Visit the History-Laden Kidderminster Railway Museum
If you are passionate about trains and rail travel history, you cannot miss a visit to the Kidderminster Railway Museum. Set in the heart of Worcestershire County, the facility pays homage to one of the first and most important railway nodes in the United Kingdom’s history.
The Kidderminster Railway Museum makes for a perfect stop on your travels through Worcestershire. The facility has both an educational purpose and an entertainment role. It features vintage relics from the days of steam travel and modern artefacts that show the evolution of train transportation in England.
A brief history of the Kidderminster Railway Museum
The Railway Museum in Kidderminster is a relatively young facility, having been established in 1990 by a group of volunteers with an arduous passion for trains and railway history.
The museum collects and displays artefacts that are related to railway travel throughout the British Isles. Its galleries are in full expansion, so you are likely to see new exhibits on every additional visit that you make to the Kidderminster Railway Museum.
The building that hosts the present-day museum was built in 1878 by the Great Western Railway. For many years, it has served as storage for grain, wool, and carpets. The goods came mostly from the local industries and stationed here before being transported to all the corners of the Kingdom.
Between 1960 and 1990, the building became disused and was showing signs of severe damage before a group of volunteers got together into a registered charity organisation and saved it from destruction.
Since its establishment, the Kidderminster Railway Museum has come a long way. Nowadays, it is a fully registered and accredited facility with the Museums Libraries and Archives. It is also a major collector of everything related to train travel and freight transportation in the United Kingdom. People who are passionate about the history of railways and trains come from far away to admire the impressive collections stored here.
What to see at Kidderminster Railway Museum
While travelling through Kidderminster with your family, you should make a stop at the local Railway Museum. Here, you will get the chance to find out more about how transportation worked almost 150 years ago. It is also the ideal opportunity to educate your children about the rich history of the railway and trains of Worcestershire.
Visiting the Kidderminster Railway Museum is especially fun for kids. The facility has several attractions that will delight and entertain them, such as:
● Station totems
● Signalling instruments and finials
● Destination boards, signals, signs and gas lamps
● 5-inch gauge models of locomotives and trucks
● Platform ticket machines and signs
Furthermore, on the adjacent modern railway, there are train locomotives that feature the loveable characters from Thomas the Tank Engine books and cartoons.
How to get to the Kidderminster Railway Museum
You can easily reach the Kidderminster Railway Museum from almost anywhere in Worcestershire.
If you travel by car, you will find Kidderminster only half an hour from the M5/M42 motorways. Take the A442 from Bromsgrove or the A449 from Worcester or Wolverhampton and follow the signs for the Severn Valley Railway. There is ample parking on the site.
If you travel by rail, which we highly suggest, you will find the Kidderminster station between Birmingham (Snow Hill or New Street) and Worcester. The small town has inter-city links from either of those two cities to all parts of the country. The museum is less than 100 yards from the Network Rail station.
If you are arriving by plane, you will find that the Birmingham International Airport is about half an hour away by road, probably three-quarters of an hour by train.
The full address of the Kidderminster Railway Museum is Station Approach, Comberton Hill, Kidderminster, Worcs. DY10 1QX.
To access the museum, you have to go through the Severn Valley Railway’s Kidderminster Town station, pass the booking office, and turn right just before the platforms.
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