2 minute read
A New Railway Museum in Kent
now seven times longer than the previous R260 grade rail. This equates to a customer validated minimum cost saving of £92,000 for just 1 curve on the site. Importantly, it removes the disruption of rail renewal to normal site operations 6 times over, and provides greater track availability to keep the freight flowing and the lights on in our homes and industry.
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A warehouse used to store historic trains is to be transformed into a locomotive museum celebrating British railway heritage.
Locomotive Storage Ltd, which owns the Hornby site in Margate where the building is located, has been given permission by Thanet District Council to push ahead with plans for the new attraction, which will be called the One:One Collection.
Once open, visitors will be able to see some of the most iconic and historically important UK railway locomotives, rolling stock and memorabilia as well as a "sizeable collection" of engineered models.
Vehicles such as London buses and vintage trucks could also feature. The plans are the brainchild of noted railway enthusiast Jeremy Hosking, who has 25 full sized locomotives in his collection, and former chief executive of Hornby Frank Martin, who was boss between 2001 and 2013.
Hornby Hobbies, which manufactures model railways and toy products, operates a visitor centre in the building next door to the warehouse on Ramsgate Road and is a tenant of Locomotive Storage Ltd.
Mr Martin says there are significant structural changes that need to be done and this year will be spent focusing on health and safety, and disabled access, but hopes to hold open days next year, with full completion in three years. "We're convinced the museum will bring people into the area - the only other attraction like this is the National Railway Museum in York," he said. "To gauge interest, we held an open weekend in 2019 and had 2,500 people on that weekend and they were all paying guests, so we believe the interest is there." In a statement prepared by Haptic Architects and submitted to Thanet council, Mr Hosking, who runs Locomotive Storage Ltd, and Mr Martin set out their plans to transform the warehouse.
