Passengers can now learn more about a town’s rail history as they wait for a train.

Interpretive posters outlining the impact of railways on Keighley have been installed in the waiting rooms on platforms one and two of the town’s station.

Behind the project is the Keighley Station Partnership (KSP), a group dedicated to improving information provided at the site.

The posters – created by its team leader, Graham Mitchell – describe the arrival of the Leeds & Bradford Extension Railway in 1847 and its effect on the town, with the construction of three separate station buildings.

And they outline how – following the arrival of the Great Northern Railway in 1884 – huge railway yards were developed in Cavendish Street and East Parade to handle the wide variety of engineering and textile products of Victorian Keighley.

Mr Mitchell said: “We have lost so much railway infrastructure that only people of my generation now remember the impact the railways had upon our town – with a steam locomotive depot in Lawkholme Lane, engines shunting trucks day and night in the two goods yards and heavy horses pulling wagons laden with merchandise.

“Photographs showing these developments have been sourced from Keighley Library, Bradford Industrial Museum, the Kevin Seaton collection and others and I hope that Keighley residents waiting for trains will find them interesting and informative.

“We hope also, on a further poster, to add details of the many local railway employees who gave their lives in the Great War.”

A further series of posters, providing information on town centre shopping and the bus network, has already been provided by Keighley BID and the Keighley Bus Company. The posters, which have been situated on the exit ramps leading up from the platforms, are aimed at visitors arriving in the town.

Keighley BID officer, Phil Walker, said: “Keighley Station is a ‘destination gateway’ to Bronte Country and there has long been a need to provide information on what the town has to offer to visitors arriving from Leeds, Bradford and Skipton, as they walk up the long ramps to the forecourt.

“We hope these imaginative posters, and others yet to come, will do that and Keighley BID has been happy to provide eight new poster cases to fulfil this need.”

Pete Myers, stakeholder manager with train operator Northern, said: “It is a little thing but these panels are truly fantastic.

“Working on the railway it is easy to forget just what a history we have, and how the railways have shaped – and continue to shape – the communities that we serve here in the north.”