A NEW station for Brighton’s Volk’s Railway will be craned into position today.

The Aquarium station, on the beach close to the Sea Life Centre in Marine Parade, has been designed by Hove architects ABIR and built by Boutique Modern at its warehouse in Newhaven.

It was loaded on to a lorry last night and was due to arrive in Brighton around 9pm.

This morning, the three elements of the modular building will be lifted into place on the beach.

The new station, which will also house a new visitor centre, is part of a £1.65 million Heritage Lottery-funded improvement scheme.

This will also see three of the original train carriages restored and a new conservation workshop on the site of the former train sheds to the east along the beach.

The Volk’s improvements are part of a £1 billion investment in Brighton and Hove’s seafront, with many of the projects either completed, under way, or in the pipeline.

Council leader Warren Morgan said: “It’s great to see progress with yet another project, this time east of the Brighton Palace Pier, in addition to everything else going on to improve things on the seafront.

“We must easily have the busiest seafront in the country in terms of investment.”

The design for the new station was inspired by traditional fishermen’s houses.

Organisers say they hope the new buildings will allow the Volk’s Railway to become “a year round” attraction and allow the line to be opened for special occasions outside of normal seasonal opening.

The application to the Heritage Lottery Fund was made following nine months of preparatory work.

The new building will replace the existing timber framed tram shed which a council surveyor ruled as not “economically viable to repair” because of considerable defects in steel and concrete caused by extensive corrosion as well as traces of wet rot.

The new station and visitor centre is slightly bigger than the current shed with new indoor space for ticket sales, queueing, toilets, café seating and extra room for heritage displays.

Work to restore the world’s oldest operating electric railway has been delayed by several months following the discovery of an old, but still live, underground gas pipe.

It has been the first disruption to the much-loved attraction since its closure between 1940 and 1948 because of the Second World War.

The delay was seen as another blow to businesses in Madeira Drive which already have limited access because of the closure of the Victorian terraces.

It had been hoped the railway could re-open in late spring but it is now expected trains will not start running until the autumn.

It was during the demolition of sheds that the hidden gas supply was found.

It is believed the pipe once supplied the traffic superintendent’s office by the Banjo Groyne.

It was capped off but not disconnected several generations ago.