Welcome to the S&D 200 Blog - Telling the story of the Stockton & Darlington west of the Pennines

The recent award of £213,108 for ‘West Side Story – the forgotten history of the Stockton & Darlington Railway in Cumberland, Westmorland and Furness’ from the National Lottery Heritage Fund (NLHF) now enables us to finally commence Phase 1 of our signalling project at KSE. 

This will involve rebuilding the remains of the 1861-built Stockton & Darlington Railway signalbox and installing appropriate signalling to enable the box to control shunting movements on the southern side of the site. The ‘box only operated for a short number of years – it was almost immediately found to be too small for the operation at KSE and was soon replaced by the much larger Junction ‘box. However, it survived until the closure of the route, being used as a ‘brew’ cabin by the PW gangs before sadly being largely demolished following closure of the railway. The back wall, sections of both side walls and the foundations remain. 

Upon completion, it will be used for part-operational, part-demonstration purposes and will be made available in conjunction with our colleagues in the Institution of Railway Signal Engineers as a training facility for volunteers / staff from other Heritage Railways etc. There will also be public access via a new wheelchair accessible footpath from the station car park.

Phase 2 of the signalling project will see reconstruction of the Junction ‘box, large signal gantry etc. so that, ultimately, together, the two signal boxes will control all train movements at KSE.

We are most grateful to all the various organisations and private individuals for their assistance in developing the plans to this point, for making available many components required for the project and for providing the finance to enable the project to get underway. Considerably more finance will be required as the project develops and we will shortly be launching an appeal to enable us to provide match-funding for the NLHF grant to complete Phase 1. We very much hope that you will support us as you watch the work progress on this blog –

THANK YOU!


The 1861 'box towards the end of it's life, still substantially complete.


Location: South Rd, Kirkby Stephen CA17 4LA, UK

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