Talyllyn Railway

fWotD Episode 3296: Talyllyn Railway Welcome to featured Wiki of the Day, your daily dose of knowledge from Wikipedia's finest articles.The featured article for Thursday, 14 May 2026, is Talyllyn Railway.The Talyllyn Railway (Welsh: Rheilffordd Talyllyn) is a narrow-gauge railway in Wales, which runs for 7+1⁄4 miles (12 km) from Tywyn on the Mid-Wales coast to Nant Gwernol near the village of Abergynolwyn. Opened in 1865 to carry slate from the quarries at Bryn Eglwys to Tywyn, it was the first narrow-gauge railway in Britain authorised by Act of Parliament to carry passengers using steam haulage. Despite severe underinvestment, the line remained open, and in 1951 it became the first railway in the world to be preserved as a heritage railway by volunteers.Since preservation, the railway has operated as a tourist attraction, expanding its rolling stock through acquisition and an engineering programme to build new locomotives and carriages. In 1976, an extension was opened along the former mineral line from Abergynolwyn to the new station at Nant Gwernol. A major rebuilding and extension of Tywyn Wharf station took place in 2005, including a much-expanded facility for the Narrow Gauge Railway Museum, and in 2021 the railway was designated a World Heritage Site as part of the Slate Landscape of Northwest Wales.The fictional Skarloey Railway, which formed part of The Railway Series of children's books by the Rev. W. Awdry, was based on the Talyllyn Railway. The preservation of the line inspired the Ealing Comedy film The Titfield Thunderbolt.This recording reflects the Wikipedia text as of 00:18 UTC on Thursday, 14 May 2026.For the full current version of the article, see Talyllyn Railway on Wikipedia.This podcast uses content from Wikipedia under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License.Visit our archives at wikioftheday.com and subscribe to stay updated on new episodes.Follow us on Bluesky at @wikioftheday.com.Also check out Curmudgeon's Corner, a current events podcast.Until next time, I'm neural Arthur.