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- This article is part of the history of rail transport by country series.
The British railway system is the oldest in the world.
Railed roads and tramways, 1676 to 1825
Early rails
As early as 1676 railed roads were in use in Northumberland to ease the conveyance of coal from the mines to the banks of the river at
Newcastle-on-Tyne. These were simply straight and parallel rails of timber on which carts with rollers drawn by horses enabled several wagons to be moved simultaneously. Called
tramroads , these primitive rails were superseded in 1793 when the then superintendent of the Cromford Canal, Benjamin Outram, constructed a tramway with L-shaped cast-iron rails: it was a little over a mile in length and had a gauge of 3 ft 6 ins .
Although these rails were a huge step forward over the wooden "rails", they themselves were superseded when William Jessop - who had been a pupil of
John Smeaton - built and, with Outram, manufactured cast-iron rails without guiding ledges, where the wagon wheels were flanged instead. Jessop first employed these rails in 1789 at the
Loughborough Canal. Such rails could be manufactured in 3-ft lengths.
Cast-iron rails had a propensity of breaking easily, and gradually
wrought-iron began to be used. In 1820 John Birkenshaw introduced a method of rolling rails in greater lengths; wrought-iron was used from then onwards.
See also
Wagonway also
History of rail transportEarly public railways
These railways were built and paid for by the owners themselves. When longer lines were planned, inviting public subscription, as with many canals, an Act of Parliament became necessary to protect investors from unrealistic, or downright fraudulent, schemes. It could also be used to enforce the sale of wayleave on the part of landowners. The first line to obtain such an act, in 1758, was a private coal-owner's
wagonway, the
Middleton Railway into
Leeds. The first for public use, and on cast iron 'L' rails, was the
Surrey Iron Railway incorporated in 1799 to run between Wandsworth and
Croydon in south
London. It was worked by horses. Although it survived only until 1845, and was for freight traffic only, it prefaced almost a score of others in different parts of the country. Meanwhile, the first passenger-carrying public railway, though horse-drawn, was the Oystermouth Railway, when it was authorised to do so in 1807.
Two of the railway engineers who pioneered the use of steam locomotives were
Richard Trevithick and John Blenkinsop. At the time there was intense argument about the relative superiority of smooth wheels on smooth rails and the so-called
rack and cog wheel: early locomotives did not possess sufficient adhesive weight for the tractive power required. Although it was soon discovered that the cog wheel was unnecessary on ordinary railways, it is still used on mountain railways such as the
Snowdon Mountain Railway.
The
Stockton and Darlington Railway came into being because the proprietors of
Wylam Colliery, near
Newcastle upon Tyne wanted to abolish horse-drawn trains in favour of steam. One of Trevithick's locomotives was obtained in 1805, although the wooden track did not at first allow it to be used; in the event two of the Colliery's employees, William Hedley and
Timothy Hackworth, designed a locomotive in 1813, which became known as
Puffing Billy. A year later
George Stephenson, another of Wylam's employees, improved on that design; and it was that design that convinced the backers of the proposed tramway between Stockton and
Darlington, which had been given the go-ahead by Parliament in 1821, to appoint Stephenson, who had recently built the Hetton colliery railway, as engineer.
Traffic was originally intended to be horse-drawn, but Stephenson carried out a fresh survey of the route, and the Act was amended so that steam locomotives could also be used; it was also enabled to carry passengers in addition to coal and general merchandise. The line was 25 miles in length: had 100 loops along its single track, and four branch lines to collieries. It opened on 27 September 1825. It was initially operated like a public road, and it was a common occurrence for waggoners' trains to meet on the single track when arguments as to who should back up to a passing loop would ensue.
The first railway in
Scotland was between
Kilmarnock and Troon. At first it was operated by horses, but in 1817 locomotive haulage was introduced.
The development of the railways, 1825 to 1923
Two railways were the pioneers in railway development in England.
