Avon Valley Railway near Bristol suffers “substantial” theft over Christmas

Heritage railway charity Avon Valley Railway near Bristol has suffered a ‘substantial’ theft over the Christmas holidays.

Volunteers at the popular attraction in Bitton discovered a large theft of stored track materials when they returned to the yard on December 28.

A substantial quantity of cast iron ‘chairs’ stored in the yard at Bitton had been stolen sometime between December 23 and 28.

The ‘chairs’ are used to hold the rails in place and bolted to the sleepers - holding the track to the gauge.

Volunteers say they were probably passed over the fence and taken away down the cycle path. 

A spokesman for the railway said: “After a lot of hard work put in by our volunteers and staff over another successful Santa season, to discover we have been targeted by thieves again hurts.

“The chairs stolen were earmarked for planned track work within the yard at Bitton and had been collected and acquired by our volunteers over several years. 

“The value of approximately 2 tons of ‘scrap’ cast iron, will be nothing compared to the price we will now need to pay to replace them with new, somewhere in the region of £3,000 - £4,000. Money that we didn’t need to spend…”

The incident follows previous similar robberies, of track and signalling components over the last few years, which have hit the railway hard, particularly when running costs are getting higher year on year. 

The railway’s spokesman added: “As a charity we find it extremely difficult to keep funding replacements, with some heritage items particularly difficult to source or replace entirely.” 

As a result, the railway is now working on improving its site security to protect its assets and has already sought quotes to purchase new fencing materials and improve its CCTV coverage. 

In the meantime, people can now donate via the robbery support fund on the Avon Valley Railway Heritage Trust website, with any money raised going to improve site security and replace some of the stolen components. 

If you have any information about the robbery please contact Avon and Somerset Police quoting crime number: 5223315413.