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Is it time to stop blaming Beeching?


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1 hour ago, Nearholmer said:

Bus particularly is an ‘open goal’, in that the basic routes (roads!) exist, and relatively small bus-prioritisation schemes could quickly swap the balance of convenience between car and bus. But right now subsidised bus routes are being further cut, because usage has collapsed during Covid, and the way bus services are presented to the potential user is an anarchic mess, so that many people barely even know they exist in some places.|

Looking at some rail operators web sites they are not much better. There some very simple things that can improve bus services; link the destination display to the gps ticket machine so that it updates appropriately the remainder of the journey - little point still saying its going to x via y when y was passed long ago. Ensure bus stop information is up to date / provide information if none is and on routes where "hail and ride" applies provide some signage at intervals so people know there is a service.

 

15 minutes ago, phil-b259 said:

There is FAR to much obsession with the GC route to London. It passed through sod all south of Rugby, had lousy conectivity with other rail routes and none of the large towns / cities it passed through were left without rail services as a result of its demise.

Yet if had survived a large chunk of HS2 would not be needed. A issue often overlooked with the GC route that bode against it was the Nottinghamshire coalfield where increasing subsidence was being more of problem in comparison to the Midlands route. A interesting theme for a model would be what would have happened if the Midland became so riddled by subsidence it became unuseable around Clay Cross; the Loughborough connection still built but as a double track mainline and the GC retained northwards from there.  Maybe even the Nottm Suburban repaired from its war time damage to allow NE-SW services to loop round without reversing to then run via the GN through Derby and Egginton jn to Burton.

Edited by Butler Henderson
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51 minutes ago, kevinlms said:

What is a key thing about the loss making branch lines, is that so many should never have been built in the first place. 

True, but it has to be viewed from the perspective of the period.  The coming of the railways provided an opportunity for small communities to be connected to the outside world as never before and therefore there was a mad scramble to get connected much like the desire to bring high-speed broadband to the remotest of communities today.  Until then they'd been reliant on horses or their feet.  Remember too, it wasn't just passengers that were served by these branch lines, many were promoted primarily for goods.  They enabled a wider range of products to reach all parts of the country and had a dramatic effect on the cost of transporting coal, slashing costs for the consumer.

 

As for the "dubious" figures used by Beeching to justify his plans, it did not stop with his departure.  As an example:  After the Bourne End to High Wycombe line closed in 1970 as a result of an obvious attempt by BR to discourage use, the same started to afflict the remaining section.  As a result the Marlow Maidenhead Passengers Association was set up which quickly formed a unique bond between its officers and certain senior managers at Reading.  All have long since passed away but even so I'll not go into specifics.  Suffice to say that following one particularly "convivial" meeting BR agreed to open the books to prove the branch was losing money.  Fortunately (unfortunately for BR) the MMPA could call on the services, pro-bono, of some very experienced accountants who were commuters on the branch.

 

Their findings included the fact that the only revenue assigned to the branch was that for journeys wholly within the branch.  For any journeys from branch stations to Maidenhead or beyond  100% of the revenue was assigned to the main line and not a penny to the branch despite the vast majority of journeys being to Maidenhead or beyond.  Likewise, the cost of the alterations at Bourne End were shown as a recurring annual cost rather than a one-off capital investment amortised over several years as any other business would.  Once this was made public in the district, BR admitted the true loses on the branch were a fraction of what they'd claimed and the line has thrived ever since.   Today it helps that the current MD of GWR was brought up in Marlow and for a few years actually served on the MMPA committee!

 

Another thing that didn't help the survival of many lines was the failure to modernise and stick to the old way.  For example, despite the introduction of Diesel railbuses or railcars, the stations remained fully staffed and fully signalled for may years meaning the only real saving was in the cost of a fireman, fuel (?) and motive power maintenance.

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29 minutes ago, Butler Henderson said:


Yet if it [the GC] had survived a large chunk of HS2 would not be needed. 

 

Granted - but by and large its not 'main lines' which are the problem now. As the Japanese, French, Germans, etc have aptly demonstrated the much higher speed (and by that I mean 186mph not the 250mph the Westminster Government have used) achievable on dedicated high speed infrastructure is viable to build due to significant journey time reductions as well as increases in capacity - but putting back the twigs as it were (e.g. Bourne End to Wycombe or alleviating chronic traffic congestion in Guildford but rebuilding as far as Cranleigh) is not as bus based solutions can be done for a fraction of the cost! (even though research proves time and time again car drivers are very reluctant to switch to a bus, but much more likely to change to a tram or train if provided).

