Great Central Railway (Nottingham)

The Great Central Railway (Nottingham) runs from the transport centre at Ruddington to just outside Loughborough along the old Great Central Main Line.

The railway has aspirations to bridge the Midland Mainline at Loughborough and link up with the southern “Great Central Railway” creating a single 18 mile heritage attraction.

All of the stock is kept at Ruddington, including the DMU fleet. Since the 1990's a Class 108 set has been based on the railway, joined in the early 2000's by a Class 116 set owned by the Nottingham Railcar Group.

In the early 2020's, the line attempted to branch out into Second Generation stock with the addition of a Class 144, but this was not successful and the set never ran any services. This was partly due to the railway ceasing all public services over the Covid pandemic and taking some five years to rebuild its systems to the standards required by the industry regulator to the point where they could reopen. Following the return of services in 2024, a Class 107 was hired to operate DMU diagrams, as the resident sets had all been out of traffic for many years and at that time remained so.

The Class 116 is of particular historical value (following severe arson attacks at other railways) as the DMS vehicle is now unique making it the last "complete" Class 116 set in preservation (albeit its centre car is of Class 117 origin).

Currently four sets are present on the railway, one operational, with the most active restoration work being undertaken on the Class 108.