks, it's a journey full of surprises.
01:25Now that's a pretty majestic view from a railway station.
01:28So join me to celebrate Britain's favourite railway stations.
01:33This week we're celebrating railway stations linked to our heritage and traditions.
01:46Exploring how they were built, what they mean to communities now, and how history is being brought into the present.
02:02In York, Ireland cover its Victorian grandeur and how people embrace their new railways.
02:12They really were monster trains. You could have, say, three engines drawing 100 carriages.
02:16Oh, wow.
02:19The city is off to Suffolk to explore a station that made it through some of the darkest moments in Britain's history.
02:26People don't realise how badly Lowestoft took the bombing. It was dreadful.
02:32You were taken somewhere to be kept safe.
02:35Damien is travelling to West Yorkshire to one of the grandest stations in the country.
02:42The stately home of railway stations as it moves into the 21st century.
02:48This was trailblazing.
02:50This is showing off. This is structural gymnastics.
02:53And down in Devon we find out how one heritage line is keeping up a very unique railway station tradition.
03:01This is railway collecting dog Henry.
03:03Henry has become something of a local celebrity.
03:19But first, I'm visiting the stunning county of North Yorkshire, one of my favourite places.
03:26I'm off to York.
03:27Situated where the rivers ooze and fuss meet, the walled city has been standing proud since Roman times.
03:37But I'm not here for that story, or for my Viking ancestors either.
03:41I'm here to visit one of the most spectacular Victorian railway stations in the country.
03:49York held the title of the largest station in the world when it opened on the 25th of June 1877.
03:57Here we are in the magnificent York station, the grand old Victorian dame of them all.
04:09I must have been through this station thousands of times, but I've never really stopped to take a closer look.
04:15Wow, just look at this. Talk about making an entrance.
04:28So why build such a huge station in York?
04:31Well, it was very simple really.
04:34It was strategically positioned perfectly between Newcastle in the north and London in the south.
04:43It distributed people and goods more efficiently from this location than anywhere else.
04:49And it was used to fuel the optimism of the industrial revolution.
04:59This Grade II listed station was truly built to last.
05:08I love the sense of magnificence and scale of York Railway Station.
05:14And even the character and personality of it.
05:16But I need somebody that can bring the bricks and mortar to life to get truly under the skin of what is a fabulous railway station.
05:28Dr Emma Wells is a historian and author with a passion for all things architectural.
05:35Who better to help me delve into the rich history of this grand building?
05:39So Emma, York was incredibly, and still is, incredibly important railway station, isn't it?
05:44Absolutely. What it's saying is, York is arriving.
05:47This is the birth of the industrial age, but also the birth of the railway, and York's here to play with the big boys.
05:54You can see that mix, that sort of intermingling, if you will, of engineering and architecture.
06:00I mean, there's so much history within these walls, within the stones.
06:03Just behind us here, we've got evidence of shrapnel from when York was bombed during the war.
06:07You can see the sort of little speckles and dots all over this sort of atrium area.
06:12Wow.
06:13Yes. So literally within the walls.
06:16The reminders of World War Two might be all around us, but today Emma's giving me a lesson in the building's Victorian origins.
06:24The work of architects, Thomas Prosser and William Peachey.
06:30York combined engineering might and ornate design featuring arches, pillars and balustrades.
06:38It was built using yellow Scarborough brick to mirror the city walls.
06:43It's been called one of the greatest cathedrals of the railway age.
06:49Oh, now we're in the cathedral that is York station, aren't we?
06:53Yes, this is the real, where the magic is, I suppose.
06:57We've got those beautiful iron arches above us that keeps us safe, that keeps us out from the elements.
07:04Yes, it's very functional, but it's also architecturally ingenious, really.
07:08We hadn't seen it before.
07:09It's not like St Pancras that was earlier, which was just one great big span of iron.
07:15This has three.
07:16And of course, what does that remind you of? A church.
07:18A church, yeah.
07:19Got the nave and the two aisles.
07:21And what's York known for? It's churches, it's minster.
07:24So it's very much in keeping harmonious.
07:28It took 100 columns in six different sizes to hold this vast roof above passengers' heads.
07:35With curved girders known as ribs, carrying it across the platforms.
