More info: The Severn Valley Railway was opened in 1862 at the end of a nine-year building project and was originally part of the longer Shrewsbury to Hartlebury line. The original line contained 15 stations and did not have the Bewdley to Kidderminster section until the loop line was constructed and opened in June 1878 by Great Western Railway who ran most of the railways in South and mid-Wales.
The line was never that busy due to the fact that for economic reasons it had been laid as a single track line. Although several passing loops were added at a later date, the limited capacity meant that it could never aspire to regular through traffic from stations and industries outside of the Severn Valley, and so only saw local passenger and goods traffic. Fortunately, there were several coalfields in the area that used the Railway to transport their coal to nearby power stations and further afield.
After the government nationalised the railways in 1948, the Severn Valley line was handed to British Rail. After decades of declining traffic all passenger traffic was halted in 1963. In 1966 the line was purchased by Severn Valley Railway and in 1967 the first loco arrived. One of the first locos was the Flying Pig which still runs on the Severn Valley Railway today.