Celebrating the Stockton & Darlington Railway

This year is the 200th anniversary of the world’s first passenger railway – the Stockton and Darlington Railway. The line is still operating and local events form part of the nationwide Railway200 celebration.

One of our Hebei partner cities, Tangshan, is the site of the first Chinese passenger railway, albeit this was not opened until 1881. There are many similarities – not only were they both their country’s first passenger railways, but also both generated revenue carrying coal to the coast.  In addition and the key figures in both were English – George Stephenson for the Stockton to Darlington and Claude Kinder for Tangshan.

As part of our 2025 exchange programme we will be encouraging our Chinese and UK students to explore this shared railway heritage. We will be taking our UK Student Ambassadors to the Chinese Railway Origin Museum in Tangshan during their Easter visit to Hebei Province, then also taking Chinese students and their North-East partner school buddies to the Hopetown and Locomotion Museums in the summer.

We are proud to support SDR200 and the shared heritage it represents.