07:41Pride of place beneath the original station clock, dating back to the opening in the 1870s.
07:49All over the station, there are stunning design details, including heraldic crests and the red and white city of York coat of arms.
07:58So what are they called those there, Emma?
08:01Those little sort of triangles, they're called spandrels.
08:04They're really ornate again, aren't they?
08:06That's what we see all over the station.
08:08What I would say is the first of the Victorian age of branding here.
08:11And we're seeing York being associated with not only the railway, but also with the birth of the industrial age and Yorkshire.
08:20With these sort of hidden insignia.
08:22Oh look, yes, the white rose.
08:24Yeah, the white rose and what is it next to? N-E-R.
08:27North East, yeah, railways.
08:29Exactly, we're York, we're Yorkshire, and this is what we do here.
08:32They're really making a statement through everything.
08:34So it's a real sense of place and a sense of belonging and pride, isn't it?
08:39Yes, exactly.
08:40And it's a sort of, all of this is quite a Victorian optimism with this sort of industrial age.
08:45People are quite afraid of it, but it was showing, no, it's beautiful, look what's coming.
08:49Well, look what it's allowing us to do, travel.
08:52Wow, it's been so fascinating.
08:55I'm never going to look at a train station the same way again.
08:58I know.
08:59That's great.
09:00The architecture of York Railway Station makes its heritage impossible to miss.
09:06I can't believe what Emma was saying, that there was shrapnel still in the walls of the station from the bombing in the Second World War.
09:13This railway station really is living history, it's amazing.
09:17If these walls could talk, there are bound to be more fascinating tales of the past to uncover here.
09:24And it turns out that even the walled city of York had to make room when the railway came around.
09:30Here in the grand old city of York, I'm delving into the past.
09:51While the present day station dates back to the 1870s, it wasn't the city's first.
09:57Its predecessor was built between 1840 and 1842 and tucked inside the city walls, which meant trains needed to get through them.
10:08The hole, you see, in the unbreachable wall of York's fortifications, was punched in by the infamous George Hudson, who at the time was king of the railways.
10:22A railway pioneer, Hudson convinced the investor of the earliest passenger locomotives, George Stevenson, to build his line from Newcastle to London, through the city.
10:35The only problem with York's original station was that it was a terminus station.
10:41So, the trains had to come in and reverse out again, which caused no end of headaches.
10:47York's engineers and entrepreneurs decided to take the station outside of the city walls and build the station that we know today.
10:58While York had outgrown its original station and needed an upgrade,
11:0550 miles away, Huddersfield's railway tycoons had gone big from the start.
11:13Look at how this station welcomes you.
11:18This is more than a station.
11:23It's grand, imposing, it's making a statement, and it's saying, I mean business.
11:36The man behind Huddersfield Station was Yorkshire architect James Piggott Pritchett.
11:43Completed in 1850, its elegant neoclassical style earned it the reputation as the stately home of railway stations.
11:52This incredible grade one listed facade, with its impressive Corinthian columns and portico entrance, I mean it really is quite splendid.
12:04The station sat at the very heart of Victorian Huddersfield, then a world leader in the production of Walstead, a type of wool yarn.
12:13The vision of two rival railway firms working together, it linked the town's growing trade to the industrial centres of Manchester and Leeds.
12:23Huddersfield Station was effectively the Wall Street of its time, and Huddersfield's textile industry was Silicon Valley.
12:33But even the highest spec Victorian building needs updating.
12:46The station is partially closed while it undergoes a massive £70 million redevelopment programme.
12:53But I'm getting a special sneak peek.
12:56I'm meeting Andrew Croghan, one of the men in charge while this ground-breaking project takes place.
13:03So you can really, you can see the improvements on this side of the station, can't you?
13:08You can, yeah.
13:09You've got these lovely blades of light that cut through with the cast IO.
13:13Aesthetically, it'll look amazing once it's all completed.
13:17Some of the original features are so rare on the railway today, they're going to extraordinary lengths to preserve them.
13:25The Grade II listed timber tea rooms date back to 1886.
13:30So each and every piece, 8,000 in total, had to be taken apart by hand and safely stored away during the revamp.
13:40Redevelopment on this scale doesn't come cheap, but the station's Victorian builders poured a fortune into it back then too.
