Visiting Locomotion in Shildon

Whilst we were on holiday up north at Easter we spent a morning at Locomotion, learning about the history of the railway and seeing old trains and vehicles up close. It was a lovely, educational day out and a great start to our holiday.

What is Locomotion?

Part of the Science Museum group, Locomotion lets you get up close to incredible engineering feats in Shildon – the world’s first railway town. Admission to the museum is free, although they do welcome donations, and it’s open seven days a week.

Getting to Locomotion

We drove to Locomotion and there is plenty of free parking on site. Locomotion is also a 10-15 minute walk from Shildon railway station.

Locomotion facilities

Locomotion has plenty of toilets and baby change facilities. They also have Café Number One which is open daily and is complete with Eurostar seating! We had some Costa drinks from the cafe during our visit and it was a lovely place to relax, although incredibly busy.

Our visit to Locomotion

We accidentally visited Locomotion on a special event day where the main Locomotion hall was full of train enthusiasts, model train sets and more. This was why it was so busy! But, it did mean there was even more to look at and made for a really different day out!

Locomotion is made up of two big halls – one that has always been there and New Hall which has been years in the planning and opened last year. Both are full of old trains, vehicles and relics from the history of the railways.

There is so much to see and do at Locomotion and we spent about three hours exploring the halls and taking in all the exhibits as well as the model train enthusiasts’ stands.

We finished our trip with a visit to the on site play area which was a good size and not too busy. A great way to let the kids run off steam after an educational morning!

We enjoyed Locomotion and are so glad we visited but, if you’ve been to the Railway Museum in York don’t expect the same scale of attraction. Locomotion is much smaller but still a great place to see, especially as there is no entrance fee.

You can find out more about Locomotion over on their website and for reference the address is: Dale Road Industrial Estate, Shildon DL4 2RE