The next successful venture was the
Liverpool and Manchester Railway . It is considered to be the first true railway, in that it was specifically laid for use by steam locomotives, with cuttings and embankments, rather than using ropes to overcome gradients. It had been a project proposed several years before the S&DR, but local landowners had so vigorously opposed the plan that it had been abandoned. The undoubted success of the S&DR prompted a revival of the scheme, and Stephenson was asked to survey the route. Eventually, after one attempt was blocked by opponents of the scheme, the Act of Parliament was obtained, and the line built. The
Rainhill Trials, the competition to find the best locomotive to work the line, which Stephenson won with his locomotive
Rocket - a revolutionary design, using a multi-firetubed boiler with exhaust steam assisted, fire side, forced convection - were held in 1829, and the L&MR opened on 15 September 1830.
The L&MR was known as the 'Great Experimental' Railway, and engineers from Europe and America came to see the lessons learnt, which were impossible to predict until they could be tried out on the ground. For example, the entire track had to be replaced in the second year, something unforeseen. The first light locomotives soon needed replacing by more powerful ones to haul the increasingly long and heavy trains, and different designs of locomotive evolved to pull passenger and goods trains.
Canterbury and Whitstable Railway
The
Canterbury and Whitstable Railway was opened, after five years of construction, on 3 May 1830, four months earlier than the L&MR. It was the earliest railway in the south of England. Steep inclines meant that stationary engines were necessary on part of the six miles of track. It closed in 1952.
Further Progress
As Manchester had grown on cotton spinning, so Leeds had a growing trade in weaving. The
Pennines restricted canal development, so the railway provided a realistic alternative, especially with the growth in coal usage from the mines in the North East and Yorkshire; A number of lines were approved in the area, such as the Leeds and Selby Railway, in 1830, which would link the former to the port of
Hull, via the
River Ouse.
While the L&MR had not ousted the Lancashire canal system from the transport of goods, there was an unexpected enthusiasm for passenger travel. The financial success of these lines was beyond all expectations and interests in London and Birmingham soon planned to build two lines to link these cities with each other and with the L&MR. These two lines were the
London and Birmingham, designed by Robert Stephenson, which ran from Euston Square, London, to Curzon Street, Birmingham, and the Grand Junction, engineered by
Joseph Locke, which ran from Curzon Street to an end-on junction with the Warrington and Newton Line, a branch of the L&MR, at Dallam, near
Warrington in Cheshire. Although the Grand Junction was so-called because it was designed to link the other two lines it was actually completed and opened first, on 4 July 1837, with the L&BR following a few months later.
Although an Act of Parliament allowed railway companies compulsory purchase of wayleave, if a powerful landowner objected to a line across his land he could object to the bill being passed in the first place. Some landowners were also charging excessive amounts, so these early lines did not always follow the optimum paths. It was the curves on these early lines that, a century later, would lead to
British Railways' experimentation with, and later introduction of,
tilting trains.
Railway Mania
Although the Government was in favour of the development of trunk railways to stimulate economic recovery and to facilitate the movement of troops in times of potential civil unrest, it was legally necessary that each line was authorised by a separate Act of Parliament. While there were entrepreneurs with the vision of an intercity network of lines, such as those through the
East Midlands, it was much easier to find investors in shorter stretches, clearly defined in purpose, where rapid returns could be predicted.
All the railways were promoted by commercial interested parties; as those opened by the year 1836 were paying good dividends it prompted financiers to invest money in them, and by 1845 over 1000 projected schemes were put forward. When the government stepped in and announced closure for depositing schemes, the "Railway Mania", as it was called, was brought to an end.
The commercial interests mentioned above were often of a local nature, and there was never a nationwide plan to develop a logical network of railways. Some railways, however, began to grow faster than others, often taking over smaller lines to expand their own. The L&MR success led to the idea of linking Liverpool to London, and from that the seeds of the London and North Western Railway - an amalgamation of four hitherto separate enterprises, including the L&MR - were sown. Within 50 years the L&NWR was to become "the biggest joint stock company in the world".