Edited by phil-b259
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2 minutes ago, phil-b259 said:

 

Granted - but by and large its not 'main lines' which are the problem now. As the Japanese, French, Germans, etc have aptly demonstrated the much higher speed (and by that I mean 186mph not the 250mph the Westminster Government have used) achievable on dedicated high speed infrastructure is viable to build due to significant journey time reductions as well as increases in capacity. - but putting back the twigs as it were (e.g. Bourne End to Wycombe or alleviating chronic traffic congestion in Guildford but rebuilding as far as Cranleigh) is not as bus based solutions can be done for a fraction of the cost!

May be, but it is generally accepted in this area that if BNE-HWY had not closed in 1970 it would be viable today and be a major contributor to reducing road congestion along the route.  Sadly, for many reasons, reinstatement is not possible despite what some locals think.

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1 hour ago, Dagworth said:

I believe the most short sighted part of the closures was the wholesale destruction of the infrastructure that followed. It would have been much better to have left it in place and kept the land as available corridors that would have allowed much easier reopening if/when needed. 
 

Andi

Nail & head = hit!!  It has happened in places, but not often. A few bits of line were mothballed in the Black Country, and in Dudley some of it is being slowly dragged back into use.

Even if it didn't help the 'real' network, it might have helped the heritage lines? One of the great heritage "what if's?"  is what if the Severn Valley Railway could get back to Ironbridge? Unfortunately the trackbed north of Bridgnorth was totally obliterated under housing.

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1 hour ago, jonny777 said:

The big catalyst for Beeching came during the closure of the M&GN early in 1959. I think the government had expected a public outcry when the closure of an entire route was announced, but apart from a few localised objections, this outcry never materialised; which must have given the road lobby in government a great boost to their morale. 

Similarly, the Stainmore line was another major pre-Beeching closure, in this case of a trans-Pennine route, that was weathered by the powers that be,

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I have attached the pdf for  "the Beeching Report" ... the Reshaping of British Railways.

Let us not forget Richard Beeching was a high-flyer of great intellect, even a Visionary

Post WW2 Britain had little choice but to maintain a loss making railway, simply because there was no alternative method of transporting goods and people around, however that changed  during the late 50's as roads / and motorways were constructed, and lorries and cars improved in speed and availability,austerity declined,  people became better off. The post WW2 railway losses were  initially manageable, but then the losses escalated quickly to the point of excessive burden on the Exchequer. The 1955 modernisation plan helped but did not arrest the losses, the railways had become a political hot potato,  Govts did not act  quickly, by the time Beeching was offered the Chair,  it needed rapid decisive response, that rapid   response was possibly where a mistakes were made in the closures of certain routes.

Beeching as a visionary. He identified the strengths and weakness of the railway,  the inefficient handling of unprofitable wagon traffic goods, his solution fully fitted liner trains,, eg Freightliner, the low-cost container loaded / unloaded  at a terminal leaving the expensive part, the wagon, free for more trips (at 75mph) . He identified that 50% of the coaching stock was held for excursion traffic, traffic which was vanishing rapidly as the population bought cars. He identified the range of costs,  some lines had revenue of only 1/7th of operating cost, others with revenues 7 times that of operating costs. Please read the Report attached to my post and feel free to criticise my views

 

BRB_Beech001a(1).pdf

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1 minute ago, CKPR said:

Similarly, the Stainmore line was another major pre-Beeching closure, in this case of a trans-Pennine route, that was weathered by the powers that be,

In fairness, once Stainmore's raison d'etre, its freight traffic, disappeared as the Furness ironworks closed, then its closure was inevitable. Never the easiest or cheapest of routes to operate, and with little passenger traffic, summer South Shields-Blackpool workings notwithstanding, its days were numbered.

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True,  but there was still opposition to the closure of the Stainmore line as it meant that all freight traffic for West Cumbria and  Furness that originated from Teeside and Wearside had to be routed via Newcastle and Carlisle. There was also the loss of a diversionary east-west route to and from the north-east. 

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3 hours ago, Nearholmer said:

Anyone who thinks this was a uniquely British, or a uniquely Beeching thing (even if it is fair that his name remains associated with it), would do well to compare the railway maps of Germany, France, Ireland, and a host of other countries dating from, say, 1939 and 1969. They all show hefty pruning.

