Museum of Scottish Railways

The Museum of Scottish Railways is a railway museum operated by the Scottish Railway Preservation Society (SRPS). It is based on the SRPS's large collection of railway artefacts from across Scotland. The museum is located at the Bo'ness and Kinneil Railway, and is the largest building on site. It is the largest railway museum in Scotland, consisting of three large buildings which contain heritage locomotives, coaches, wagons and other exhibits.

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Bo'ness railway station

Bo'ness railway station is a heritage railway station in Bo'ness, Falkirk, Scotland. It is not the original Bo'ness railway station, which was located roughly a quarter mile west on Seaview Place, now the site of a car park. The station has a booking office, buffet, shop, information desk, large free car park, bay platform, footbridge and trainshed which covers the platforms. This is the easternmost station of the Bo'ness & Kinneil Railway, operated by volunteer members of the Scottish Railway Preservation Society. The buildings in the station area were brought to Bo'ness in the 1980s, saving each of them from permanent demolition elsewhere. Of these, the trainshed is the most important historically. It was originally built at Edinburgh Haymarket station, and was the original Edinburgh terminus of the Edinburgh and Glasgow Railway, which opened in February 1842. At Haymarket, two similar trainshed bays stood side by side and abutted the two-storey station offices building which still stands today. Haymarket station remained a terminus only until 1846, when the railway was extended partly in tunnel and partly in cutting through Princes Street Gardens to Waverley station. The extension passed by the Haymarket trainshed on its southern side. When traffic through Haymarket increased after the opening of the Forth Bridge, the tracks into Waverley were quadrupled. To make space for these tracks, the southern bay of the original trainshed was demolished. The northern bay remained standing, latterly providing no more than car parking space, until plans for alterations to the station in the 1980s required its removal. As the building was listed, it was carefully removed for re-erection at Bo'ness. This work was managed by Sir Robert McAlpine & Sons. Cast iron columns and arched spans support the trainshed roof, which is slated on wooden sarking in the standard Scottish manner. The roof trusses are of wrought iron tension members and cast iron posts, and all the ironwork is detailed in a light classical style. At Bo'ness, as at Haymarket, there are no smoke ventilators, though smoke troughs have been added to reduce soiling from locomotive exhausts. The station office building at Bo'ness was originally built by the North British Railway at Wormit, on the south shore of the Tay facing Dundee. This station was located on the Tayport branch, close to the end of the Tay Bridge, and opened at the same time as the second bridge, in 1887. Bo'ness signal box is a standard Caledonian Railway structure. It was originally Garnqueen South Junction box, the location where the route of the Caledonian Railway Main Line, heading north, diverged from the route of the Monkland and Kirkintilloch Railway. The footbridge adjacent originally stood at Murthly station, on the Highland Railway main line north of Perth. As a group, the buildings are listed by Historic Scotland in Category A. The stone built goods shed and the Buffet/Shop building housing the Visitor Information Point are modern construction. Being base of the SRPS's many operational fields such as railtours, steam and diesel locomotive restoration and maintenance and facilities for maintenance of the Bo'ness and Kinneil Railway itself requires a sizable yard, a diesel MMPD, a steam traction running shed and restoration building (Romney Hut), a coaling stage and water column, a carriage and wagon restoration and storage building and signalling stores among other facilities. A new Display Shed between the MMPD and the carriage and wagon building was erected in 2011 to provide housing for railway artifacts that were previously left out in the open such as the Class 303 EMU "Blue Train" and the Class 126 Inter-City DMU along with various rolling stock and diesel locomotives which is open for the general public to view the artifacts stored within the shed. A Visitor Trail public walkway from the car park at the southern edge runs along its eastern boundary, to the Display Shed, and continues around past the MMPD and along the northern edge of the site, providing a new disabled-friendly access route to the Museum of Scottish Railways. The walkway also passes a model railway (open to the public on weekends and bank holidays) housed in two wooden Norwegian carriages, which contains a small village and station, Glenauchter, although this is based on Gleneagles railway station rather than Bo'ness.

Hippodrome Cinema, Bo'ness

The Hippodrome Cinema in Bo'ness is an early example of a purpose-built cinema and thought to be the oldest such building surviving in Scotland. The cinema, which opened in 1912, was built for the Bo'ness cinematography pioneer Louis Dickson and designed by renowned local architect Matthew Steele. It is designated as a Category A listed building.

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Grange House

Grange House (also known as Grangepans, Grange, Old Grange, and Grange Hamilton) was an estate house near Bo'ness, West Lothian (now Falkirk council area), in Scotland. The original house was built in 1564 for Sir John Hamilton. It was demolished in 1906. Hippolyte Blanc submitted designs to the Cadell family for additions to the house. Photographic copies of these designs survive, and are held by the National Monuments Record of Scotland.

Bo'ness

Borrowstounness, commonly known as Bo'ness ( boh-NESS), is a town and former burgh and seaport on the south bank of the Firth of Forth in the Central Lowlands of Scotland. Historically part of the county of West Lothian, it now lies within the Falkirk council area, 17 miles (27 kilometres) northwest of Edinburgh and 6+3⁄4 miles (11 kilometres) east of Falkirk. At the 2011 census, the population of Bo'ness was 15,100. Until the 20th century, Bo'ness was the site of various industrial activities, including coal mining, saltmaking and pottery production. With its location beside the Forth, the town and its harbour grew in importance in the Industrial Revolution and later continued to grow into the Victorian era. Since the late 20th century, deindustrialisation has changed the nature of the town, with the coal mine closing in 1982 and the waterfront area now being primarily used for leisure purposes. However, some industry remains in the town including an ironworks and a timberyard/sawmill beside the Forth. The centre of the town contains several listed buildings and is part of a conservation area. The town is the home of the Museum of Scottish Railways and also a regional motor museum.