Government involvement
While it had been necessary to obtain an Act of Parliament to build a new railway, the government initially took a
laissez faire attitude to their construction and operation, although as early as 1844 there had been a bill put before Parliament. This suggested, among other things, the state purchase of the railways which was not adopted. It did, however, lead to the introduction of "Parliamentary Carriages". The Government had begun to take an interest in safety matters, with the 1840 "Act for Regulating Railways", which empowered the
Board of Trade to appoint railway inspectors, with in 1842 the
Railway Inspectorate, to enquire after the causes of accidents and recommend ways of avoiding them.
"The Battle of the Gauges"
George Stephenson adopted his L&MR railway gauge to that of the width of the tramroads in use in the colliery districts: a width of 4 ft 8.5 ins , and all railways built by him and his assistants adhered to that width. When Bristol businessmen wished to build their railway linking their city with London, they chose
Isambard Kingdom Brunel as their engineer. Brunel favoured a wider gauge of 7 ft 0.25 ins : he felt that railways would not be in contact with one another and that there was therefore no need for there to be a uniform British gauge. The
Great Western Railway was therefore constructed on that premise. He was, however, incorrect; and when railways of a different gauge met the inconvenience caused led to the setting up of a commission to look into the matter. Their conclusion was that the "narrow gauge" should be adopted throughout; although the GWR attempted to forestall that, Parliament later passed the
Gauges Act which stipulated the standard gauge.
See also
Early successes
The financial success of the early railways was phenomenal, as they had no real competition. The roads were still very slow and in poor condition. Prices of fuel and food fell in cities connected to railways owing to the fall in the cost of transport. The layout of lines with gentle gradients and curves, originating from the need to help the relatively weak engines and brakes, was a boon when speeds increased, avoiding for the most part the need to re-survey the course of a line. Less than 20 years after the Liverpool line opened, it was possible to travel from London to Scotland by train, in a small fraction of the former time by road.
By 1923 there were some nine major railways operating in England and five in Scotland. In addition there were smaller companies, such as the Cambrian Railways and the many South
Wales lines; the Furness and Hull and Barnsley Railways in England; and many much smaller lines. A brief note about each of the larger companies will illustrate how they grew to the importance they had assumed by the time of the huge amalgamations which took place in 1923, in which all but a very few railways were absorbed. Each of the railways described briefly below have their own article.
Major railway companies in Great Britain
English railways
- Great Central Railway : before 1897 the GCR was called the Manchester, Sheffield and Lincolnshire Railway, when it served those areas by means of an east-west line; it then built a line to London, and was renamed as the GCR. The line occupied the central position between the East and West Coast main lines and had its London terminus at Marylebone station. Since nationalisation the route has been truncated.
- Great Eastern Railway : the GER was an amalgamation of the Eastern Counties Railway and the Northern and Eastern Railway, and as its name suggests served the eastern counties of England: Cambridgeshire, Essex, Suffolk and Norfolk. Its main London terminus was Liverpool Street.
- Great Northern Railway : the GNR began as an amalgamation in 1846 of two rival schemes: the London and York Railway and the Direct Northern Railway . The GNR main line ran northwards from King's Cross to a joint station with the NER at Doncaster. Other lines served Lincolnshire and Derby Friargate. The GNR also had joint ownership of the Cheshire Lines Committee, giving access to Liverpool; other joint workings led to West Yorkshire . The GNR, with the NER and the NBR, operated the East Coast Main Line between London and Edinburgh
- Great Western Railway : the GWR was incorporated in 1835 to construct a railway, operated on the broad gauge of 7 ft 0.25 in , between Bristol and London. With the addition of several railways - among them the Bristol and Exeter Railway ; South Wales Railway ; West Midland Railway ; South Devon Railway ; and the Cornwall Railway - the GWR territory took shape. The major routes, apart from the original line, served Weymouth, Plymouth and Penzance to the west; all of South Wales to Fishguard and Aberystwyth; Birmingham and Chester to the north-west. A working agreement with the LNWR took the latter line to Birkenhead on Merseyside. The broad-gauge system resulted in what became known as the Gauge War: it caused great problems where the GWR met other companies' tracks, and eventually the last broad gauge line was abolished. The name "Great Western Railway", unlike all the other railways referred to, has been retained throughout the nationalisation of the railways, and one of the train operating companies bears the name in 2005.
- Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway : the L&YR was incorporated in 1847; as with all the major railways it was the result of amalgamations, in this instance the Manchester and Leeds Railway which in 1859 joined the East Lancashire Railway to form the L&YR. Its lines covered the two counties, and served, inter alia Manchester, Leeds, Liverpool, Preston
...
,
Doncaster and
Goole. In 1922, after the passing of the Railways Act 1921, the L&YR amalgamated with the LNWR.
- London and North Western Railway : the LNWR was formed in 1846 when four existing lines were amalgamated: the London and Birmingham Railway; the Liverpool and Manchester Railway; the Grand Junction Railway; and the Manchester and Birmingham Railway, making the LNWR the largest in the country at that time [420 miles ]. By 1923 its main line stretched from Euston station in London to Carlisle, with branches to Oxford and Cambridge; to Peterborough; and from Crewe to North Wales and West Yorkshire. It had running powers to enable its trains to reach Swansea and other parts of South Wales; and it also owned a railway in Ireland. The LNWR, together with the Caledonian Railway, operated the West Coast Main Line between London and Glasgow.
- London and South Western Railway : Promoted as the London and Southampton Railway, the first section opened in 1838. By 1923 its main line extended from Waterloo
...
in London via
Salisbury and
Exeter to
Plymouth running parallel, but south of, the GWR main line. Other main towns served were
Portsmouth and
Bournemouth as well many of the south and south-west
seaside resorts. The latter were served by what was known as the
Atlantic Coast Express. The LSWR also had a busy suburban network in south-west London. The Somerset and Dorset Joint Railway was jointly owned with the Midland Railway.
- London, Brighton and South Coast Railway : the LB&SCR began as the London and Croydon Railway and the London and Brighton Railway . Its network of lines covered a large portion of the South London suburbs and served almost the whole of the county of Sussex, much of Surrey and some extensions into Kent and Hampshire. Many of the south coast resorts owe their existence to the line. Electrification began in 1909 on the overhead system; this was later changed to third rail when the LB&SCR became part of the Southern Railway.
- Midland Railway : the MidR was formed in 1844 with the amalgamation of three railways: the North Midland Railway; the Midland Counties Railway, and the Birmingham and Derby Junction Railway. In its early days it had no London terminus, using termini of other railways until 1862, when its grandiose London terminus at St Pancras was built. By 1923 its main lines ran from St Pancras to Carlisle, via Nottingham and Sheffield
...
, and via
Derby to
Manchester. It also had a secondary main line from Derby through Birmingham to Bristol. It part-owned the
Midland and Great Northern Joint Railway, serving east coast ports and resorts; the Somerset and Dorset Railway ; and had access using other joint railways to reach Swansea in South Wales, Liverpool, and the port of
Stranraer in Scotland. The latter route gave it access to its ownership of two of the Irish railways.
- North Eastern Railway : The NER was incorporated in 1854, and was the amalgamation of three railways: the York, Newcastle and Berwick Railway; the York and North Midland Railway; and the Leeds Northern Railway. In 1923 its main line ran from the joint station at Doncaster through York and Newcastle-on-Tyne
...
to
Berwick-on-Tweed. It formed part of the East Coast Main Line, and its headquarters were at York. It had a larger tonnage of mineral and coal traffic at the beginning of the 20th century than any other railway in Britain.
...
.
Scottish railways
For further details see List of early British railway companies
The Grouping
See particularly List of railway companies involved in the 1923 grouping
On 1 January 1923, as a result of the Grouping* the "Big Four" railway companies were set up as follows:
Some lines remained outside this grouping, particularly those operated as Joint railways - such as the
Midland and Great Northern Joint Railway and the Somerset and Dorset Joint Railway.