 

The Irish case is interesting, because their ‘Beeching’ was Todd Andrews, who attracted a lot of flak at the time from the TUs, but managed overall to retain the very high esteem that he was held in because of other public service roles that he filled - he isn’t the same hate figure as Beeching, despite shutting probably a greater, or as great, a proportion of the network.

 

Maybe us Britishers are especially sentimental about barely-used rural railways.

 

Wasn’t there also a similar report for Northern Ireland (in Britain but outside Beeching’s mandate)? I can’t remember the name associated with that though.

 

One route that I think would definitely be retained if it was still open today is the Hatfield to St. Albans line, though this closed to passengers well before Beeching in 1951, and almost lost its passenger service before WW2. Today it has a few schools, an FE college and a university campus close to the route, as well as several businesses that would attract commuters (even allowing for working from home). The parallel bus services in the former railway corridor seem to be well used, with several people seemingly going all the way between Hatfield, Smallford and St. Albans or between intermediate stops close to the railway line, so that the improved ‘reach’ of the bus would not necessarily be an advantage. I suppose a disadvantage of the railway is that it doesn’t quite get into the city centre in St. Albans, but it’s no more of a problem than the existing stations there (London Road might actually be more convenient in some cases). The adjacent ex-LNWR Abbey Line perhaps demonstrates what the GNR line could have been, had it stayed open. The problem today is that key sections in Hatfield itself have been obliterated by subsequent developments, and to a lesser extent this has also happened at the other end.

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1 hour ago, Tim Dubya said:

 

Bang on Andi, I'm thinking that mothballing the infrastructure as a whole and only removing certain structures due to age and or maintenance issues would have saved money then and billions now.  These structures would inevitably have had to been rebuilt anyway, so removing them then, but retaining the 'estate' would have been the best option.

 

 

 

Almost all of the rail closures in Victoria, Australia, the land is still Crown land and many of the old lines are for public benefit, such as Rail Trails. A couple of once were termini are now shopping centres, but rare.

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1 hour ago, Nearholmer said:

And, the accepted wisdom of the day was that private car travel would be a serious liberator, and that bus travel would always be there as an option for the car-less.
 

The first held good, was true c1960-1990, then congestion really started to bite, and the second only held until c1980.

So why did congestion really start to bite only in 1990? The population wasn't growing hugely. Was it a case of more people abandoning bus travel, since railway lines had gone from the 1960s? Was there an increase in people travelling generally, rather than to/from work?

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1 hour ago, Mike_Walker said:

 

Another thing that didn't help the survival of many lines was the failure to modernise and stick to the old way.  For example, despite the introduction of Diesel railbuses or railcars, the stations remained fully staffed and fully signalled for may years meaning the only real saving was in the cost of a fireman, fuel (?) and motive power maintenance.

We had a high level BR manager come to visit the BRMA convention one year.

He was on the LMR and was telling us some of the problems with trying to modernise and save money.

 

He once attended an interview and was asked about the station he worked at, so he told them. He was told, that it must be hell to work there now, as it was busy back in the 1930s, when the questioner worked there. Goods traffic?

He didn't tell him, that it was now a sleepy hollow, with nothing to do, once you'd sold the morning peak tickets!

 

Another thing he had problems getting people to accept better ways to do things. It had always been the practice to send items, such as the station bicycle to Derby Works to get repaired, where it might take weeks before they saw it again. It was vastly more efficient to send it to the local bicycle repair shop.

 

Sorry I can't remember his name.

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24 minutes ago, kevinlms said:

So why did congestion really start to bite only in 1990? The population wasn't growing hugely. Was it a case of more people abandoning bus travel, since railway lines had gone from the 1960s? Was there an increase in people travelling generally, rather than to/from work?

The increase in train travel, that may be due to increased affluence,  people travel more as their disposable income increases, and long distance express trains trump motoring for ease and convenience.  Against this , it may seem hard to believe with petrol at £6 per gallon, measured over the long-term, cost per mile,  motoring is getting cheaper, while rail fares are rising.

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17 minutes ago, Rugd1022 said:

A bit of related trivia - the lad 'imself Tony Hancock was paid £24k to appear in a promotional film for the Beeching Report, which was a lot of money to the average Joe in 1963, does anyone remember it...?

So plenty of money to waste!

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19 minutes ago, kevinlms said:

So why did congestion really start to bite only in 1990? The population wasn't growing hugely. Was it a case of more people abandoning bus travel, since railway lines had gone from the 1960s? Was there an increase in people travelling generally, rather than to/from work?

