Policies
Occasional criticisms of aspects of the museum, such as that it has devoted insufficient attention to modern traction; that it was neglecting scholarship in favour of commercialism; or that its photographic collections constitute a "black hole", do not always take into account the financial constraints under which the museum operates: its Grant in Aid from the Department for Culture, Media and Sport amounts to £6.50 per visitor, which is used more cost-effectively but delivers much less overall income than for comparable London museums and it depends on money-making initiatives such as the Yorkshire Wheel, which operated at the museum from 2006 to 2008, and visits from Thomas the Tank Engine as chronicled in Thomas and the Great Railway Show. The museum has also suffered a few thefts of objects.
The museum can be allocated material from the railway industry by the Railway Heritage Committee. Because of the diversity of material falling potentially within the museum's collection policy and the problems of caring for it, decisions on acquisition of new items for the collection can be difficult. There has been a tradition within the museum of treating rolling stock as if it were still in railway service and unquestionably capable of undergoing heavy repairs and restoration, and many of the museum's locomotives have been operated in preservation on the main line, heritage railways or at the museum. More recently, there have been moves to less interventionist forms of conservation in some cases.
Since 1977, the Friends of the National Railway Museum have been in existence as a group to give financial and other support to the museum, such as financing the restoration of Duchess of Hamilton.
The 1990 "Great Railway Show" won the Museum of the Year award and in 2001 the museum gained the European Museum of the Year Award. It has also won White Rose awards from the Yorkshire Tourist Board, and in recognition of the several major developments in 2004 was given the Heritage Railway Association's Peter Manisty Award.
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