Perhaps unsurprisingly, the attractive railways and stations of East Dorset have proved fertile ground for modellers. With the apparent exception of Broadstone, all the district’s stations feature in operational or planned models. We plan to present profiles of these as they develop. Here is the current list:
Wimborne
Colin Divall has been developing a diorama of the station as it might have appeared at the opening of the Southampton & Dorchester Railway in 1847. The link leads to a description and images of its current state view PDF.
Wimborne Railway Society has long had a 4mm. model of the station and its approaches. This is normally housed in Wimborne and frequently taken out for exhibitions. Inevitably it is compressed from the space that would be needed for a scale-accurate version of the prototype, but is remarkably complete otherwise.
Verwood
Steve Smith from Shepton Mallet (one time resident of Verwood and Wimborne) is developing a fine-scale layout of Verwood Station.
Bailey Gate
Blandford Railway Club is developing a model of Bailey Gate Station (in addition to its operational model of Blandford Forum Station).
West Moors
Duncan Chandler from Bridgnorth, Salop, has started work on a model of West Moors Station and Junction.
Daggons Road
A few years ago, Tim Hale developed an ‘Alderholt’ model, based heavily on Daggons Road Station, but he sold it. There was a website link, but this was deleted.
The above list just leaves the smaller railway installations to complete the set – at Ashley Heath Halt, Uddens Sidings, Corfe Mullen Junction and Waterworks Siding, Carter’s Clay Siding, Corfe Mullen Halt, and the larger, pre-1933 one at Wimborne Junction – any of which we think would make a delightful cameo or ‘side-show’ on larger layouts, or even by themselves!
