This beloved British heritage railway line could soon get longer

Back in the 1960s (thanks to nationalisation) thousands of miles of railway tracks across Britain were ripped up and thousands of railways stations were shut down. One victim of the mass closures was the North Dorset Railway in Shillingstone. But, decades later, volunteers have been working hard to bring it back to life. 

A huge project to reinstate the North Dorset Railway line began in 2005. Over 20 years, hundreds of local volunteers from the North Dorset Railway Trust (NDRT) helped to repair the platforms at Shillingstone station, relay half a mile of track north of the station and restore the station building. It finally reopened as a visitor attraction in September, complete with a railway museum, a cafe, a cinema wagon and a souvenir and book shop, and it plans to start running heritage passenger services in late 2026. But there’s still more work to do. 

Trustees are now in talks with Dorset Council about the prospect of extending the line southwards. If the proposal is approved, it would create a total of 2km of working track. 

In a New Year message, the NDRT’s chairman Gavin Collins wrote: ‘We are in a consultation phase with Dorset Council about extending south to Holloway Lane at the southern end of Shillingstone Village, and talking with them about acquiring some land for restoration and storage sheds, siding space for more rolling stock and a loading/unloading area for road-rolling stock movements away from the station.

‘This includes shared use of the Trailway/track bed to connect the station to this area and, if approved, would give nearly two kilometres of running line.’

Collins added that there is also a longer term aim to extend the line further north towards Sturminster Newton but that discussions have been paused for now because ‘the owners of the next section of track bed on the way are not interested in having the railway on their land’. 

ICYMI: Five abandoned train stations in England are being brought back to life. 

Plus: Manchester’s Bee Network is getting its first trains in 2026. 

Stay in the loop: sign up to our free Time Out UK newsletter for the latest UK news and the best stuff happening across the country.