National Railway Museum Shildon

National Railway Museum Shildon, also known as Locomotion: The National Railway Museum at Shildon or Shildon Locomotion Museum was built during 2004 at a cost of £11.3 million, and is based on the former "Timothy Hackworth Victorian Railway Museum".

The museum is operated in partnership with Durham County Council and was expected to bring 60,000 visitors a year to the small town. However, during its first six months, the museum attracted 94,000 visits. By 2012 visit numbers were exceeding 200,000 a year.

The museum is arranged as stops along the 1 km demonstration line with station direction board signs and information points on the trail between the car parks and the main collection building. The museum has a six-spur apron in front of the main shed and another short length of track for showing off resident locomotives and visiting trains. The A1 locomotive, Tornado was operating on the line on 3 May 2010, during a visit to the museum.

The trail starts at the 19th-century welcome building. The original Sans Pareil is on display here. The second building is Timothy Hackworth's house.[4] It contains several activities about the history of Shildon. Soho is a stone building that was a railway workshop, having originally been an iron merchant’s store. The fourth stop is the former goods shed for the town, with most incoming and outgoing goods being delivered to the railway by horse and cart. The building is built partially from recycled stone sleeper blocks, the old fixing slots being visible in the wall.The museum is home to several locomotives from the National Collection, including a replica of Timothy Hackworth's Sans Pareil.

The original engine, built to compete in the Rainhill Trials, is also at Shildon. The trials were to decide which engine should operate the passenger railway between Liverpool and Manchester. After a 175 years absence from the town, the locomotive was returned and is displayed in the Welcome building.