EAST Lancashire Railway rolled back the years this weekend with a special timetable of services out of the 1950s and 60s.
The Festival of Steam, which began on Friday and ran until yesterday, featured a selection of eight main line and branch line locomotives aiming to recreate a provincial station from 50 years ago.
Every working steam engine available to the East Lancashire Railway (ELR) was used to pull trains for the public along the scenic twelve mile route through the Irwell Valley from Bury’s Bolton Street Station.
As a special addition to the event, The ELR’s oldest locomotive, a Lancashire And Yorkshire Railway ‘A’ Class, built in 1898 pulled trains on the line, giving passengers an opportunity to see how railway design and innovations changed between it’s construction and the end of steam.
On Saturday evening, the smallest engine in the fleet, the Peckett, hauled its first passenger train ever.
The locomotive was saved from the scrap heap 30 years ago and underwent a full restoration at the ELR locomotive works before steaming again in 2008.
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