Complete details of the railways within those four companies are given in individual articles *
For the events leading up to the Grouping see Railways Act 1921,
Following the grouping: 1923-1947
In the 16 years before the outbreak of
WWII the new companies set about the tremendous task of rebuilding railways which had had little or no work done since the end of
WWI hostilities in 1918. Priority was new rolling stock: locomotives, coaches and wagons. As an example of the need for rationalisation, the LMSR took over 10,316 steam locomotives at the grouping: these comprised no fewer than 393 different classes.
In the 1920s the companies produced some exceptional locomotives:
- LMSR: Royal Scot class 4-6-0 ; Sir Henry Fowler was Chief Mechanical Engineer
- LNER: A4 Pacific 4-6-2 ; A3 Pacific class 4-6-2 ; B17 Sandringham class 4-6-0 ; Sir Nigel Gresley CME
- GWR: Castle class 4-6-0 ; King class 4-6-0 ; Hallclass 4-6-0 : Charles B. Collett CME
- SR: King Arthur class 4-6-0 ; Lord Nelson class 4-6-0 ; R.E.L. Maunsell CME
In addition to those mainly passenger locomotives, many new classes of freight engines were produced: the
pannier tank locomotives of the GWR and the Garratt heavy freight 2-6-0+0-6-2 locomotive of the LNER being two examples.
Total length of the British railways at 1 January 1923 was 19,585 route miles . From the end of the 1920s, when it was obvious that the motor vehicle was in the ascendancy, dozens of little-used branch lines began to close: some to passenger traffic, many completely.
Although few railways were constructed, some new works were undertaken. Among them were:
- Station redevelopments
- Lines to allow easier running - one example being those on the Isle of Thanet
- The Southern Railway began a programme of main-line electrification, which was to bring fast services to many of the south coast resorts, and to extend the London suburban routes.
These latter themes are taken up more fully in the sections that follow.
The grouping period
During the
First World War the system was taken under government control and run by the Railway Operating Division of the War Office. This revealed some advantages in running the railways with fewer companies, and after the war it was widely agreed that the required development of the rail network could not be achieved under the conditions that had existed before the war. Nationalisation of the railways, which had been mooted by
William Gladstone as early as the 1830s, was considered, but was rejected by the government and the owners of the rail companies. A compromise was created in the Railways Act 1921. Under this act, almost all of the hundreds of existing rail companies were grouped together into four new companies: the
London, Midland and Scottish, the Southern, the
London and North Eastern, and the
Great Western. This "grouping" had been first proposed in the 1850s, and lasted from 1 January 1923 to 31 December 1947. This small amount of companies, although not in direct competition with each other, competed to be the fastest, most modern and most comfortable. The companies were spurred on even more by the increased road competition. Products of this competition were the LMS and LNER races to Scotland, with the infamous Flying Scotsman and the Mallard's world speed record of 126 mph, the LMS's production of diesel railcars, electrification of lines by the LNER, the GWR's ingenious marketing and the SR's mass electrification scheme, which led to nearly the whole of the south east's trains being almost entirely electric. Many claimed Britain had the best railways in the world at this period, and it could certainly be justified.
However, road transport grew rapidly during the
1920s, stimulated by the cheap sale of thousands of war-surplus vans and lorries and the subsidised construction of new roads. The revenues of the railway companies suffered in particular because of the loss of freight to road haulage. This was largely because the Government would not release the railways from their obligations as 'common carriers'. The common carrier requirement had been brought in the
19th century. It obliged railway companies to carry any cargo offered to it at a nationally agreed charge, which was usually well below a rate necessary to make the operation profitable for the railways. The intention had been to stop railway companies "cherry picking" the most profitable freight whilst refusing to carry less profitable freight. This had been a necessary measure when railways had had an effective monopoly over land transport. But with road competition encroaching, it put the railways at a disadvantage, because they had to subsidise unprofitable freight operations with profitable ones, which drove up charges.