13:49This is lavish. This is splashing a lot of cash on a train station.
13:55It was, but I think when you look around the area, you've got the mills were starting to pop up.
14:00You've got the industry was starting to ramp up.
14:03So I think it might have been perhaps future-proofing itself at the time.
14:10It's such an impressive roof structure. All of this cross-bracing detail.
14:15I mean, the connections, the little roses in the centre are acting as tensile arrangements to hold the whole roof together.
14:22This is showing off. This is structural gymnastics.
14:25Absolutely, yeah. Just shows what the Victorians could do, didn't it?
14:28Preserving Huddersfield's Victorian engineering is one thing.
14:35But back then, it served a town of only 30,000 people.
14:40The 175-year-old station now needs to cater for 3 million passengers passing through it every year.
14:48And Paul Sumner is one of the people in charge of making it fit for a sustainable future.
14:56Look at this. It's literally like model railways, kind of on steroids, isn't it?
15:01This is HD1, our main compound in Huddersfield.
15:04And we're going to modernise it, bring it up to modern-day standards.
15:08You've got two great big sections of track here, a huge crane.
15:12How many people have we got down here on the ground at the moment?
15:15We'll have around 800 people at its peak, working 24-7.
15:19We'll be electrifying through here along the Trans-Pennine Route upgrade
15:23between the major cities Manchester, Leeds and York.
15:27The Trans-Pennine Route upgrade aims to transform 76 miles of track
15:33and 23 stations across the north of England.
15:37The electrification of the entire route will remove up to 87,000 tonnes of CO2.
15:44That's almost 6 million car journeys worth every year.
15:49Electric trains might be the next wave of innovation here,
15:53but the team are keeping Huddersfield's original Victorian ingenuity
15:58at the heart of the revamp.
16:00When you walk into the stations, you look up, you see that incredible ironwork
16:04which must have needed to be very sensitively restored.
16:09Yeah, that original roof had what we call a lantern in the centre,
16:13but around the 1950s it lost the original lantern.
16:16So what we're doing is putting that lantern on to enclose that space
16:20how it was originally intended.
16:22So even when you're looking at bringing the station up to date,
16:25there's always the opportunity to go back to the original drawings,
16:28to the original design, to see if there's something that you can tease out of that.
16:32Yeah, bringing it back to life, because it's been there for 100 years plus
16:37and it's had to take the weather and everything that's thrown at it.
16:41So actually it's going to breathe new life into the station for the future.
16:46Yeah, walking up to Huddersfield station and seeing its grand ornate facade,
16:59you could be mistaken for thinking this is a museum,
17:02but then when you hear about the industry, the community,
17:06do you understand its importance?
17:09As Victorian grandeur makes way for radical transformation,
17:15Huddersfield station is more than just a stop on the line.
17:19It's a meeting point between heritage and progress.
17:24Station buildings like Huddersfield are impressive and York certainly is,
17:33but I want to understand more about the lifeblood of any station, its passengers.
17:39Railway historian Dr. Susan Major is an expert on some of the earliest to use stations like York,
17:47Victorian day trippers.
17:50A certain Mr. Thomas Cook started the craze back in 1841
17:55when he organised the first ever railway excursion for 500 people,
17:59from Leicester to Loughborough.
18:01But York saw its fair share too.
18:04You know, Susan, what I really admire about your work,
18:06it's not about the buildings, it's about the people that use the stations
18:10and not the rich folk.
18:12That's right. Because of the invention of the railway excursion,
18:15it meant that ordinary working folk were able to come away for the day to places like York.
18:20And in 1844, for the first time, we had 25,000 people in the summer on trains
18:26and the population of York at that time was only 30,000.
18:30Wow. How did they feed them?
18:32Good question.
18:34There was one lovely account which talks about a train coming from the north,
18:38from Newcastle, and another one coming from the Midlands, Leicester.
18:41And the second train had arrived and, sadly, the first train had been
18:45to all the coffee shops and places and eaten all the food.
18:49So the Geordies that came down at the stop, that's not...
18:51Actually, nothing's changed then, has it?
18:54No. They really were monster trains.
18:56You could have, say, three engines drawing 100 carriages.
19:00Oh, wow. Railway companies, all they wanted to do was make money.
