THERE is a uniqueness about Didcot Railway Centre and its facilities. Apart from retaining its character, charm and authenticity as a former Great Western steam locomotive shed, Didcot is the only heritage railway operation of its size in the country that sits in a triangle of railway lines with no road access. It is a rail locked site and its current 25 acre footprint is constrained by the curvature of adjacent railway lines serving London, Oxford and Bristol.
However, its survival and development into a premier tourist attraction in the heart of the Thames Valley commuter belt is owed in no small part to readers of The Railway Magazine who responded to an letter in the August 1961 edition, aiming to preserved a ‘14XX’ locomotive. The letter had, apparently, been sent in the April but no one had any idea it was being printed until the August issue was published.