Purely from personal observation/experience, I would cite (1) the long term effects of bus deregulation; with fewer subsidies, the less patronized routes suffered reduction or loss of services, leading to more car use.  Meanwhile busier areas saw extra buses, competing against each other for business, and the provision of bus lanes which can contribute to congestion.  (2) A general increase in wealth among the working population led to 2 or 2+ car families, with working spouses and young people driving to work, further education, shopping and leisure who would previously have used bus/bicycle/motorbike. 

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Blaming Beeching personally for closing railways is wrong; He was appointed by the Government of the day, who had in turn been appointed by the population in a democratic election, to deal with the huge losses BR was incurring. Many of the more foolish closures occurred long after he had left BR, for example Penrith/Keswick, Bangor/Caernarvon, as mentioned above Bourne End/High Wycombe, and of course the Waverley route. 

 

And poor old Beeching even gets the blame for closures which were nothing to do with him, for example a book in front of me states that the Princes Risborough/Watlington branch 'fell victim to the Beeching Axe'.... in 1957 ! 

Edited by caradoc
Grammar
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15 minutes ago, petethemole said:

Purely from personal observation/experience, I would cite (1) the long term effects of bus deregulation; with fewer subsidies, the less patronized routes suffered reduction or loss of services, leading to more car use.  Meanwhile busier areas saw extra buses, competing against each other for business, and the provision of bus lanes which can contribute to congestion.  (2) A general increase in wealth among the working population led to 2 or 2+ car families, with working spouses and young people driving to work, further education, shopping and leisure who would previously have used bus/bicycle/motorbike. 

Relating your post to my late father, b 1921, his circumstances of growing affluence and expectation were typical of his generation, his journey to work was  14 miles daily, 7 miles each way. On marriage he cycled,  a Raleigh Roadster,  then he acquired a  car, I recall a 1934 Austin Ruby then 1934 Ford Y-type, and a 1948 lowlight Minor, and later  a series of more modern Fords,   when he was short of money for petrol for the car, he took the bus for a few days, for some time he had a  Lambretta scooter, for the last years to retirement,  he gave up on cars in entirety and had a Honda C70 step-through,  public transport featured as a  last resort,  for most of his travelling to work over 40 years

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2 hours ago, spamcan61 said:

Absolutely, I've lost count of the number of line histories I've read over the years where a small company struggles to build a line from nowhere in particular to nowhere at all, then sells out to a big company for peanuts. Then the line closes eventually (often pre Beeching) anyway.

Also how many of these lines were built on the basis of 'the lowest quote was duly accepted'. Which effectively meant, that the railway was going to cost more to build, than they had originally budgeted for and so they NEEDED the lowest price.

How many of these bargain basement builders collapsed, leaving the owners to find someone else to complete? Since the money had almost certainly been collected locally, meant that these railways were in dire trouble, right from the start.

No wonder so many had to sell out, because they had no cash to buy a couple of locos and some stock, to run a token service.

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15 hours ago, MyRule1 said:

 

Yes - "Beeching" is convenient shorthand for this process but surely "Minster of Transport cuts" would be better?

To get back to this from the OP, that is part of the issue. "Beeching" is a quick and familiar short cut description that even the general public (maybe now of a certain age) are familiar with. It's a 'cover all' description of wholesale railway closures around that time, that has stuck ever since.

As for 'is it time to stop blaming Beeching?' I think he will forever carry the can for the decimation of the railways to such an extent that reinstatement - especially of freight traffic - has been almost impossible in many cases.

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1 hour ago, kevinlms said:

So why did congestion really start to bite only in 1990? 

 

Did you ever try driving to Bournemouth, or Torbay, or the Lake District in the 1960s during the summer? 

 

My Dad did for our annual holidays, and we sat for hours in traffic jams trying to get through Bath, Salisbury, Kendal, Ilminster, etc., etc. And that is leaving aside the nightmare known as the Exeter bypass. 

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2 hours ago, Nearholmer said:

And, the accepted wisdom of the day was that private car travel would be a serious liberator, and that bus travel would always be there as an option for the car-less.
 

 

 

The dumb brained idea was that if they closed unrenumerative branch lines, then prospective passengers would simply drive to their nearest main line railhead and continue their journey by train. 

 

I'm sure that kind of thinking still pervades certain planning departments today. 

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