Nicknames of the railway companies.

[pH]

2 minutes ago, Nearholmer said:

The US ones ring true to me, because they turn a load of verbiage into something easy to say.

Like: 

Cedar Rapids and Iowa City Railway - the CRANDIC.

[melmerby]

1 hour ago, pH said:

Like: 

Cedar Rapids and Iowa City Railway - the CRANDIC.

That's an acronym not a nickname.

Like Selnec. (SE Lancashire & NE Cheshire)

Edited August 20, 2021 by melmerby

[melmerby]

1 hour ago, pH said:

Two from the US:

 

 

Missouri Kansas Texas (MKT) Railroad - “Miss Katy” or just “The Katy”.

The Katy lives on, albeit as a UP heritage paint job:

 

MKT was in fact a railway not a railroad.

 

Edited August 20, 2021 by melmerby

[Nearholmer]

Has The Swedey, for the GER been mentioned?

[melmerby]

Norfolk Southern Railway have done the same for "The Nickel Plate Road" (and 19 other constituents of the present company on fleets of what were then new locos, plus another few odd ones on older locos.)

 

The nicknames were prominent as part of the identity of the companies.

[Nearholmer]

Pity we didn’t have ‘pre-grouping’ diesels, because these 1950s liveries are very good.

 

How about a 66 in LMS black and silver?

[keefer]

6 hours ago, Ian Smeeton said:

 

 

The then Lord Provost of Glasgow Michael Kelly promoted the newly reopened Subway as the Clockwork Orange, but most Weejies I came across called it the Subway, while a few preferred the 'Electric Worm'

 

Regards

 

Ian

It has, officially, at various times in its history been either the Subway or the Underground. 

I remember after the 1979 refurbishment, the stations had a large, orange U outside, although before that, the station signage was 'UndergrounD'.

Of course it is now officially the Subway again.

Edited August 20, 2021 by keefer

[pH]

1 hour ago, melmerby said:

The Katy lives on, albeit as a UP heritage paint job:

 

MKT was in fact a railway not a railroad.

 

The entity merged with the Union Pacific in 1988 was the ‘Missouri Kansas Texas Railroad Company’ and had operated under that name since a reorganization in 1923.

 

That colour scheme is an abomination! It is a ‘riff’ on a couple of previous MKT diesel red colourschemes, plus a reference to the stripes in the last colourscheme (the ‘John Deere’ scheme of green with yellow striping).

Edited August 20, 2021 by pH
To add date

[009 micro modeller]

11 hours ago, iands said:

... or a fairly recently extinct TOC - WAGN - We're All Going Nowhere (actually said to me by a WAGN staff member whilst visiting KX 'box). 

 

I’ve heard that one (or a variant, ‘We Are Going Nowhere’). And their predecessor, Notwork SouthEast.

 

10 hours ago, nightstar.train said:

Another modern one - worst late western.

 

Or, as in Private Eye, the whole company being referred to as ‘Worst Group.’

 

Regarding the big four companies, I’ve heard some of those mentioned but not really heard any for the Southern (though I appreciate the simpler initials don’t lend themselves to making interesting nicknames).

[Wickham Green too]

Superb Railway, of course !

 

 

Yep - just made that one up.

[kevinlms]

5 hours ago, 009 micro modeller said:

 

Regarding the big four companies, I’ve heard some of those mentioned but not really heard any for the Southern (though I appreciate the simpler initials don’t lend themselves to making interesting nicknames).

Suburban Railway?

[Bucoops]

Going Modern again - Greater Angrier.

[Zomboid]

13 hours ago, 009 micro modeller said:

Or, as in Private Eye, the whole company being referred to as ‘Worst Group.

If I ever want to be rude about First Group, I prefer to call them "Last".

[laurenceb]

They seem to have been called worst bus in a lot of places

[The Johnster]

Arriva, or as we called them Arriva Later. 

[Mike_Walker]

EWS was known as Eat Work & Sleep or Ed's Wonderful System by certain of its staff.

 

Go Ahead is Go Backwards to many.

 

Not a nickname, but one Chiltern Turbo ran around for a couple of weeks with its branding skilfully amended to read:  Sadly a part of Arriva.

[jim.snowdon]

On 20/08/2021 at 10:44, nightstar.train said:

Another modern one - worst late western.

Preceded by Worst Great Western.

 

[Tankerman]

Not exactly a nickname for the GWR, but in the 1950's and early 1960's a lot of the older ex GWR employees in west Cornwall, including my uncle who was a ganger in the Redruth area, referred to the GWR as The Company. The oldest ticket collector at Truro took it a stage further by replacing one of the BR buttons on his waistcoat with a GWR one.

[Engineer]

Referring to the recent mention of Glasgow Subway.

 

Some references, including Wikipedia, mention Shoogly or Shooglie as a nickname, particularly referring to the ride quality of the system in its previous form.  A while ago I was chatting to a Glasgow resident and they also confirmed this nickname.

[Nearholmer]

Mentioned it a few posts back, although I spelt it differently.

[The Johnster]

4 hours ago, Tankerman said:

Not exactly a nickname for the GWR, but in the 1950's and early 1960's a lot of the older ex GWR employees in west Cornwall, including my uncle who was a ganger in the Redruth area, referred to the GWR as The Company. The oldest ticket collector at Truro took it a stage further by replacing one of the BR buttons on his waistcoat with a GWR one.

During my time with BR at Canton as a freight guard in the 70s, BR was always referred to as 'the company', wherever I went which included on to the LMR.

[jim.snowdon]

1 hour ago, The Johnster said:

During my time with BR at Canton as a freight guard in the 70s, BR was always referred to as 'the company', wherever I went which included on to the LMR.

Much as to staff on London Underground the organisations was known as 'The Combine'.

 

[Monkersson]

2 hours ago, Engineer said:

Referring to the recent mention of Glasgow Subway.

 

Some references, including Wikipedia, mention Shoogly or Shooglie as a nickname, particularly referring to the ride quality of the system in its previous form.  A while ago I was chatting to a Glasgow resident and they also confirmed this nickname.

I was speaking to my uncle about this thread, he worked on the Subway from the mid 50's and he's never heard it called that, though the Glasgow Trams where nicknamed 'Shooglies'

[pH]

6 hours ago, Tankerman said:

The oldest ticket collector at Truro took it a stage further by replacing one of the BR buttons on his waistcoat with a GWR one.

In the mid 1960s, one of the guards on our local line was still wearing his Caledonian Railway uniform hat.
 

[Mike_Walker]

The Pacific Great Eastern - forerunner of the British Columbia Railway was known as:  "Please Go Easy",  "Prince George Eventually" or "Past God's Endurance".