19:03So your excursionist might be in an open truck, no toilets, no lighting, no heating.
19:09People felt like animals because they were packed into these wagons.
19:12So they tended to moo and bleat and things.
19:14And the people watching them on the wall would moo and bleat at them as well.
19:18So it was quite a spectacle.
19:20And the reason the trains were so jam-packed?
19:23Well, in 1844, tickets cost as little as one pence per mile,
19:29with many railway companies offering cut-price day trip deals.
19:33Rail travel was now available to more people than ever.
19:37And with so many on the move, a day out could be fraught with danger.
19:42You had literally several thousand excursionists arrive at the gates of a station.
19:48Oh, dear.
19:49When they opened the gates, first of all, you quite often had a big crush,
19:52quite a dangerous crush of people sweeping in.
19:55It was all rather disorderly.
19:57Some of the trains, you tended to have young men on the top of them.
20:00And there were lots of nasty accidents,
20:02because some of the bridges were too low.
20:05Now this is a very well-organised, beautifully earned station,
20:08very attractive, but in the old days it was quite different.
20:12Thank goodness York has evolved into a much safer station these days.
20:27But one that still proudly shows off its past.
20:31In the station's long history,
20:33there have been times when all this came close to being lost forever.
20:42Railway stations like York here in North Yorkshire aren't just grand reminders of our industrial past.
20:58They're also vital for the people they serve.
21:01And this is certainly the case down on the Suffolk coastline,
21:06where city's exploring a station full of memories that sits at the heart of its community.
21:13Lower Stoff Station is the most easterly railway station in Britain.
21:18For over 175 years, it's carried fishermen to the docks, holidaymakers to the beach,
21:24and even carried thousands to safety during the war.
21:28The station is right in the heart of town,
21:30and I'm here to find out why it's still such a vital part of its past, present and future.
21:36As part of a partnership with Greater Anglia,
21:44volunteers are hoping to make the station an inviting modern hub,
21:48while celebrating and keeping alive its unique history.
21:51It's all led by Community Rail Development Officer Martin Halliday.
21:58Martin, would you tell me about the history of this station?
22:01Where did it all start?
22:03So, a gentleman called Samuel Morton-Pito
22:05bought the railway to Lower Stoff in 1847,
22:08and he enlarged the harbour.
22:10He wanted that fish that could be landed in Lower Stoff
22:12could be in Manchester the next morning,
22:15and that's what he achieved.
22:17Yeah.
22:18And it brought tremendous prosperity to the town.
22:21So, I read somewhere that there was also a peculiar enterprise in the 1890s.
22:28The Great Eastern Railway were very enterprising,
22:31and they felt that if they were to put barrels of seawater
22:36and send that down to some posh spas in London,
22:40people could bathe in it and enjoy the sort of health benefits.
22:44What people didn't know was that as it got more and more popular,
22:47they just popped in a little pipe into the harbour
22:50and pumped it across to the station and filled these giant vats.
22:54I mean, seawater is great for you.
22:55It's so good for the skin, but I don't know about harbour water
22:57and whatever else you might get in that.
22:59Not harbour water, no.
23:00No, there's only fish heads and everything in it.
23:04This unusual water trait was short-lived,
23:06but throughout the 19th century, the vital railway port thrived,
23:10and by 1920, Lowestoft was the busiest on the Great Eastern Railway.
23:15The station also welcomed thousands of tourists who flocked here
23:19to enjoy its seaside charm.
23:23Sadly, it didn't last.
23:25In the 1970s, trade and passenger numbers started to drastically drop,
23:29and by 2005, the station was in need of some serious TLC.
23:36Lowestoft's my hometown, and I'd seen the condition of the station.
23:40It was very sad.
23:41Yeah.
23:42Doors were boarded up.
23:43Three-quarters of the buildings were derelict.
23:45What you didn't want to happen is that someone came along and said,
23:48right, well, it's unused, and we'll knock it down.
23:51The first thing we did was we reopened the doorways.
23:54Yeah.
23:55So you can see the harbour when you arrive.
23:57What strikes me about this station
23:58is that this feels like an open square almost.
24:01Yes, of course, it sadly lacks a roof.
24:04What happened to the roof?
24:05So the station is a real survivor,
24:08and it survived at least three East Coast floods,
24:12two fires, two world wars.
