Locomotion is a new £11 million museum which opened to the public in September 2004. It is the first national museum in the North East of England. Developed on the site of the pioneering Stockton & Darlington Railway and the popular Timothy Hackworth Museum, this national resource is part of a six-year regeneration programme for Shildon, the world's first railway town, and has welcomed over 75,000 visitors already, against an annual target of 60,000.

The museum, part of the National

Museum of Science & Industry, is the creation of a groundbreaking partnership between the National Railway Museum and the local authority, Sedgefield Borough Council. Local MPs Tony Blair and Derek Foster, attended the official opening on 22 October. Locomotion had many sponsors and was supported by a £5 million HLF grant and £2 million of European funding.

The museum's extensive collection holds 70 vehicles from the national collections many of which were previously at risk through outdoor storage or totally inaccessible to the public. Highlights include the original Sans Pareil, built to compete in the famous Rainhill Trials, the ground-breaking Advanced Passenger Train Experimental, and a magnificent NER Snow Plough. Locomotion has been designed to allow regular movement of vehicles in and out, accommodating everything from visiting legends like Flying Scotsman and City of Truro, to trains arriving for conservation and leaving for loan to other museums.

Local consultation was of paramount importance and members of the public were invited to take part in the selection process for an innovative new public art project on a railway signalling theme, using text messaging. An HLF grant funded Time Tracks, a community archive project that engages local people with Locomotion by recording and sharing their personal reminiscences.

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