19th November, 1841

A meeting of landowners and others was held at Yarmouth, to consider a scheme proposed by Mr Robert Stephenson for constructing a railway from Yarmouth to Norwich. Mr Stephenson’s railway, first known as the Valley Line, pursued a route avoiding crossing the river, but included a plan for diverting the course of the stream at Thorpe for a distance of about 50 chains.

The scheme, estimated to cost £150,000, was adopted, and the line, the first to be opened in Norfolk three years later, was afterwards called the Yarmouth and Norwich Railway.