THE new high-speed electric trains may not be arriving on our rails this year, but all eyes will be turning back to where modern rail travel began, with 2016 well and truly being about the return of the steam train.

Railway enthusiasts are gearing up for what is to be a year of significant events for the age of steam – both in Swindon, with the GWR 175 celebrations getting under way, and on tracks much further away.

On Thursday perhaps the most famous of British locomotives returned to the rails for its first passenger service up the East Coast Main Line following a multi-million pound refit, carrying around 300 VIPs. Thousands of people turned out in London, York and along the railway line to catch a glimpse of the Flying Scotsman resplendent in its British Railways livery following its decade-long, £4m restoration.

Some enthusiasts were so keen to get up close to the locomotive that it was forced to grind to a shuddering halt at one point on its journey after around 60 photographers climbed onto the railway in Cambridgeshire.

Swindon rail enthusiast and photographer Ken Mumford has fond memories of the Flying Scotsman himself, having travelled aboard the legendary train in the 1960s right up the east coast, as well as being the guest of honour at the locomotive’s last refit courtesy of his son Jonathon who worked for Network Rail.

He also fondly remembers travelling to see the Flying Scotsman at Moreton-in-Marsh in 2003, although he is sure there are others there who don’t have quite such a fond memory of the occasion.

He said: “We were told by the courier to stand on the footbridge and we would get a good view of the loco arriving. I was on the side of the footbridge, and in comes the Flying Scotsman. But the trouble was the driver put the ‘blower’ on, which resulted in two plumes of black smoke coming out of the loco’s chimney. The folk in their refinery could not move fast enough – if they could move at all. I didn’t take a photo of them, I thought I might get clobbered.

“The Flying Scotsman is a credit to its designer [Sir Nigel Gresley] and it was in some ways the fore-runner to the A4 Pacifics such as Mallard. I suppose the main reason for its fame and popularity is because it was the first locomotive to reach 100mph.”

But the return of the Flying Scotsman is almost certain to stick in the craw of fans of a locomotive built at the Swindon Works almost a quarter of a century earlier.

The City of Truro – which returned to Steam at the end of last year to celebrate 175 years since the foundations of the GWR works were laid – also lays claim to having clocked 100mph in 1904, just a year after first hitting the rails.

This claim has long been the subject of a dispute, due to a complication over the official timings of the descent of Wellington Bank in Somerset. Railway journalist Charles Rous-Marten recorded a speed of 102.3mph, but there was no second timekeeper to verify this. 30 years later when the Flying Scotsman laid claim to the title, technology had developed and locomotives were fitted with a dynamometer car to verify their speeds.

Mr Mumford – a true GWR man at heart — added that he was more excited about the Swindon 175 celebrations this year.

He said: “The thing about Flying Scotsman is that it has cost so much and taken so long that I think the new-build Tornado has stolen the thunder while Flying Scotsman was taken apart and put back together.”

That said, interest continues to mount surrounding the Flying Scotsman, and enthusiasts will be looking forward to potentially seeing the locomotive passing through Swindon later this year on a special excursion.