When Party Trains Run

Normally party trains can run on most operating days, except when we have special events on.

If it will be of interest as to what sort of locomotive that will be pulling the train, then trains on Saturdays and Wednesdays are normally diesel hauled, and trains on Sundays and Bank Holiday Mondays are usually steam hauled.

What We Provide

For a party train we reserve and decorate one coach for your exclusive use. You or your children can enjoy the party with friends while the train travels between Moor Road and Park Halt stations on our normal passenger service. If you like you can leave the train at Park Halt and explore the ancient woodland of Middleton Park, returning to the train when you wish (but don't miss your last train back!).

Party trains run either in the morning or the afternoon, your choice! In each case the train makes three return trips. We have more detailed information sheets for you to download, please click on the time you require:

• A morning party is from 10.15 until 12.15.
• An afternoon party is from 13.15 until 15.15.

Catering

You are welcome to bring your own food for consumption either on the train or at Park Halt. Hot and cold drinks and confectionery are available at our Moor Road shop.

If you wish we can arrange for food to be provided for your party, supplied by Megabites of Rothwell, from £6 per head. Please ask for further details.

We regret that your own party food can not be eaten in our cafe area, nor games played inside that area.

Party Train Fares

The fares for a party train depend on the size of the party, as follows.

• For a party with up to 20 people (aged 1 or over), £80.
• For a party with up to 30 people (aged 1 or over), £110.
• For a party with up to 40 people (aged 1 or over), £140.

Please note that other discounted offers can not be applied to these prices.

How to Book Your Party

All dates are offered as “subject to being available” and we operate the bookings on a first come first served basis. We regret that we do not yet have any facilities for booking party trains online. Instead, to obtain more information or to make a booking, please either:

• call in at Moor Road on any day when we are running trains and ask at our ticket desk; or
• telephone us on 07376 744 799 (but only between 9.30am and 5.30 pm, please); or
• email us on This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

As the Railway is run entirely by volunteers, if you telephone us there may not always be somebody available to take your call. If that is the case then please leave your name and telephone number (twice) and we will call you back at the earliest opportunity. This may be the next day on occasions.

If you would find it helpful to have a copy of our leaflet describing the party trains and the booking requirements, you can download one from here. This will open in a new browser tab or window.

Once you have asked to book for a particular date and time we will check to ensure that it is available. When we have made sure that it is, then we will advise you on how to pay your deposit of £30.00p. This deposit must be paid in order to secure the booking. We will hold your booking for up to five days pending payment of the deposit. After that period we can not guarantee to hold the date and time that you have requested.

See What Others Have Said

26 July 2017.

"We held our son's 3rd Birthday here last Saturday and it was amazing! He and his friends loved every minute of it and they were all so excited!! It was non stop fun and the train carriage was perfect - we had plenty of room and being able to get off at each end was great as the end platform has a large grassed area where they can run wild for a bit and gives you time to do group pictures or play games - we did the pinata there. The staff were absolutely amazing and they all clearly love their jobs and seemed as excited as we were!! They decorated the train beautifully and hung our special banner for us and made Matthew personalised posters which they gave us to take home. So a very special thank you to all the hard working staff and Janet who managed the booking perfectly smoothly!! We will definitely be back again!!"

More Details

We are happy to discuss any other type of train hire or party you may have in mind, as described below.

In particular, we can make special arrangements for school parties: please see our separate page for school visits for details of these.

Tour Parties

Another form of party that we are happy to accommodate is for coach tours or similar, either to travel on one of our regular train services or (by special arrangement) on a charter train (as described below).

More details of the facilities that we can provide for such tour parties are given on our separate page for the travel trade.

Charter Trains

Another possible kind of special arrangement is that you may be able to charter a complete train at a time when otherwise we would not be running trains. We need a lot of notice of this, to be able to arrange crews (since they will be volunteers, like all our other staff), and we have to make a substantial charge for such trains, in order to cover the costs involved.

If you wish to find out more about the possibility of chartering a train, please email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

Other Facilities Hire

As well as hiring trains, we are able to hire out our training room for meetings, for either a half day or whole day. Depending on how you want it laid out, this air-conditioned room can accommodate between 40 and 60 people; we can provide the usual audio-visual facilities, and can arrange catering if you require it.

If you wish to find out more about the possibility of hiring these facilities, please email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..