Railfest 2012: Britain’s biggest rail celebration is a real cause for national pride

This is one of a series of blog posts we’ll be bringing you in the run-up to our huge 9-day Railfest 2012 festival in June 2012. More blog posts about Railfest 2012
[HR][/HR]Emma Farley, Head of Marketing and PR at the National Railway Museum, writes:
With last weekend’s magnificent Jubilee celebrations making us all proud to be British, the UK’s biggest rail celebration – Railfest 2012 –*is giving visitors, myself included, a similar sense of national pride. Britain is the birthplace of the railway, and seeing an area the size of 11 football pitches teaming with the record-breaking locomotives that have made their mark on global history for being the fastest, strongest, first, last and oldest gives a real reason for jubilation.

The railways are the evidence of Britain’s engineering prowess across the decades, and this nine day celebration of Britain’s railways alongside the nation’s Jubilee festivities continues *to recognise the stuff that makes us proud to be British.
Now the street parties are over, families wanting to continue their jubilee celebrations are making tracks for LMS Princess Royal Class No. 6201 Princess Elizabeth, the locomotive whose whistle heralded the start of the flotilla down the Thames.*Seeing the mighty blue Mallard up close at Railfest, we can be proud that a Doncaster-built locomotive holds the record for the world’s fastest steam locomotive at 126mph. And Tornado, the newest steam locomotive to be built for 50 years, was built in Darlington.
Notable figures from the art world are weaving the event into the rich tapestry of Britain’s rail history, recording the bustle of the crowds for posterity. Artist and illustrator David Charlesworth GRA is currently capturing the atmosphere of Railfest on canvas and John Wigston GRA is producing wonderfully detailed pencil sketches.

As well as the home of the railway’s glorious past, Britain is also the seedbed for the railway of tomorrow. Last week museum Director Steve Davies shared his vision of a new £250,000 gallery to ‘showcase, discuss, debate and inform’ the modern industry. Tonight as part of Railfest 2012 a panel of local and national experts are presenting their views and answering questions about the proposals for the HS2 high speed rail line and how this project could deliver an efficient transport system like those we already see in continental Europe.
Thanks to support from the leading rail magazine titles – RAIL, Steam Railway and Model Rail –*Railfest gives us a real reason to be proud that Britain is home to both the glorious past and future of the railways.

Filed under: Railfest 2012