Expansion plans for the Great Central Railway

The Great Central Railway has announced its plans to build a new Locomotive Works, Education and Visitor Centre at its Loughborough site.

The new works will offer enhanced facilities for the restoration and maintenance of the railway’s extensive locomotive fleet along with greater manufacturing capabilities. Incorporated into the works will be a new visitor centre allowing extensive public access to the works along with new education and learning facilities.

Great Central Railway Managing Director Michael Gough said. “We are excited by this development, which will allow our visitors unprecedented access to truly engage with all the activities needed to restore mainline steam locomotives”.

The Great Central Railway has recently expanded its educational offering and the new centre will provide much needed facilities for schools, colleges and universities to engage around several areas of their curriculums. The GCR will also use the facilities to increase education and skills transfer for its own volunteers with emphasis on increasingly rare heritage skills.

Michael continued. “One area we have been concentrating on at the Great Central Railway for the last 12 months is our support for schools and colleges and their curriculum needs. The centre is designed with this is mind, offering a range of capabilities to support learning from early years through to our own young engineers and volunteers”.