A RAILWAY enthusiast has spent a three year “labour of love” and thousands of pounds on rendering one of South Cumbria’s best loved train stations in miniature.

For the last three years Mike McManus, from Moreton, Merseyside, has been working on a model of Dent station on the picturesque Settle-Carlisle line - meticulously researching pictures, books and plans to recreate it as it was circa 1960.

“It’s not something you undertake lightly,” said Mr McManus, who fell in love with the station in his teens when he used to travel between Nottingham and his hometown of Glasgow by rail.

“I have been making model railways since I was a kid and I am 62 now, so this is what you might call the last great project, it is a real labour of love.”

The 4mm to one foot scale model - which is 26ft long and laid out on seven different levels of shelves in Mr McManus’ shed - has cost him around £3,000 in materials.

Everything save the model trains and the windows of buildings - which were specially laser cut - were made by Mr McManus from scratch.

“I have got so many books on the Settle-Carlisle line it is unbelievable and there are plans and photographs,” said Mr McManus, a former British Rail engineer and joiner.

“I used to travel through the station and say to myself: ‘I have to model this one day’, it has always nagged at me.”

Mr McManus is currently working on finishing the station master’s house and will then have completed all the large buildings that are part of the model, although he expects to keep “tinkering” for a long time to come.

He said he would like to thank Gazette readers who sent him information for his research following an appeal in 2013.

In particular he wanted to apologise to a lady named Dorothy who had rung up to give him some information, but who he had been unable to contact as he had an incorrect number for her.

Anyone who has any information about Dent Station circa 1960 that might help Mr McManus can ring him on 0151 677 1395.