On this day in 1849, 175 years ago, the six segmental arches of Twizel Viaduct carried their first live load following completion by the York Newcastle & Berwick Railway.
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Documents for further study
Documents for further study
The fabulous Railways Archive website hosts a collection of documents relating to the Beeching Report, railway investment and the closure programme. Below you will find links to the relevant page, from which you can download PDF copies.
The impact of Beeching’s report was probably best demonstrated by the list of withdrawals and modifications to the nation’s rail passenger services. It goes on and on. All corners of the British Isles were reached, but the effect was felt most in rural areas were bus services were often poor or non-existent.
However, amongst the lines identified below are a fair number that ultimately escaped the axe thanks to the vocal and tenacious campaigning of protestors.
Was your local line affected?
Passenger services to be withdrawn
Glasgow Central-Carlisle (Local) Edinburgh Princes Street-Carstairs-Lanark Glasgow St. Enoch-Dumfries-Carlisle (Local) Glasgow St. Enoch-Lugton-Kilmamock~(Local) Darvel-Kilmamock Stranraer-Dumfries Dumfries-Castle Douglas-Kirkcudbright Glasgow St. Enoch-Dalry-kilmarnock Ayr-Dalmellington Kilmarnock-Ayr Kilmamock-Ardrossan Lanark-Muirkirk Glasgow Central-Edinburgh Princes Street Hamilton-Strathaven/Coalburn Edinburgh Waverley-Berwick-upon-Tweed (Local) Edinburgh Waverley-Dunbar Edinburgh Waverley-Hawick-Carlisle Langholm-Riddings Junction-Carlisle Thornton-Crail-Dundee Stirling-Alloa-Kinross Glasgow Buchanan Street-Stirling-Perth (Local) Gleneagles-Crieff-Comrie Glasgow Buchanan Street-Stirling-Oban Killin Junction-Killin Oban-Connel Ferry-Ballachulish Craigendoran-Anochar Fort William-Mallaig (Local) Ballinluig-Aberfeldy Perth-Blair Atholl-Struan Lossiemouth-Elgin Aberdeen-Inverurie Aberdeen-Keith-Elgin (Local) Aberdeen-Fraserburgh Maud-Peterhead Fraserburgh-St. Combs Tillynaught-Banff Aberdeen-Ballater Aviemore-Craigellachie-Elgin Aviemore-Inverness-Elgin (Local) Georgemas Junction-Thurso Glasgow St. Enoch-Barrhead Glasgow St. Enoch-East Kilbride Glasgow St. Enoch-Kilmacolm Glasgow St. Enoch-Paisley West Coatbridge-Dumbarton Edinburgh Princes Street-Kingsknowe Glasgow Queen Street-Kirkintilloch Edinburgh Waverley-Musselburgh Ayr-Stranraer Inverness-Wick Inverness-Kyle of Lochalsh Doncaster-Leeds Central (Local) Selby-Goole York-Hull Hull-Hornsea Town Hull-Withernsea Driffield-Selby Leeds Central-Castleford Central-Pontefract Leeds City-Knottingley Wakefield-Goole Bradford Exchange-Batley-Wakefield Leeds Central-Pudsey-Bradford Exchange Bradford Exchange-MirfieId-Huddersfield (Local) Bradford Exchange-Halifax-Huddersfield (Local) Huddersfield-Clayton West-Penistone Leeds City and Bradford Forster Square-Ilkey-Skipton Leeds City and Bradford Forster Square-Keighley-Skipton (Local) Leeds City-Shipley-Bradford Forster Square (Local) Leeds City-Cudworth-Sheffield Midland (Local) Leeds City-Cross Gates-Micklefield (Local) Leeds