Come and visit part of Ripon’s rich industrial heritage, showing this railway that still exists with some of the machinery used on it.

The aim is to illustrate the manufacture, use and history of what the Victorian’s called ‘portable railways’ – small industrial railway equipment, made in quantity, to standard designs, and sold ‘off the shelf’ at fixed prices. Our artefacts are displayed along with other industrial items from the same era, to give context. In addition, we tell the story of the 1902 project to build a tourist railway to Fountains Abbey. In Ripon, portable railways (some laid down permanently) were used at Doublegates gravel quarry, on WWI Ripon camp construction, at Littlethorpe potteries, in George Harrison’s Ure Bank engine works, at Canal Sawmill’s on canal road and in the Varnish Department at Robert Kearsley’s paint works.  See artifacts, memorabilia, signs, machines, engines etc. in this museum of portable light railways.

A handy printable timetable of all the Ripon events can be found here: Timetable