24:15But in the early 90s, the roof was in a difficult state,
24:20and it was decided that rather than repair it,
24:24that British Rail would take it off.
24:26We're working at the moment.
24:27We've just got our first concept designs for reinstating the roof.
24:31Yeah.
24:32Well, you said earlier it's a great survivor.
24:35Now you're the sort of custodian of the next phase of it.
24:38With Martin in charge, hopefully it won't be too long
24:45before Lowestoft has a new roof worthy of its historic buildings.
24:50After all, we know how proud the Victorians were of their grand designs,
24:56especially here at York.
24:58But it could have been a very different story
25:01when the station faced destruction in World War Two.
25:06I'm back with Dr. Susan Major to find out how the station
25:10and its staff kept things moving during wartime.
25:14My particular interest has been on women railway workers.
25:18You tend to hear about women working in the land army
25:21Sure, you do.
25:22And the military and munitions,
25:24but you don't hear quite so much about the women railway workers.
25:27They were able to do jobs which involved meeting people,
25:31skills that they hadn't had before.
25:33They might be working signals, collecting tickets.
25:36Women were promoted very quickly,
25:38so it did introduce a bit of feeling into the relationship.
25:41A bit of gender friction.
25:42Yes, that's right.
25:44But these women had a difficult time.
25:45Quite often there were no toilets for women workers,
25:48and they didn't have proper uniforms,
25:50but most of them loved it because it was an opportunity to meet people,
25:53very varied, very exciting, very dangerous as well.
25:57Across the UK, over 80,000 women heeded the call
26:01to fill railway positions left empty by men who had enlisted,
26:06from porters and guards to mechanics and maintenance workers.
26:11At York, one of them was Nellie Nelson.
26:14She was working when the station faced its most devastating German air raid in 1942.
26:21The Railway Museum has actually got a wonderful collection of oral history interviews.
26:27In her interview, Nellie Nelson talked about her station foreman, Billy Milner.
26:32The station was very badly damaged,
26:34and he'd gone back to get some medical supplies
26:37to cope with all the people who were injured.
26:39She tried to go back in with him, but he told her, no, don't go.
26:43And sadly, when he went back into the building, there was a bomb, and he was killed.
26:48This is a plaque for William Milner, who was only 42.
26:52Oh, my God.
26:5342 years' age.
26:54Yeah.
26:55What a brave man.
26:56I think it's remarkable, isn't it, Susan,
26:58that the social history of our nation can be found and mirrored in railway stations.
27:06Absolutely.
27:07It's the arrival and the joy of people arriving that you love,
27:11and also the sadness of people's departures.
27:14It's a very magical place.
27:16It is.
27:17With lots of memories.
27:18You can feel it.
27:20Not every station is as big and busy as York,
27:33but as city is discovering down on the Suffolk coastline,
27:36even the smaller stations played a vital role during World War II.
27:41Here in Lowestoft, a major port during wartime,
27:46the town found itself a target for enemy bombing.
27:49To escape the danger, in June 1940,
27:533,000 local school children boarded trains from these platforms
27:57to Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire.
28:02Local evacuees Keith, who was eight,
28:05and Brenda and Alma, both only six,
28:07all set off from Lowestoft Station.
28:10It's such a pleasure meeting all of you.
28:13So do you remember the day?
28:14What was the day like when you were evacuated?
28:17We were brought down to the station,
28:20and we were just told we were going to have a day out,
28:24and we said,
28:25oh, you're going for a train ride, lovely.
28:28I remember being on the railway station here with my gas mask box.
28:33I just remember the steam coming past the windows on the train.
28:38I'd probably never been on a train before.
28:40First stop was Peterborough for a lunch break,
28:45but you didn't get off the train.
28:47They brought the sort of packed lunch to you,
28:51and then we went straight into Glossop.
28:54And we all said, well, are we going to get back on the train to go home?
28:58Oh, no, you're now going to have a new mummy and daddy to come pick you up,
29:03and you will go and live with them.
29:07I went with one foster parent, my brother went with some more,
29:12and my sister went with another.
29:14We were all split up.
29:15No, you couldn't all stay together?
29:16Yes, but no.
29:17Well, I was with three billets.
