Hopetown Carriage Works, also known as the Stockton and Darlington Railway Carriage Works, was a carriage works of the

Stockton and Darlington Railway The Stockton and Darlington Railway (S&DR) was a railway company that operated in north-east England from 1825 to 1863. The world's first public railway to use steam locomotives, its first line connected collieries near Shildon with Darl ...

built in 1853 in Hopetown, near

Darlington Darlington is a market town in the Borough of Darlington, County Durham, England. The River Skerne flows through the town; it is a tributary of the River Tees. The Tees itself flows south of the town. In the 19th century, Darlington underwen ...

County Durham County Durham ( ), officially simply Durham,UK General Acts 1997 c. 23Lieutenancies Act 1997 Schedule 1(3). From legislation.gov.uk, retrieved 6 April 2022. is a ceremonial county in North East England.North East Assembly �About North East E ...

, England. The works built railway carriages from 1853 to around 1884. Now preserved, it is still used as a museum workshop.

Description

The building was to a design by Joseph Spark, completed by architects ''Ross & Richardson'' of Darlington. It is constructed of coursed squared stone and has a roof of Welsh slate; the building consists of a two storey centre section with

Venetian style Venetian Gothic is the particular form of Italian Gothic architecture typical of Venice, originating in local building requirements, with some influence from Byzantine architecture, and some from Islamic architecture, reflecting Venice's tradin ...

entrance, with two single storey wings.

History

The building was used for the manufacture and maintenance of two axle railway carriages; there were two internal rail track running the length of the building and wings connected to the main network via a small turntables located in the central two storey building. The central building included lifting facilities (later removed). Construction on the site ended in the 1880s (about 1884.) with the introduction of longer wheelbase bogie vehicles for which the works was unsuited - all carriage manufacture was transferred to the

York Railway Works York is a cathedral city with Roman origins, sited at the confluence of the rivers Ouse and Foss in North Yorkshire, England. It is the historic county town of Yorkshire. The city has many historic buildings and other structures, such as a m ...

after 1863 under the

NER NER may refer to: * New European Recordings, a record label * ISO 3166-1 three letter code for Niger * Named entity recognition, a text processing task that identifies certain words as belonging to one class or another * Northeast Regional, an Amtr ...

. The building was later used as a store, and to repair wagons, as well as being used as a rifle range by the railway company. In the 1980s the site and building was acquired by

Darlington Borough Council The Borough of Darlington is a unitary authority and borough in County Durham, Northern England. The borough is named after the town of Darlington, and in 2011 had a population of 106,000. It is in the Tees Valley mayoralty. The borough bord ...

and became part of the

Darlington Railway Centre and Museum Head of Steam, formerly known as the Darlington Railway Centre and Museum, is a railway museum located on the 1825 route of the Stockton and Darlington Railway, which was the world's first steam-powered passenger railway. It is based inside the ...

. The building was Grade II listed in 1986.

Current use

The

A1 Steam Locomotive Trust The A1 Steam Locomotive Trust is a Darlington, England based charitable trust formed in 1990 for the primary purpose of completing the next stage of the locomotive heritage movement, the building of a new steam locomotive from scratch (i.e. not a ...

, constructors of the new locomotive

60163 Tornado LNER Peppercorn Class A1 No. 60163 ''Tornado'' is a 4-6-2 steam locomotive completed in 2008 to an original design by Arthur Peppercorn. It is the first new build British mainline steam locomotive since 1960, and the only Peppercorn Class A ...

took over the tenancy buildings east wing in 1995. The

North Eastern Locomotive Preservation Group The North Eastern Locomotive Preservation Group (NELPG) was formed in 1966 with the intention of preserving some of the steam locomotives then still working on regular goods or passenger trains in North East England. At the time of its formation, ...

(NELPG) took over the west wing in 2002. The New Build

LNER Class P2 The London and North Eastern Railway Class P2 was a class of 2-8-2 steam locomotives designed by Sir Nigel Gresley for working heavy express trains over the harsh Edinburgh to Aberdeen Line. As they were to serve on Scottish expresses, they wer ...

, is being built here by the same people that created Tornado.

References

Literature

External links