Category: News

As part of its ongoing work to revive the oldest narrow gauge railway in Mid Wales the Corris Railway is looking to build a new station in the village of Corris itself, in place of the original which was demolished in 1968. Because of present day site restrictions it is not possible to completely recreate the former station as it was but the new structure will include an overall roof, a feature that made its predecessor an iconic part of the British narrow gauge scene.

The next phase will feature two aspects which have to be tackled and completed together. Patrick Jolley who is heading the project explained. “The new station will have a run round loop, including a traverser rather than a headshunt because of space restrictions, and a new platform. The twist in the plot is that we cannot build the run-round loop without changing the shape of the platform from a rather stubby triangle to a longer curve and there is no point in being able to have locomotives heading trains in both directions rather than propelling in one as is currently the case if passengers cannot board them. Loop and platform have to be done together.”

Patrick continued: “The works will cost £48,000 at current prices and thanks to a flow of donations including some very generous individual contributions we now have £20,000 to hand. Once we have the bulk of the funding in place and can commit to the work it will have to be done in a “window” between the end of December and the following Easter. All financial help is of course much appreciated as are offers of practical help with maintaining our existing tracks and future permanent way work.”

Donations towards the Corris Station project can be made online via the website or cheques payable to Corris Railway can be sent to Corris Railway, Station Yard, Corris, Machynlleth, SY20 9SH.

The Corris Railway Society once again held its Annual Model Railway Exhibition at Y Plas in Machynlleth over the August Bank Holiday weekend and despite the hot weather making the beaches of the Mid Wales coast an attractive alternative welcomed 420 visitors over the two days with 78 of the visitors being children. Exhibition organiser Bill Newton always tries to find at least one layout where younger visitors can “try their hand” and perhaps think that they would like to try railway modelling as a hobby. Bill commented:

“We had a record number of visitors in 2018 when the Bank Holiday was sadly a washout for coastal attractions and I did fear the worst when I saw the forecast for a hot and dry couple of days. But once again when all of the invoices are paid there will be a nice sum of money making a very useful contribution towards continuing the history of the Corris Railway and keeping trains running in the Dulas Valley. Thanks go to all the exhibitors and also to those who publicised the event, helped with setting up and breaking it all down, the volunteer caterers, the door staffers, the sellers of goods and raffle tickets and the rest of the exhibition team. Not to mention another team from our all volunteer workforce who were operating trains and staffing the Museum and shop at Corris itself.”

The Corris will be running its trains on Sundays in September and October, plus Saturdays October 19th and 26th.