29:19I was with Mrs Wardle first,
29:22and from there I went to the next billet,
29:26and that was a Miss Woods.
29:28And then her and her father got ill,
29:31so they then moved us to our third billet.
29:33I was one of the last children to be selected.
29:36I went off on my own with this lady.
29:39I remember going up into the bedroom and me sitting on the mattress,
29:43and it was then that I felt lost and alone and cried for my mum.
29:48Yeah, of course you did.
29:51For many children like Brenda, Keith and Alma,
29:54evacuation was the hardest experience of their young lives.
29:57But in wartime, it was still far safer
30:00than the dangers they faced at home.
30:04It's wonderful to see all three of you here in the place
30:07where you were taken somewhere to be kept safe for all that time.
30:12They were trying to keep us safe.
30:15A lot of people don't realise how badly Lowestoft took the bombing.
30:19It was dreadful.
30:21My final question, Bea,
30:23well, what does Lowestoft Station mean to you?
30:27Home.
30:28It's absolutely beautiful now.
30:30I mean, no comparison with now and years ago.
30:34So maybe we're coming into the heyday of Lowestoft Station now.
30:41Wow, that was quite an emotional chat
30:44to have.
30:45There's something truly special about the fact
30:48that they were back here in the same station
30:51that they remember being sent off during the war.
30:54And really shows us that railway stations aren't just,
30:58you know, a means to an end.
31:00It can also be a place that holds really special evocative memories for people.
31:05What a day here in Lowestoft.
31:11This station, to me, proves you can be a part of the working railway network,
31:17but also celebrating heritage and history.
31:20This station has been welcoming people for over 175 years.
31:26And it's really thriving.
31:33Here at York, the railway station is also keeping its history as part of its present.
31:39The Milner Hotel has stood here directly attached to the station since 1878.
31:47Previously, it was called the Royal Hotel, a rather savvy marketing move by its owners,
31:53the North Eastern Railway, who adopted the name after Queen Victoria stopped by York on a trip to Scotland.
32:00These days, it's managed by Andy Barnsdale.
32:06My goodness, what a building, Andy.
32:08It's absolutely breathtaking.
32:11This is Victoria Honour at its best.
32:14It's a prominent building that stands out the minute you step off a train.
32:18William Peachy was commissioned as the architect for the North Eastern Railway,
32:23and they wanted a flagship hotel to show off, basically.
32:27So it really was a statement piece, this thing?
32:29It was.
32:31The North Eastern Railway went all out to impress its wealthy clientele,
32:36with 100 bedrooms and elegant high ceiling banqueting rooms.
32:42In 2024, Andy decided to rename this fabulous York landmark in honour of one of the city's railway heroes.
32:52So the hotel's renamed to the Milner in memory of William Milner.
32:56So that's the guy that has the plaque on the station platform?
33:00Yes.
33:01So we discovered that he had one daughter, Brenda, who was 95 last year, and so we wanted her to open the hotel in the memory.
33:11And she must have felt such a sense of pride.
33:14Overwhelmingly, yeah.
33:15And she's the last of the Milner line, so she was very proud that his name will live on beyond the hearth.
33:22What a wonderful piece of railway heritage, and it's amazing to see that its close connection to the railway has continued to evolve over the last 150 years.
33:36So far, I've been busy exploring the station's past.
33:43But next, I'm going to find out how they're keeping its Victorian legacy going and running things these days.
33:50I'm at York Railway Station.
34:07It's full of rich heritage, yet it's also one of the busiest hubs of the modern rail network.
34:14Over 25,000 passengers pass through here every day.
34:20I've learned about the social history, and I've even learned about the magnificent architecture of this railway station.
34:27But how does it actually work today?
34:29Who pulls the trains into the station?
34:32Who moves the people through it?
34:34It turns out, it's this woman.
34:38Station manager, Stephanie Walker.
34:41Steph, what was the moment where you thought,
34:43I know what I want to do for a living.
34:45I want to manage one of the busiest stations in the country.
34:48I started as a seasonal temp for the summer.
34:52But like a lot of people in the railway, it just gets hold of you.
34:56My dad worked for the railway for over 40 years.
34:59So I always feel quite, you know, emotionally attached to York Station and train travels.