The road haulage operators, who had no such restrictions, could therefore undercut the railways and take away their business. It was then thought that no large railway could operate at a profit unless more than half its traffic is freight, and the freight was being siphoned off by the road companies. The railway companies responded to this with a national campaign in the late 1930s for a 'square deal' to allow them the same commercial freedom as road operators. However just as the campaign looked like being successful,
World War II started. The common carrier requirement was not lifed until 1957.
With the transport policy pursued by the government, and more general changes in lifestyle favouring travel by road, the Big Four railways never ran a healthy profit. Indeed, the LNER never made a profit at all. However, they were still able to produce the world-leading services on the East Coast Main Line, running trains at speeds of up to 110 mph, a remarkable achievement. Also the SR invested heavily in electrification of all its lines, and this electrification was done at a far faster rate than at any time under BR.
During
World War II the railway companies' managements joined together, effectively becoming one company. The railways were used more heavily than at any time in their history during this period.
The railway system suffered heavy damage in some areas due to German
Luftwaffe bombing, especially in cities such as
London and
Coventry. However this damage was not as extensive as it was in many other European countries such as
France and
Germany. This unwittingly worked to the railways' disadvantage, because in other European countries the damage to their railway systems had been so bad that it gave them an opportunity to essentially re-build their railway systems from scratch, and dramatically modernise them.
During the war very little was invested in the railways and they became increasingly run-down. With only essential maintenance work being carried out during the war, the maintenance backlog increased even further.
Rolling stock also began to deteriorate. After the war, it was clear that the rail network could not be maintained in the private sector. According to a calculation by the Central Statistical Office during the period 1938-1953 the railways suffered a net disinvestment of £440 million
Nationalisation
See Transport Act 1947
for full detailsThe Transport Act 1947 nationalised nearly all forms of mass transport in
Great Britain. The British Transport Commission was formed to oversee the working of the Act. To oversee the railways, the British Transport Commission Railway Executive, known as
British Railways, came into being. Under the BTC's Railway Executive, the railways were organised into six regions:
In 1962, the British Transport Commission was dissolved and various Boards were established to oversee and regulate the railways, the docks and inland waterways. . In 1968 the British Railways Board adopted the trading name
British Rail.
The railways in the post-war world
In the post-war world, lifestyles underwent radical changes, cars became affordable to the masses, new road and
motorways were built. The railways on the other hand entered the post-war world with technologies and operating practices which had changed little since the
Victorian era. The last 60 years have seen the railways stumbling to adjust to the new world.
The railways attempts to modernise during the 1950s were largely unsuccessful, and resulted in the huge
Beeching Axe closures programme of the 1960s.
Before the war, the railway companies had formed a powerful political lobby group, but one effect of nationalisation was to effectively destroy this political influence .
Conversely the newly privatised road haulage industry and motor interests were becoming increasingly powerful and influential over government transport policy, a trend which dictated transport policies of all British governments for the rest of the post war period.
In the immediate post-war period, most of the money spent on the railways was spent on clearing the enormous maintenance backlog inherited from the war. After that there was little left over for modernisation. By the start of the 1950s Britain had fallen well behind the rest of Europe in terms of dieselisation and electrification of its railways. Indeed under the Labour government there was a political incentive to avoid dieselisation because this would have meant a reduced demand for coal, which would have put miners out of work.
The bureaucratic committee structure of the BTC and British Railways did not help matters, it slowed progress towards modernisation to a crawl.
The modernisation plan
The modernisation plan of the mid to late 1950s, was intended to bring the railway system kicking and screaming into the 20th century. However most railway historians now regard it as a costly failure and a missed opportunity. The plan involved major projects of electrification and dieselisation of the existing network.
However, the plan has been widely criticised since it failed to define what the railways were actually for, and failed to take into account the impact that the motor car, road transport and a changing society would have upon the railway system, and attempting to carry the railway system on as it had been since the Victorian era as if nothing had changed.
So, for example, massive investment was made in
marshalling yards at a time when small wagonload traffic which they dealt with was in steep decline and being lost rapidly to the roads. This proved to be a costly mistake. In total £85 million pounds was wasted on upgrading marshalling yards, many of which were closed a few years later.
