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 YOU ARE IN: BLUEBELL

The Bluebell Railway

- A Wonderful Smell !
 

 CALLING ALL LOCAL RESIDENTS!

TRAVEL AT HALF PRICE ON THE BLUEBELL RAILWAY
with your
'FRIENDS RAILCARD'
Costs £5 - valid for 1 year

Available to residents of

Ardingly
Burgess Hill
Chailey
Chelwood
Copthorne
Crawley Down

Danehill
East Grinstead
Fletching
Forest Row
Haywards Heath
Horsted Keynes

Lindfield
Newick
Sharpthorne
Turners Hill
West Hoathly
Uckfield

Apply in person (at weekends) or by post to:
Booking Office, Horsted Keynes Station, RH17 7BB
With £5 and a S.A.E. - allow 14 days for card to be issued

Talking Timetable 01825 720 850 (24 hours)
Horsted Keynes: 01825 720 831 (weekends 10am-4pm)

Railcard discounts are not available on East Grinstead to
Kingscote bus service, Golden Arrow Puillman train, Santa Specials
services, Day Out With Thomas event days or other special events

 

Horsted Keynes Station. Click on the picture to view full size.
That looks familiar! Horsted Keynes Station as seen on TV screens all over the world. Often disguised as somewhere else but always recognisable.


Perhaps you have stumbled on this page by mistake, if that is the case then you might like to take a quick look at some of our OTHER PAGES ,
or go straight to
 
THE OFFICIAL BLUEBELL SITE.

A Local takes exception to their mispronounciation! These two "nazis" pronounced Horsted Keynes as Horsted Keenes Don't worry, the land girls got him!

A shootout on Horsted Keynes station! Mock battle during a 1940's weekend which is a regular event held in May.

 

If you've heard of Horsted Keynes before then it's almost certainly because of "The Bluebell" Railway. Stand in the middle of the village and as long as the wind's in the right direction you can enjoy the smell of hot oil and steam, which even the internet can't convey - YET !

Getting on for 50 years ago the then British Railways decided to implement a report that recommended reducing their mounting losses by the simple expedient of closing down every line that didn't make a profit! A group of train enthusiasts managed after a long battle with officialdom and with the help of a little old lady called Miss. Bessimer to reopen 4 miles of the line that used to run from East Grinstead to Lewes in Sussex. Their line ran from the station of Sheffield Park to the edge of our local station Horsted Keynes. This was the first full scale railway line to be reopened by private enterprise and it has gone from strength to strength. Now The Bluebell Railway is 9 miles long and a Public Company. It is actively pushing back to its main line connection at East Grinstead. The only thing in their way - a few million tons of rubbish tip which fills a half mile long cutting to the North of their temporary terminus at Kingscote. Nevertheless they have grants and planning permission and with just a few more million pounds from the public the diggers will be on their way !

Given good luck, and not too many bodies under the rubbish, they hope to reconnect with the main line at East Grinstead soon. We wish them the best of luck ! Perhaps then Horsted Keynes will return to its happy status as a quiet Sussex village with two Churches and two pubs but I expect that it will never be the same. "No bad thing" we hear you say !

Pop video filming at Horsted Keynes station October 2007

If you'd like to visit The Bluebell Web Site then please follow this link. It's a great day out with lots to see and do. If travelling by car then Horsted Keynes has easily the better parking facilities and a pleasant picnic spot. Busses connect with both Sheffield Park and Horsted Keynes stations at weekends. Coming from the North get the train to East Grinstead and a vintage bus will take you on the three mile trip around the rubbish tip to Kingscote Station. Please note that to placate the local residents you CANNOT park at Kingscote or even buy a ticket there (unless you arrive by bus or bike!). It is now 2007 and the line is laid all the way up to the edge of the rubbish dump at Imberhorne. Passenger trains still haven't started to run along this track and the rubbish is still to be removed so you will have to wait a bit longer before you can book your seat for the inaugural through journey!

Dogs are welcome to the line, and there is even a special ticket available for them. The upper part of the field at Horsted Keynes is a good place for them to let off steam. The only restrictions are the buffet/restaurant building and Golden Arrow Pullman Dining Train, for obvious reasons. Guide and recognised assistance dogs are most welcome, and travel free

Local residents get to travel on the Bluebell at a discounted fare, this concession is NOT well publicised but more details can be found here. This idea, of giving local residents, who inevitably have to put up with a certain amount of disruption and extra traffic, cheaper admission to local attractions is one that other tourist sites might like to emulate. We think that it is fair to say that the Bluebell are generally regarded as good neighbours.
 

As we are dedicated to the village of Horsted Keynes rather than the railway itself we thought that you might be interested to see the station from a rather unusual angle looking South from the bridge over the line to East Grinstead. Here you can see that our very rural station is in fact huge with five platform faces and routes going off in three directions! The large roof just visible on the far left hand side and covering much of the former goods yard is for extensive modern buildings (camouflaged to look old from a distance) where the railways carriages and wagons are repaired and some are stored. In fact the whole area could easily be confused with a large factory site. The old railway cottages on the right, whilst being a wonderful place for retired train spotters to live, are in a very remote location. The next nearest house is at least half a mile away and the nearest that any vehicle can approach is the other side of the railway line two hundred metres from their front doors. This means a walk in all weathers along the path, over the railway bridge that this photo was taken from, and then down the hill on the other side just to get a newspaper! They are though just a "stagger" from the fully licensed Horsted Keynes buffet which sometimes opens late into the evening! If any resident would like to lend us a view from there window overlooking the station we would be delighted to install a web cam there! High speed broadband comes in very well to these homes so perhaps they aren't that remote from civilisation after all!

 
 
© May 2008  All exclusive content on this web site (including photographs) is copyright and may not be published in any media or  reproduced on any other web page without express written permission. This will not be unreasonably withheld as long as you ask FIRST!-
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