City-Wetherby-Harrogate Wetherby-Church Fenton Malton-Whitby Middlesbrough-Guisborough Middlesbrough-Whitby-Scarborough York-Harrogate Leeds-Harrogate-Northallerton-Darlington Darlington-Richmond Darlington-Barnard Castle-Middleton-in-Teesdale Darlington-Bishop Auckland-Crook Sunderland-Durham-Bishop Auckland Sunderland-West Hartlepool (Local) Newcastle-on-Tyne-Washington Sunderland-South Shields Newcastle-on-Tyne-Hexham (Local) Newcastle-on-Tyne-Haltwhistle (Local) Newcastle-on-Tyne-Newbiggin Newsham-Blyth Monkseaton-Blyth-Newbiggin Newcastle-on-Tyne-Riverside-Tynemouth (Local) York-Sheffield Victoria-Nottingham Victoria-Leicester Central-Banbury Crewe-Warrington-Preston-Carlisle (Local) Dunstable North-Hatfield Wolverton-Newport Pagnell Buckingham-Bletchley Northampton Castle-Peterborough East Wellingborough Midland Road-Northampton Castle Seaton-Stamford Rugby Midland-Peterborough East Leamington Spa Avenue-Coventry-Nuneaton Trent Valley Derby Midland-Tamworth-Birmingham New Street (Local) Wolverhampton High Level-Burton-on-Trent Wellington-Shrewsbury (Local) Stafford-Wellington Crewe-Shrewsbury (Local) Crewe-Chester General (Local) Bangor-Afon Wen Chester General-Holyhead/Caernarvon (Local) Manchester Exchange-Warrington Bank Quay-Chester General (Local) Llandudno-Blaenau Ffestiniog Bangor-Amlwch Wrexham Central-Chester Northgate-New Brighton Liverpool Lime Street-Chester General Manchester Piccadilly-Buxton Stoke-on-Trent-Silverdale Kidsgrove-Etruria (Stoke Loop) Leek-Uttoxeter Stockport Edgeley-Stalybridge (Local) Liverpool Lime Street-Tyldesley-Patricroft-Manchester Exchange (Local) St Helens Shaw Street-Earlestown-Warrington Bank Quay Manchester Exchange-Huddersfield (Local) Wigan Wallgate-Fazakerley-Liverpool Exchange Wigan Central-Glazebrook Glazebrook-Stockport Tiviot Dale Blackpool North-Fleetwood Manchester Victoria-Bury-Bacup Manchester Victoria-Bury-Accrington-Colne Southport Chapel Street-Preston Earby-Barnoldswick Rose Grove-Todmorden Sellafield-Moor Row Ulverston-Lake Side (Windermere) Barrow-Whitehaven Carlisle-Penrith-Workington Oxenholme-Windermere (Local) Carlisle-Silloth Kettering-Leicester London Road (Local) Leicester London Road-Nottingham Midland (Local) Manchester Central-Chinley-Derby Midland (Local) Buxton-Millers Dale Banbury-Woodford Halse Manchester Central-Chinley-Hope-Sheffield Midland Kettering-Melton Mowbray-Nottingham Midland Nottingham Midland-Melton Mowbray Leicester London Road-Burton-on-Trent Leicester-Peterborough North Leicester London Road-Melton Mowbray Derby Friar Gate-Nottingham Victoria Derby Midland-Trent-Nottingham Midland (Local) Nottingham Midland-Worksop Derby Midland-Sheffield Midland (Local) Carnforth-Wennington Carlisle-Skipton London Broad Street-Richmond Watford Junction-Croxley Green Harrow and Wealdstone-Belmont Watford Junction-St Albans Abbey Walsall-Rugeley Trent Valley Birmingham New Street-Sutton Park-Walsall Walsall-Dudley Manchester Exchange-Tyldesley-Wigan North Western (Local) Manchester Exchange-Stalybridge-Greenfield Manchester Victoria-Newton Heath-Middleton Manchester