Another element of the modernisation plan was replacing steam with diesel and electric traction. However the dieselisation plans were rushed, and many classes of diesel locomotive were rushed into full scale production before their prototypes had been fully tested. Predictably enough it turned out to be an expensive fiasco. Many of the new diesels were chronically unreliable, some so much so that they had to be withdrawn from service after just a few months of service, at enormous cost. This affair did little to bolster British Railways' reputation with the public or the government.
Theoretically dieselisation would produce efficiency savings, because diesel locomotives were less labour-intensive than steam. However the unreliability of many of the new diesels wiped out much of the potential efficiency saving from dieselisation.
The modernisation plan was hugely expensive costing more than one billion pounds , and failed to produce the hoped for revival in rail traffic.
The Beeching era
By the early
1960s the railways were running at a huge deficit, and patience with them by the government had run out. In 1962 the transport minister
Ernest Marples appointed
Richard Beeching as head of British Railways with a brief to cut the spiralling losses. His report
The Reshaping of British Railways issued in 1963, concluded that much of the railway network carried little traffic and should be closed down. His report proposed a massive closures program which would involve 5,000 miles of track, and 2,363 small stations being closed.
The closures recommended by the report were mostly implemented. They peaked in the mid 1960s and continued until the early 1970s.
The Beeching closures proved highly controversial at the time, and have done so since. The closures failed to produce the hoped for savings, or to restore the railways to profitabillity.
The 1970s
The
1970s saw British Rail successfully introduced high speed diesel train services in 1976 with the InterCity 125
High Speed Train , on some services, and adoption of the InterCity brand. This created an increase in passengers using the railways and improved British Rail's fianances.
Less successfully, British Rail attempted to create a
tilting train - The
Advanced Passenger Train , but this was later cancelled.
The 1980s
In the 1980s the regions of BR were abolished and the system sectorised into five sectors. The passenger sectors were InterCity ,
Network SouthEast and
Regional Railways . Trainload Freight took trainload freight,
Railfreight Distribution took non-trainload freight, Freightliner took
intermodal traffic and
Rail Express Systems took parcels traffic. The maintenance and remaining engineering works were split off into a new company, BRML . The new sectors were further subdivided into divisions. This ended the "
BR blue" period as new liveries were adopted gradually. Infrastructure remained the responsibility of the Regions until the "Organisation for Quality" initiative in 1991, when this too was transferred to the sectors.
There was the controversial 'Serpell Report' but due to the hostile reaction it encountered it was largely dropped.
The rolling stock of BR was becoming increasingly obsolete and near the end of its life. An attempt at a cheap
DMU replacement was made with the "Pacers" - essentially modified bus bodies placed upon a fixed wheel freight waggon wheelbase, which met with customer dissatisfaction. However more successful stock such as the '
Sprinters'
DMU and Networkers were introduced.
To considerable surprise the Thatcher government, which had been perceived as anti-rail, carried out the electrification of the
East Coast Main Line.
At a regional level, the New
Network SouthEast introduced extensive new stock, in the form of Networkers . It also conducted numerous electrification projects; including the
Midland Main Line to Bedford , and the Southern 750 V DC system reached
Hastings and
Weymouth.
Thameslink was introduced through London over the re-opened Snow Hill tunnel, while the network out of
Marylebone was relaunched with great success. In the Midlands,
Birmingham Snow Hill Station was re-opened in 1987.
The 1990s
The 1990s were dominated by privatisation of British Rail by the government of
John Major.
Privatisation
For main article see Privatisation of British Rail.
Contemporary developments
The British railway system continues to be developed. Contemporary projects include:
- The Channel Tunnel Rail Link, a project to construct a 108-km high-speed rail line from London to the British end of the Channel Tunnel, and involving a great deal of complex civil engineering including a 1.2-km bridge over the River Medway, a 3 km tunnel under the Thames near Dartford, a 3.2-km tunnel through the North Downs, 19-km twin tunnels running into central London, a major new railway station extension to St Pancras Station
