outside it is beautiful

outside it is beautiful is a digital audio stories artwork project set on the Bentham train line which will connect rail passengers with the communities and landscapes they are travelling through. 

Using dedicated GPS app technology, passengers will be able to hear stories pinged via their phones about the landscape they can see out of the train window as they travel from Leeds to Morecambe. Stories will be written and performed by the people who live there in free creative sessions.  

Why?

We want to encourage train passengers to look out of the window and learn more about the communities and landscapes they are passing through. We want them to experience stories about the area in a different way and to encourage them to think anew about journeying on public transport.

We want to further develop communities' awareness of the areas they live in and to share this with visitors through the creative act of telling stories. 

Overall we hope the project will make a difference by encouraging a greater sense of responsibility and love for the landscape, deepen communities’ knowledge about where they live, develop their creative excellence and embolden participants and passengers to seek new wildlife and cultural experiences beyond the project.

Lastly, it's a celebration of the beauty, history and wildlife and landscape that can be seen out of the train window - the sights, sounds, textures, people and animals which are often unknown and invisible to the sometimes anonymous traveller who is passing by in minutes... even seconds.

How?

In late 2025, communities up and down the Bentham line will come together and work with us to create words, stories and sounds about the places they live in and the natural landscapes and wildlife around them. They will excavate peat bogs. Journey with curlews. Visit the old Wintergardens. Gaze at the Dark Sky. Plumb the depths of the heritage of this famous line. They will become ghosts, prophets, horse whisperers, sages and artists. This huge tapestry of sound, this rap, this poetry, will be pinged onto passengers' phones as they travel along The Bentham Line- making it rich with sight, sound, history and wildlife - a landscape come alive in the ears and eyes of train passengers.

See here for how the app might sound on the train...

Phase one of the project - Research & development

In October 2024 we activated our research and development phase, working with communities up and down the Bentham line from Morecambe to Leeds. In a week full of imaginative workshops exploring the culture of the rich Yorkshire and Lancashire dialects, the local wildlife and history of The Bentham Line, we met with people living with dementia, young people,  vulnerable groups, vulnerable children, women just released from prison, the Kurdish community, the Forest of Bowland National Landscape, the Yorkshire Peat Partnership and the general public. Supported by Arts Council England through its National Lottery Project Grants programme and by Northern (rail) we formed long lasting partnerships, friendships and made the connections to develop more. We had in kind support from Northern and Culturapedia/Spot On and The Leeds-Morecambe Community Rail Partnership. 

Phase two - development of our existing partners, collaborators, participants and funding strands

We are in the process of developing our project putting in the place structures that we will need to create the project in phase three. We are currently applying for funding strands, developing our partnerships and relationships with the groups we will work with in phase three and liaising with AT Creative. We are being funded by Northern's community fund (trains) for this phase

Phase three - the project itself

The project, beginning in November 2025, with pre production and free professionally led writing workshops with community groups and the public on the train itself, and culminating in the launch of the app and a standalone project website for anyone with access needs in March 2026.

Post project - phase four

Plans for a book and a documentary art film on the project

afterword

We want to create an exciting, beautiful and experimental experience which will encourage passengers to engage on a deeper level with the places, landscapes and communities they are travelling through. We hope the project will promote a greater sense of shared identity, bring inhabitants, landscapes and visitors closer together and encourage a greater sense of responsibility for the world we live in by creating a lifelong artistic legacy on the Bentham line.