Two special train tours will be running during the Brunel birthday weekend of 8-9 April, 2006, as part of the Brunel 200 celebrations.
 | | Travel from Brunel's Temple Meads |
Each tour will use the Great Western Railway King Class locomotive No 6024 King Edward I and will follow a circular route starting and finishing at Brunel's Bristol Temple Meads Station. The Brunel Anniversary Limited running on 8 April will follow a route through the Severn Tunnel to Shrewsbury via Newport, Abergavveny and the Welsh Marches. The Sunday tour will head for Cheltenham, Worcester, Hereford, Pontypool, Newport and then back to Bristol Temple Meads through the Severn Tunnel. History Temple Meads Station was built in 1841 and designed by the esteemed engineer. The end of the present-day Temple Meads station鈥檚 gothic forecourt is Brunel鈥檚 original Old Station building, now the British Empire and Commonwealth Museum. Brunel was responsible for the laying of more than 1,000 miles of railway in the West country, the Midlands, South Wales, and Ireland. 听 In March 1833, he was appointed chief engineer of the Great Western Railway and his work began with the line that linked London to Bristol. The Great Western Railway was the first railway to use London time in all its timetables and stations, rather than the varying local times of destinations. All the other railway companies followed suit, leading to an Act of Parliament that standardised time in different parts of the country once and for all. Details of the Brunel birthday rail trips are available from Kingfisher Railtours: Tel 0870 7472983. | 
