When Mathias drove to Devil’s Bridge rather than taking the narrow gauge Vale of Rheidol Railway in the first episode of Y Gwyll I was very disappointed. In my other favourite Aberystwyth-set Cymru-Noir, it plays an important role (see The Day Aberystwyth Stood Still by @exogamist). But in the final episode, Y Gwyll made up for it: using Borth station as a location, having Matthias correctly identify a Bachman model of an 00 gauge GWR City Class, and featuring a large and beautiful 4mm scale model of Borth and the surrounding area.
I forgot to mention it when I posted about the show yesterday, but I came across some information on RMweb concerning that layout: it was constructed especially for the show (at great expense), track-wise it is – as it appears to be – a simple continuous loop (with a Bachmann Class 158 running round it), and at around 4m x 5m it is too large to go on permanent display at Borth Station Museum (@BorthStation) to which it was donated at the end of filming. It may be displayed on 5th July for ‘Steam Saturday’… hopefully I might be able to get up there to see it! There are also a couple more pics on RMweb from last year’s open day.
Image Borth Station © Copyright Ben Croft and licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons Licence.