Celebrate 200 Years of Railway History!
In 1825, the Stockton & Darlington Railway opened the world’s first passenger railway station on Tuesday 27th September — a milestone that transformed travel forever. Steam locomotives carried passengers and goods at unprecedented speed, sparking a transport revolution that connected towns, boosted industry, and shaped modern Britain.
This special SideTracked Railway 200 event at Penarth is part of a nationwide celebration running from Wednesday 24th to Tuesday 30th September 2025. All finds and hides from this event count towards your SideTracked statistics, and a unique profile badge will be created especially for this event. Whether your chosen location is old, disused, miniature, or still bustling today, it’s part of a railway story that’s been 200 years in the making.
When: Thursday 25th September, 2025. 18:00-18:30
Come celebrate 200 years of the railway with a quick chat and maybe a drink at Penarth station and the aptly named The Railway pub for SideTracked 200 week!
Penarth Station (or Penarth Town as it was originally known) was built for the Cardiff, Penarth and Barry Junction Railway, and opened in 1878 as part of that company's new line to Lavernock. This was a continuation of the Taff Vale Railway's Penarth Extension Railway, which had been completed in February 1878 and gave the town its first rail link to Cardiff.
The Taff Vale took over the CP&BJR in 1889 and had the line completed from Lavernock to Biglis Junction (east of Cadoxton) on the Barry Railway in 1890. The extension attracted holiday and weekend traffic from Penarth to the beach at Lavernock or Barry Island Pleasure Park for the day, with steam trains running every 30 minutes in both directions. There was also a sizeable amount of commuter traffic from the station eastwards into Cardiff. As first constructed the station had two side platforms and tracks (plus a non-platform line for goods traffic), a signal box and a goods yard at the Lavernock end of the station.
Closure of the coastal rail line removed the direct link between Penarth and Barry, Barry Island, Rhoose or Llantwit Major. Completion of the journey from Penarth by rail today entails first travelling north as far as Grangetown, before catching a connecting train in the reverse direction to Barry or any of the stations mentioned above, thus increasing the journey time and distance travelled.