Swale Rail Line Group meeting at Sittingbourne and Kemsley Light Railway We were delighted to accept an invite from Sittingbourne and Kemsley Light Railway to hold our line group meeting at their Kemsley Down site. Our visit began at Sittingbourne Viaduct station, where a diesel hauled service had been arranged specially to take us…
Launch of our New North Downs Way Station Map Boards,Tuesday 18th August at Hollingbourne Station Working in collaboration with Kent County Council, we aim to increase sustainable tourism along the North Downs Way, by promoting rail to trail routes from and to Charing, Lenham, Harrietsham and Hollingbourne stations. All four stations along the Kent Downs…
New Station Adoption For Yalding We were recently approached by Derek who wants to make improvements to brighten his local station at Yalding. We introduced him to Southeastern’s Station Adoption scheme and Southeastern provided their safety brieifing on Saturday 8th August. Once the formalities and site safety checks are complete, Derek will begin…
Queenborough History Weekend, 5th – 7th June At the start of June, the Queenborough Society and Queenborough Guildhall Museum came together to celebrate the history of the town, from Charles I to Charles III 1625 – 2025. They invited the whole community to get involved with a self-led tour of the town. Window displays gave…
Maidstone Repair Cafe, Promotional Pop-up Stall Maidstone CAN, our Maidstone West station adopters invited us along to their Children and Families themed Maidstone Repair Cafe on Saturday 1st August. We saw an opportunity to provide local support to Community Rail Network’s summer Days Out By Rail campaign, bringing along walking and cycling maps for…
Ashford College ESOL Student Train Travel Training and gardening support to station adopters at Borough Green & Wrotham Station, 30 June 2026 Kent CRP managed a train travel training Train Travel Training session from Ashford International with a gardening session at Borough Green & Wrotham (BG&W) station for 19 Ashford College students whose first language…
The Lenham School Wellbeing and Kindness Event, Lenham Station, 29 June 2026 Students shared messages of wellness and kindness with commuters. Students gave out 48 bags of sweet treats with wellness and kindness messages inside and wished commuters a good evening. The aim was to promote kindness and positive wellbeing. In attendance were 3 year…
Parliamentary Reception to mark the launch of the 2026 South Eastern Railway Social Impact Report, On Track to Opportunity. Chris Fribbins, volunteer Chair of Kent CRP and Clare Dowling, Senior Project Manager, Active Journeys South and East at our hosts Walk Wheel Cycle Trust were honoured to be attend the Parliamentary Reception to mark the…
Rail Safety Week 2026 Paddock Wood Pop-up On Tuesday 16th June we set up a stall at Paddock Wood station as part of Rail Safety Week, offering an opportunity to chat with passengers about how safe they feel when travelling by rail and to raise awareness of the British Transport Police 61016 text messaging service….
Rail Safety Week 2026 4th Milton Regis (St Mary’s) Cubs On the evening of Monday 15th June, the 4th Milton Regis Cubs visited Sittingbourne train station to learn about rail safety and have an adventure travelling to Sheerness-on-Sea and back. Led by Antonia Boorman (Head Scout Leader), twenty-three cubs along with nine Scout Leaders and…
Five Acre Wood Train Travel Training Trip to Travel Safe Travel Smart, Margate On Tuesday 9th June we headed down to Margate with 10 students from mixed year groups and 3 tutors from Five Acre Wood Snodland, for the culmination of our Travelling with Confidence programme. As in past years, the school brought their students…
Ashford College ESOL Student Train Travel Training and Sustainable Tourism Guided Walk Working in collaboration with Kent Downs National Landscape, Kent CRP managed train travel training and a walk on the North Downs Way for 14 Ashford College students whose first language isn’t English (ESOL – English for Speakers of Other Languages) and 4 of…
Strood Station Adoption Meeting, June 2026 On Wednesday 3rd June, in Community Rail Week, we met with Strood station manager, Bev Rickwood and Charlotte Morris from City of Rochester School to discuss our latest station adoption. City of Rochester school are keen to involve their students in caring for the planters, creating new artwork for…
Medway Valley Walk – Yalding to Maidstone, June 2026 Whilst originally conceived as a group event to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the Maidstone River Park, a forecast of thundery showers throughout the day proved too off putting for our booked guests. Ever adaptable, our volunteer walk assistant Michael and I set off to…
Festival of Sheppey and the Sheppey Shuttle, June 2026 Throughout the Railway 200 year, we deepened our connection with Jenny Hurkett and Sheppey’s Criterion Blue Town heritage centre, who helped us to celebrate Sheppey’s transport heritage, arranged film screenings and supported and inspired many more of our events and activities. Jenny proposed the “Festival…
Diversity House: Train Travel Training, May 2026 On Friday 22nd May we were joined by an ESOL (English for Speakers of Other Languages) learning group from Diversity House for a “Try A Train” experience. Our journey began with introductions and a look at the accessibile travel information outside the station. Before moving through to the…
Low Carbon Birding Towards the end of last year, Kevin Thornton got in touch with us to discuss an idea he had for introducing the birding community and newcomers to birding to low carbon birding. Kevin is very much a rail travel advocate, combining walking, cycling, trains and buses for many of his own journeys….
Faversham Festival of Transport 16th and 17th May Kent CRP had a fantastic time with a pop-up stand at the Faversham Festival of Transport. It was a busy weekend, spanning Saturday 16th and Sunday 17th May, with the Faversham streets filled with inspiring vintage vehicles. A change of venue saw us join model railway exhibitions…
Department for Transport confirms our Accredited Community Rail Partnership status. We are delighted to announce that the Department for Transport has renewed their accreditation of the Kent Community Rail Partnership. Accreditation is formal recognition by the DfT that Kent Community Rail Partnership operates to a high standard and that its objectives and activities are…
Annual Stakeholder Event, 27th April 2026 We were delighted to welcome our stakeholders, partners, members and volunteers to our Annual Stakeholder Event, on Monday 27th April at Maidstone Town Hall. The event provides an opportunity to showcase our achievements to our stakeholders, and to celebrate the contributions of our volunteers. The Value of Community Rail…