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This weekend marks the start of the daily running season for the North Yorkshire Moors Railway.

For those visitors coming to Pickering station, they will find that all the usual facilities will be open, including the tearoom, shop and booking office.

But because work on the station roof has not yet been completed, trains will be unable to access the covered area. Services will instead pull up on the northern half of the platforms where passengers will climb aboard or exit the carriages.

This temporary arrangement is not expected to last long, as work continues apace on the £500,000 scheme to restore the main station roof.

The work won’t affect the planned timetable, which starts on Saturday 26 March and runs until 30 October 2011.

The station roof is being built to the designs of the original structure which was installed in the middle of the 19th century but removed by British Rail in 1951 and replaced by canopies.

Delays have crept into the roof project after the wrong paint was used and steel girders had to be removed and replaced with the right kind of paint.

Hopes are high that the main station roof project will be completed in two weeks’ time and certainly before the main Easter holidays.

In the meantime the public have been given a last chance to sponsor a slate on the new roof, which has so far raised £23,000 towards the total cost of £50,000.