35:04So when the opportunity came up to be manager, that was it.
35:08It's in your blood.
35:09Steph, I was talking to Susan, the historian, and she was just saying during the Second World War, it was all females.
35:15What's the balance now?
35:16I would say it's around 50-50 now, yeah.
35:19When I started 20 years ago, you didn't see many women in the more sort of traditional station manager senior roles.
35:27But it's now an all-female team.
35:29Steph's taking me up into the old station master's office, which today is still the main operation room for York.
35:38Platform 9 for the 14, a 55 LNER service to Edinburgh.
35:45This is the nerve centre of movement.
35:47It absolutely is, yeah.
35:49And here's one of our information controllers, Harry.
35:51Hello, Harry. Very nice to meet you.
35:53Nice to meet you.
35:54So we're using these systems to change the departure boards, make manual announcements for when things change,
36:01so that passengers have enough time to be able to move around.
36:03We basically organise that in this office.
36:05So, in essence, it's strategy and logistics.
36:10Absolutely.
36:12The team at York are plugged into every movement of every train in and out of the station.
36:18Controlling signals, which trains are on which tracks, and what platforms they use.
36:24It takes a lot of quick thinking to keep thousands of passengers moving, so I think I'd better leave them to it.
36:31Thanks for taking the time, Harry. And please do take your walkie talk, please.
36:35I'm a bit worried now you've turned it down.
36:38And Steph, how wonderful. Thank you so much.
36:42Steph and the team at York have certainly got their hands full, continuing the legacy of 175 years of station heritage.
36:50And they're not the only ones.
36:51Tooked away in the rolling moorland of North Devon, the Linton and Barnstable Railway was once a lifeline through the rugged Exmoor countryside.
37:13Its beating heart is Woody Bay Station, once the highest on the whole Southern Railway at almost a thousand feet above sea level.
37:23And today, it offers a trip back in time.
37:27My name is Stuart Nellums. I am the general manager here at Woody Bay Station.
37:33This railway has this unique look, unique feel, because of where it is, this sort of up high on Exmoor, because of the way the locomotives look, the station architecture people visit from all over the world, is actually quite addictive.
37:50Woody Bay Station was built in the Swiss chalet style, in keeping with the nickname the Victorians gave this area, Little Switzerland.
38:03It's the only steam railway in the UK today where passengers can still travel in Victorian carriages designed in the 1890s.
38:12This railway was opened in 1898. It ran for 19 miles from Linton all the way to Barnstable. Primarily built as a passenger railway.
38:21North Devon was quite an isolated area. Still very much relied on horse and carriage.
38:26It could take anything up to three hours to ride on a stagecoach between Linton and Barnstable.
38:30So when the railway was built, at that time it was much, much quicker. Tourism started to take off.
38:35The first hotels appeared in places like Linton and Limbeth. This railway did allow that flow of people between these two very important places.
38:46Sadly though, its popularity didn't last. As roads became a more convenient, quicker way to travel, the Linton and Barnstable Railways' days were numbered.
38:55It closed in 1935.
39:00But luckily, in 1979, volunteers with a passion for preservation formed a group to restore this picturesque little line.
39:09And today, they're still the lifeblood of the railway.
39:13We have about 200 volunteers, of which about 50 to 60 are very, very regular.
39:17There is a really great family atmosphere. It's more than just the trains. It's about the people that are running the trains.
39:25And there's one pair of volunteers who have become a star attraction.
39:30My name is John Bond. I work as what's known as a duty controller. And this is railway collecting dog, Henry.
39:38He comes with me when we come up to Woody Bay. And Henry collects for charity.
39:42I first volunteered about nine years ago. Henry would stay at home with my wife.
39:48Very sadly, she died last year. And I had to then bring Henry with me.
39:53I thought, well, if I've got a job to do here, Henry should have a job to do as well.
39:57Henry has found his calling in being a railway collecting dog.
40:01Thank you, madam.
40:03Henry is continuing a long railway station tradition. From the 1880s on, railway collecting dogs were greeting train passengers all over the UK, raising money for local orphanages and hospitals, whether it was Bill in Woking or Taff in Andover.
40:22At London Waterloo, five generations of retrievers, all known as London Jack, held the job. The last of them raised an amazing £4,500, over £200,000 in today's money.
