A new facility on the North Yorkshire Moors Railway was unveiled on Saturday 5 June. It’s a new Learning Centre, and it has been built on Platform 2 of Pickering Station.
The centre will enable the railway to realize a long-term ambition – and that its to run heritage education programmes for school pupils, college students and local groups.
It is a two-storey building comprising large classroom, purpose-built archives and a smaller reading room. The facility is to be named the “Reussner” Education Centre, in memory of Graham Reussner, the railway’s former archivist who passed away recently.
Amongst the guests were representatives from the Heritage Lottery Fund and Yorkshire Forward, – both organisations have provided substantial funding towards the project.
The Learning Centre is part of a broader “Train of Thought” regeneration programme at Pickering station. A new Visitor Centre is presently under construction, also on Platform 2 and due for completion at the end of the year. The third phase of development includes restoring the roof on Pickering station.
Following the opening, the railway intends to target schools in order to offer curriculum based educational programmes based on themes like ‘how do steam engines work’, ‘Victorian railways’, ‘wartime evacuation experiences’, ‘the history of rail transport’, and ‘how do signal systems work.’
