A VOLUNTEER who helped rebuild Swanage’s heritage railway is to travel on the first train to Wareham in 45 years.

Peter Frost was 13 years old and living in Corfe Castle when British Rail controversially closed the 10-mile branch line from Swanage to Wareham, with the last train running on the night of Saturday, January 1, 1972.

Less than six months later, the teenager watched contractors demolish seven miles of railway line in just seven weeks.

In February 1976, a 17-year-old Peter was among the first Swanage Railway volunteers to start restoration work at the abandoned and disused Swanage station in the centre of the seaside town.

Forty-one years later, Peter is looking forward to riding on the first Swanage Railway train to Wareham on Tuesday, June 13, which will be composed of four carriages with a diesel locomotive at each end.

Departing Swanage at 10.23am, the special train will mark the start of a four trains a day trial service to Wareham operating on Saturdays, Sundays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays until September 3, 2017 – a total of 60 days.

Tuesday morning's historic first train in 45 years will also be carrying some of the two generations of dedicated volunteers who have worked to rebuild the heritage railway back to the national railway system - a task that has taken more than 40 years.

Peter said: "It will be an amazing and poignant moment when the first train leaves Swanage station bound for the main line at Wareham because I remember riding on the last British Rail train out of the seaside town.

"It was very sad to watch the line being run down, closed and then quickly demolished because I grew up with the branch line during the 1960s with its station staff and train crews being extended members of my family," he added.

The Swanage Railway Society was formed during the summer of 1972 – when the tracks were being torn up – and it took four years for the volunteers to obtain a lease of the disused Swanage station, under threat of demolition, and start restoration work.

Peter said: "Most people thought we were mad because they never believed the railway could ever be rebuilt from scratch. The task just seemed so huge and unrealistic.

"But we were determined and just took one step at a time as we re-laid the line, restored the buildings and built the infrastructure needed to run and maintain a railway.”