40:40Thank you, sir. Thank you.
40:42Can I say hello to the doggy?
40:44Henry, come.
40:45He's a lovely dog.
40:47Henry has become something of a local celebrity. His fame is spreading. He has featured in the local newspapers on more than one occasion.
40:57We meet and greet normally at the entrance to the platform. And as visitors are walking down the drive, you suddenly see their face light up as they catch a glimpse of Henry.
41:07He's only been coming with me since August of 2024. But in that time, he's already collected over £2,600.
41:16He's very proud to walk along the platform, meeting such kind people here at Woody Bay.
41:23To be able to have Henry bring joy to so many people and to make their experience here that little bit more special to them is really a good feeling to have.
41:37It's so heartwarming to know that everyone at the Linton and Barnstable Railway, including Henry, are so dedicated to keeping railway station history going.
41:47And that's certainly the case here in North Yorkshire.
41:54There's a long tradition of railway workers forming their own brass bands, and York is home to three.
42:13I'm dropping in on rehearsals with the Golden Rails Band, who practice right next door to the station.
42:23They train up new recruits for the Railway Institute, or RI Band, and Nick Eastwood is the man with the battle.
42:32OK, not too bad, not too bad, not too bad.
42:36What a wonderful, wonderful noise.
42:38Well, thank you very much.
42:39What is the connection between the railway and the brass band?
42:43Back in, I think it was 1952, the RI Band was all started by railway musicians.
42:51Sure.
42:52And this was kind of the evening thing to do, the evening hobby.
42:55Right.
42:56There were many, many different things around this little area, badminton, sports, football, pub.
43:02But Band was also one of those.
43:05So it's a real sense of ceremony and place and community then, isn't it?
43:10100%.
43:11It's interesting.
43:12The brass bands that I grew up with were from the pits.
43:15My grandad was the winder in the pit, and he couldn't read a note, but he went to every single rehearsal.
43:22I'm not entirely sure to get out of the way of my grandma or whatever.
43:25I don't know.
43:26I don't know.
43:27But it's fabulous.
43:29So what is it that you guys get out of it?
43:32Teamwork.
43:33We're a team.
43:34We've all got our individual positions.
43:36So we've all got to perform as best we can to make the whole sound sound so good.
43:42My daughter wants to join, and they just wrote me in.
43:45They said, well, why don't you pick an instrument?
43:47But it's wonderful.
43:49You know, on my own, adults aren't very good, but amongst all these people, it's brilliant.
43:53How lovely.
43:54Thank you so very much.
43:56Is it all right if I stay and listen to you, please, for a little bit?
43:59Absolutely.
44:00You're always welcome.
44:02Two, one, and two.
44:03Across the country, bands formed by railway workers and sponsored by railway companies were a key part of the social life of stations like York.
44:26By the end of the 19th century, there were more than 7,000 brass bands in the UK, their performances enjoyed by tens of thousands of people.
44:37How fabulous was that?
44:40This is the station that keeps on giving.
44:42The grief.
44:43What a wonderful part of this amazing station's heritage to wrap up my visit to York.
44:49But before I leave, I reckon I've just got time for a swift farewell drink.
44:55And luckily, the station has the perfect place.
44:58Oh, wow.
44:59Oh, proper beer as well.
45:00What a place.
45:01Yes.
45:02The building that now houses the York Tap has been serving customers and the railway passengers for over a century.
45:15It was built in 1907 as the station's tea room.
45:19Well, you know what I'm going to do?
45:23Time for a beer.
45:24A beer and a pint, please, if you're doing mine.
45:26Of course.
45:38The grand old Victorian dame of railway stations is definitely York.
45:44Steeped in history.
45:46Amazing architecture.
45:49One of the most beautiful railway stations in Great Britain.
45:55And it's just the same now as it was then.
46:00Serving passengers and the city of York.
46:03Fabulous.
46:04Right, I'm going to drink my pint.
46:06Cheers.
46:07Next time, we're checking out four British railway stations that are destinations in their own right.
46:20Can you believe that that is a train station?
46:22Transit hubs full of life, history and community spirit.
46:26It tugs at your heartstrings to think that this was saved by volunteers.
46:31To be continued.
47:00Amen.
Be the first to comment