Railfest (or Railway Festival) is a term used by railway museums and heritage railways around the world on open days and special annual events.
The events are usually fundraising-oriented, and also involved with showing features of museums and their contents not always available in normal visiting times. The term is found in the United States, United Kingdom and Australia for such events. [1] [2] [3] [4]
Railfest is the name given to occasional railway festivals at the National Railway Museum in York, England. There was a Railfest in 2004, and another in 2012. The 2012 event was sponsored by EMAP magazines Rail , Steam Railway and Model Rail . [5] [6] [7]
The 2000 event was promoted as being a celebration of 200 years of Steam. [8]
The 2004 event featured a Class 171 Turbostar DMU, a Class 375 Electrostar EMU, a Class 390 Pendolino EMU and a Eurostar train.
The 2012 event had the theme of record breakers, [9] and featured exhibits such as
The National Railway Museum is a museum in York forming part of the Science Museum Group. The museum tells the story of rail transport in Britain and its impact on society. It is the home of the national collection of historically significant railway vehicles such as Mallard, Stirling Single, Duchess of Hamilton and a Japanese bullet train. In addition, the National Railway Museum holds a diverse collection of other objects from a household recipe book used in George Stephenson's house to film showing a "never-stop railway" developed for the British Empire Exhibition. It has won many awards, including the European Museum of the Year Award in 2001.
The British Rail Class 09 is a class of 0-6-0 diesel locomotive designed primarily for shunting and also short-distance freight trips along branch lines.
The Harry Needle Railroad Company (HNRC) is a railway spot-hire company, based at Barrow Hill Engine Shed in Derbyshire. Prior to 2010 the company also recovered valuable spares from scrapped railway vehicles, either on the vehicle owners site, or at the European Metal Recycling scrapyard in Kingsbury.
The InterCity 225 is an electric high speed train in the United Kingdom, comprising a Class 91 electric locomotive, nine Mark 4 coaches and a Driving Van Trailer (DVT). The Class 91 locomotives were built by British Rail Engineering Limited's Crewe Works as a spin-off from the Advanced Passenger Train project, which was abandoned during the 1980s, whilst the coaches and DVT were constructed by Metro-Cammell in Birmingham and Breda in Italy, again borrowing heavily from the Advanced Passenger Train. The trains were designed to operate at up to 140 mph (225 km/h) in regular service, but are limited to 125 mph (200 km/h) principally due to a lack of cab signalling and the limitations of the current overhead line equipment. They are used on services from London King's Cross to Leeds and York.
The British Rail Class 91 is a class of high-speed, 4,830 kW (6,480 hp) electric locomotive ordered as a component of the East Coast Main Line modernisation and electrification programme of the late 1980s. The Class 91s were given the auxiliary name of InterCity 225 to indicate their envisaged top speed of 225 km/h (140 mph); they were also referred to as Electras by British Rail during their development and throughout the electrification of the East Coast Main Line. The other end of the InterCity 225 train set is formed of a Mark 4 Driving Van Trailer, built with a similar body shell to the Class 91 locomotives. The locomotive body shells are of all-steel construction. Unusually, the motors are body mounted and drive bogie-mounted gearboxes via cardan shafts. This reduces the unsprung mass and hence track wear at high speeds. The locomotive also features an underslung transformer, therefore the body is relatively empty compared to contemporary electric locomotives. Much of the engineering specification for the locomotive was derived from the research and operational experience of the APT-P.
LNER Class A3 4472 Flying Scotsman is a 4-6-2 Pacific steam locomotive built in 1923 for the London and North Eastern Railway (LNER) at Doncaster Works to a design of Nigel Gresley. It was employed on long-distance express East Coast Main Line trains by the LNER and its successors, British Railways Eastern and North-Eastern Regions, notably on the London to Edinburgh Flying Scotsman train service after which it was named.
The British Rail Class 41 were two powercars built in 1972 by British Rail Engineering Limited's Crewe Works to operate with the prototype High Speed Train (HST) with Mark 3 carriages.
The British Rail Class 43 (HST) is the TOPS classification used for the InterCity 125 High Speed Train power cars, built by British Rail Engineering Limited from 1975 to 1982, and in service in the UK since 1976.
60008 Dwight D Eisenhower is an LNER Class A4 steam locomotive named after Dwight D. Eisenhower, the United States General of the Army.
Southern Railway 4501 is a preserved Ms class 2-8-2 "Mikado" type steam locomotive built in October 1911 by the Baldwin Locomotive Works in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania as the first of its wheel arrangement type for the Southern Railway. In 1948, the locomotive was retired from the Southern in favor of dieselization and was sold to the shortline Kentucky and Tennessee Railway (K&T) in Stearns, Kentucky to haul coal trains.
Neville Hill is a railway Train Maintenance Depot in Osmondthorpe, Leeds, England on the Leeds to Selby Line. The depot is situated 2 miles 14 chains (3.5 km) to the east of Leeds railway station on the north side of the line.
Tyne Yard (TY) is a railway yard in Gateshead, England, on the East Coast Main Line, operated by DB Cargo UK. The yard is the major freight yard of the region, with the majority of rail freight movements in Tyne and Wear from around Great Britain passing through the yard.
The 21st Century Steam program was a program conducted by the Norfolk Southern Railway from 2011 to 2015, featuring four classic steam locomotives pulling passenger excursions along Norfolk Southern rails in the eastern United States. The last train was to be Southern 4501's Piedmont Limited excursion trip from Atlanta, Georgia, to Toccoa, Georgia, but cancelled on October 1 due to Hurricane Joaquin.
The British Rail Class 800 Intercity Express Train or Azuma is a type of bi-mode multiple unit train built by Hitachi for Great Western Railway and London North Eastern Railway. The type uses electric motors powered from overhead electric wires for traction, but also has diesel generators to enable trains to operate on unelectrified track. Based on the Hitachi A-train design, the trains were built by Hitachi between 2014 and 2018.
London North Eastern Railway (LNER) is a British train operating company owned by the Department for Transport (DfT). LNER operates the InterCity East Coast franchise providing long-distance inter-city services on the East Coast Main Line from London King's Cross. LNER’s primary destinations are Leeds, York, Newcastle and Edinburgh. LNER manages 11 stations itself and its trains call at 55 stations in total.
Abellio East Midlands Limited, trading as East Midlands Railway (EMR), is a train operating company in England, owned by Abellio, and is the current operator of the East Midlands franchise.
Siemens Goole is a train factory located in Goole, East Riding of Yorkshire, England. Siemens Mobility scoped several sites in the United Kingdom before settling on Goole with an intent to build the plant if it were successful in gaining orders for new rolling stock. After a June 2018 announcement that Siemens had won the bid to build 94 2024 stock trains for the Piccadilly line of the London Underground, Siemens confirmed it would go ahead with building the factory, though this was then subject to further delays as other rolling stock companies objected to Siemens being given the contract.
The British Rail Class 69 is a class of diesel locomotives which are converted from Class 56 locomotives.
The British Rail Class 810 Aurora is a type of bi-mode multiple unit which will be built by Hitachi for East Midlands Railway. Based on the Hitachi AT300 design, 33 five-car units are to be built to replace Class 180s and Class 222s on EMR's intercity routes.
CAF Newport is a rolling stock factory located at Celtic Business Park, near Llanwern steelworks in Newport. The site was announced as a train-building factory in 2016 and was producing rolling stock by 2018. It was officially opened by HRH Prince Charles on 21 February 2020.
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