Phones 4U billionaire granted green light for personal railway around £10m mansion

The Staffordshire businessman, who founded the mobile giant before selling it for nearly £1.5 billion, hopes to build the track around his 50-room Jacobean mansion later this year.

The 62-year-old has been granted planning permission to build the narrow gauge railway which will circle his Grade I-Listed Broughton Hall, near Eccleshall.

The line will run through the estate's 28-acre formal gardens and open parkland and will be used to take the tycoon's family and friends round the expansive grounds.

The railway will echo the design of a similar attraction at nearby Weston Park.

His agent Albert Maiden said: "This is a private residence so it will be for the enjoyment of family and friends only and will not be open to the public."

The application was granted on December 22 and will also include an outbuilding to protect the train when it is not in use. Bizarrely, the building will also provide shelter for 18 cows which graze on the land.

The application has been approved by Stafford Borough Council.

Mr Caudwell, a father-of-five, is currently ranked as the 464th richest person in the world, and the 13th wealthiest in the UK. The philanthropist's net worth is estimated to be around £2bn.

As well as his railway development he also hopes to convert his £85m five-storey home in Mayfair, London, into a £250m 'super mansion'.

Eccleshall Parish Council confirmed it had not received any objections to the proposals.

Mr Caudwell founded Phones 4U in 1996 before selling the business for £1.47bn in 2006. The company then entered administration in September last year.

He announced last October that he was separating from his partner, Claire Johnson, 45, whom he had been with for 13 years, and with whom he had one child, Jacobi, 10.

Another one of Mr Caudwell's sons, Rufus, 19, hit the headlines last year when it emerged that the teenager suffered from agoraphobia.