We apologise for the delay. A replacement model train service is now available...

MOST commuters will be familiar with the despair invoked by the words ‘replacement service’.

But what happens when there’s not even a bus available to get you from A to B?

A group of railway enthusiasts have ensured a vital route between two remote villages remains open – by putting on a replacement train service instead.

And the train in question is a tiny, narrow gauge affair with a top speed of 5mph that wouldn’t look out of place in a toy shop window.

When the council announced it was resurfacing the B797, worried locals realised the two villages – Leadhills in Lanarkshire and Wanlockhead in Dumfriesshire – would be cut off from each other.

So they decided to fire up the mini railway – usually only open on week David

‘It’s been a real community effort’

ends – to replace the disrupted bus service.

With the only shop and, this week, GP surgery in Leadhills, families in Wanlockhead – Scotland’s highest village – faced being stranded and forced into a 50-mile detour to make the one-mile hop.

This week, for £1 each way, locals can ride an almost hourly ten-minute service between the villages. The tourist train, operated entirely by volunteers, is regularly slowed down by sheep on the tracks.

A Wanlockhead resident, who did not wish to be named, will be taking the train on Thursday to get to work helping elderly people in Leadhills.

She said: ‘It’s no good to us when the road is closed as it is something like a 50-mile trip to travel a mile. People need to get prescriptions from the shop, visit the doctor, go to work.’ Winnpenny, commercial manager of Leadhills and Wanlockhead Railway, said: ‘We mooted with the local council whether we could put anything on during the week the road would be closed.

‘It has been a real community effort. Having the road closed is a major disruption for people.’

While the service is a vital lifeline for locals, tourists have also seized on the opportunity to ride the train.

Sharon Stannett, 61, her daughter Sarah Osmand, 34, and grandchildren Lachlan, five, and Molly, four, from Thornhill, Dumfriesshire, enjoyed a ride on the railway yesterday.

Mrs Stannett said: ‘It was a really good idea and it really makes sense.’

The Reverend Antony Kirby, visiting with his family from North Yorkshire, said: ‘I think it’s super. I heard the road was closed and thought we might not be able to get up here.’