Darlington is a busy market town on the main line between London and Edinburgh, and the place where the modern railway began. On 27 September 1825 the Stockton and Darlington Railway opened, the first public railway to use steam locomotives, and George Stephenson's Locomotion No. 1 pulled the first train.
The story is told at Hopetown Darlington, around the original North Road station of 1842. The town centre has a large covered market hall with a clock tower by Alfred Waterhouse, and a medieval church, St Cuthbert's, known locally as the Lady of the North.