The Mid-Norfolk Railway (MNR) is a preserved standard gauge heritage railway, one of the longest in Great Britain. Preservation efforts began in 1974, but the line re-opened to passengers only in the mid-1990s as part of the "new generation" of heritage railways. The MNR owns and operates most of the former Wymondham-Fakenham branch line of the Norfolk Railway. The branch opened in 1847, was closed to passengers in stages from 1964 to 1969 as part of the Beeching cuts, and was finally fully closed to goods traffic in 1989. (The northern section of this line, to Wells, was built by the Wells and Fakenham Railway and part of this has been operated by the Wells and Walsingham Light Railway since 1982.) Regular steam and diesel services run through the centre of Norfolk between the market towns of Wymondham and Dereham via , and , and occasional sightseer services continue north of Dereham passing the nearby village of Hoe, where there is no station, to the limit of the operational line at Worthing. The line is periodically used for commercial freight operations and staff instruction for mainline railway companies. The company owns the line to a point just beyond County School railway station, which will make it the third longest heritage railway in England once restoration is complete. The MNR is owned and operated by the Mid-Norfolk Railway Preservation Trust (MNRPT, a charitable company limited by guarantee), and is mostly operated and staffed by volunteers. The railway is listed as exempt from the UK Railways (Interoperability) Regulations 2000. History Route history The Wymondham to Wells branch was opened in stages between 15 February 1847 and 1857, after Parliamentary consent was given in 1845. The entire line became part of the Great Eastern Railway in 1862. The Wymondham to Dereham section received double track in 1882, while the line north of there remained single track. Along with the rest of the Great Eastern Railway, the branch became part of the Southern Area of the London and North Eastern Railway when the various British railway companies were grouped into four large companies in 1923. The line was heavily used during World War I and World War II, with extra Air Ministry sidings provided at Dereham in 1943. In the early days of the war, Dereham was used as a reception centre for the construction materials used to build the local airfields. The nationalisation