Heighington Station is located on the route of the Stockton and Darlington railway, the worlds first passenger railway line and it is from this location George Stephenson's Locomotion No. 1 was placed on the line. The station was opened in 1825 as Aycliffe Lane and after some other name changes became known as Heighington in 1874, although the station is actually located in Newton Aycliffe.
The station has an unusual staggered layout with the platforms located on alternate sides of the level crossing at the station. There is a listed signal box located here although the station itself is not manned.
In 2015 a new assembly plant with connection into the rail network located just south of the station where at the time of writing new class 800/801 trains are being built for use on the East Coast Main Line and Great Western Main Line.
More info on the SideTracked series can be found at sidetrackedseries.info