Return to Sharpness | 143603 working first passenger trains to Berkeley Road Junction in 62 years!

Something a bit different from the normal today, as the Vale of Berkeley Railway returned passenger trains along the Sharpness Docks branch for the first time in 62 years!

150 years ago eager travellers boarded the first passenger train to Sharpness, and to celebrate this anniversary, the Vale of Berkeley Railway managed to obtain permission from Network Rail to run a special train service on the Sharpness branch on 31st July, 1st August and 2nd August 2026, utilising Rail Adventure as the train operator throughout the weekend. As the line is still classed as Network Rail property, the workings were all listed out on the mainline systems, making for an interesting trip!

The weekend saw some of the first people to ride the Sharpness branch, over 60 years after the line closed to passengers. We begin at the Sharpness Sports and Social Club, where visitors were checked in and received their tickets before a short bus trip down the road to the station. Parking and facilities are limited here, so the Sharpness Sports and Social Club provided a great starting point for parking, welcoming visitors and refreshments, and the longer term plan is to improve facilities at Oldminster Sidings and establish the VoBR as a significant asset and focal point for the Sharpness community in the future.

Once the bus arrived we boarded ex GWR Class 143 143603 Pacer for the train journey starting at Oldminster Sidings, Sharpness Docks for a 4 mile round trip, passing the site of the former Berkeley Station and continuing towards Berkeley Road junction and flask yard, right up to the Network Rail limit of operations where the line joins the mainline towards Cam & Dursley, before returning to Sharpness. During the trip, our narrator told the story of the branch and the Pacer trains.

The railway were also operating ‘Driver for a Fiver’ on their Planet diesel shunter at Oldminster Sidings. This was a brilliant little trip and great to see a preservation movement in its infancy taking a huge step forward and meeting a big milestone thanks to the hard work of members and volunteers who put the work in to make it happen, and it will be very exciting to see what the future holds for the VoBR, as there was a lot of interest from local press over the weekend for this event as well!

After our trip, we drove up the road to the site of the Berkeley Flask Yard which now sees very little use, and caught a later trip passing the level crossing here, before heading down to Sharpness Marina, and walking along the Canal to the site of the former Severn Railway Bridge.

Jointly owned by the GWR and LMS, this bridge provided a vital link into the Forest of Dean to bring coal to the docks for Export. The pillars are still in place, but the bridge is famed for the disaster that occurred on October 25, 1960 on a foggy night when two fuel tankers collided, drifted into a pier, and caused a catastrophic collapse. The destruction of the bridge had a lasting impact to the surrounding areas as the booming port trade dwindled, but one wonders whether the bridge would have survived the Dr Beeching cuts anyway, though still a sad loss of great architecture nonetheless. At low tide parts of the demolished Severn Railway Bridge and the sunken remains of the oil barges 'Arkendale H' and 'Wastdale H' become visible in the River Severn.

We finish with a look at some of the maritime history in Sharpness Docks, namely the Mersey Ferry ‘MV Egremont’ which inspired the Gerry & The Pacemakers ‘Ferry Cross The Mersey’ as well as the tall ship ‘Tenacious’, launched in 2000, it is the largest wooden tall ship built in the United Kingdom in the last 100 years. Old railway infrastructure around the dockyard was also very evident.

This was a great area to explore and all train trips were busy so there is certainly an appetite to see this venture succeed and I look forward to returning in the near future and seeing how the VoBR’s ambitious plans progress! | 02.08.2026

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