FANS of the Narnia stories can now follow in the footsteps of their favourite characters - by jumping aboard the locomotive featured in the recent Disney blockbuster at Kidderminster station.

Staff at the Severn Valley Railway - SVR - are preparing for an influx of visitors intent on travelling on the locomotive used by Peter, Susan, Edmund and Lucy in The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.

Eagle-eyed film buffs might have already noticed the starring role played by the SVR's Bradley Manor 7802 and Highley Station in the film's opening sequence.

Although the blockbuster was largely filmed in New Zealand, filmmakers used the Great Western Manor class locomotive and four chocolate and cream-coloured coaches as the setting for the children's evacuation from war-torn London, with much of the journey shot at Highley in September, 2004.

David Wilcock, SVR press officer, said he was pleasantly surprised how much footage of the locomotive and station was used so early in the film.

He said: "We were gobsmacked at how much time we got. We had no idea it would be such a decent chunk."

Mr Wilcock is now hoping SVR will benefit from a similar rise in interest to that enjoyed by the West Highland rail line after it appeared in the Harry Potter films.

He said the Bradley Manor 7802 would be running along the 16 miles between Kidderminster and Bridgnorth regularly over the next year if fans wanted to hop on board.

Last year, 252,000 passengers travelled on the line - a record number for the railway.

"It's a milestone we've been looking out for over a number of years," said Mr Wilcock.

It is a far cry from when the railway was closed in the 1960s for not paying its way as a regular travel route.

The line enjoyed a change of fortune after it reopened in 1970 as a steam engine tourist attraction and now attracts visitors from across the West Midlands and Worcestershire as well as from further afield, including the USA, New Zealand and Japan.

Mr Wilcock said the "number crunching" was not most important to the railway.

"It's not at all a question of packing people in," he said. "We want to give a really absorbing and value for money day out."

He went on: "It's more than a train ride.

"We want to make people's visits memorable."

The SVR will expand when work on a new visitor centre at Highley station begins and Kidderminster station is revamped later this year.