One of Shropshire’s biggest tourist attractions has a new boss - and he is the youngest man ever to take the helm, it was revealed today.
Nick Ralls, 36, is the new general manager of the Severn Valley Railway, which runs between Bridgnorth and Kidderminster and attracts hundreds of thousands of visitors each year.
Mr Ralls will join the railway from Aston Hall, the 17th century Jacobean stately home in Birmingham, where he was manager and curator.
He will take up his new post on June 25. Mr Ralls, whose father is a long-serving volunteer on the railway, said he was looking forward to the job.
“The Severn Valley Railway has always been there in my growing up - I think I was perhaps eight when I first travelled on the line,” he said.
“I see it as being right up there, as the most prestigious heritage railway in the country, and I want to work with the railway’s staff and volunteers to ensure that that is where it stays.”
Mr Ralls succeeds to a post which has been vacant since the departure of previous general manager Colin Binch in September 2006.
Mr Binch left after just four months in the job due to a “difference in management approaches”.
A three-man executive committee has managed the day-to-day running of the railway since then.
The committee, made up of directors Roger Smith, Tony Bending and Mike Ball, will not be immediately dissolved but will remain to provide support and advice for the new general manager.
Mr Ralls is married and currently lives in Edmaston, Derbyshire, but said he was looking to move closer to the railway’s Bewdley headquarters.
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