Victoria-Horwich Liverpool Lime Street-St Helens-Wigan North Western Manchester Victoria-Bury Bolton Street Royton-Royton Junction Southport Chapel Street-Crossens Liverpool Exchange-Southport Chapel Street Lancaster Castle/Lancaster Green Ayre-Heysham Manchester Piccadilly-Hadfield/Glossop Manchester Piccadilly-Romiley-Hayfield/Macclesfield London St Pancras-Barking (Local) London Marylebone-Leicester Central-Nottingham Victoria Westerfield-Yarmouth South Town Shelford-Marks Tey Saxmundham-Aldeburgh Audley End-Bartlow Cambridge-St Ives-March Swaffham-Thetford Dereham-Wells-Next-The-Sea Sheringham-Melton Constable North Walsham-Mundesley-on-Sea Lincoln Central-Woodhall Junction-Firsby Firsby-Skegness Willoughby-Mablethorpe Lincoln St Marks-Nottingham Midland Barton-on-Humber-New Holland Town New Holland Pier-Cleethorpes (Local) Sheffield Midland-Nottingham Midland (Local) St Margarets-Buntingford Romford-Upminster Witham (Essex)-Maldon East and Heybridge Witham (Essex)-Braintree and Bocking Wivenhoe-Brightlingsea Peterborough North-Spalding-Grimsby Town Patney and Chirton-Holt Junction Chippenham-Calne Bath Green Park-Bournemouth West Bristol Temple Meads-Bath Green Park Taunton-Yeovil Pen Mill Taunton-Minehead Tiverton Junction-Tiverton Taunton-Barnstaple Junction Liskeard-Looe Lostwithiel-Fowey St Erth-St Ives (Cornwall) Kemble-Cirencester Town Kemble-Tetbury Gloucester Central-Hereford Porth-Maerdy Abercynon-Aberdare Barry-Bridgend Cardiff-Coryton Caerphilly-Senghenydd Bridgend-Treherbert Carmarthen-Aberystwyth Berkeley Road-Sharpness Worcester Shrub Hill-Bromyard Swan Village-Great Bridge Old Hill-Dudley Whitchurch (Salop)-Welshpool Ruabon-Morfa Mawddach/Barmouth Bala-Bala Junction Llanymynech-Llanfyllin West Drayton and Yiewsley-Staines West Bristol Temple Meads-Portishead Bristol Temple Meads-Avonmouth Dock Yatton-Clevedon Bristol Temple Meads-Patchway-Pilning Bristol Temple Meads-Clifton Down-Pilning Cardiff Clarence Road-Cardiff General Ashford (Kent)-Hastings Ashford (Kent)-New Romney Crowhurst-Bexhill West Haywards Heath-Seaford (Local) Three Bridges-Tunbridge Wells West Tonbridge-Brighton Tonbridge-Eastbourne Brighton-Horsham Guildford-Horsham Maiden Newton-Bridport Brockenhurst-Ringwood-Bournemouth Salisbury-Fordingbridge-Bournemouth Okehampton-Plymouth Barnstaple Junction-Ilfracombe Okehampton-Padstow Okehampton-Bude Barnstaple Junction-Torrington Yeovil Junction-Yeovil Town Chard Central-Chard Junction Axminster-Lyme Regis Seaton Junction-Seaton (Devon) Sidmouth Junction-Sidmouth Tipton St. John’s-Exmouth Exeter Central-Exmouth Bere Alston-Callington Halwill-Torrington Bodmin Road/Bodmin North-Wadebridge-Padstow Ryde Pier Head-Ventnor/Cowes Winchester City-Alton Portsmouth-Botley-Romsey/Andover Portsmouth-Netley-Southampton-Romsey/Andover (Local) Romsey-Andover Reading Southern-Guildford-Redhill-Tonbridge (Local) Clapham Junction-Kensington Olympia
Passenger services to be modified
Newcastle-on-Tyne-Berwick-upon-Tweed Hull-Selby-Leeds City Hull-Bridlington-Scarborough Leeds City-Morecambe-Heysham York-Wakefield Kirkgate-Sowerby Bridge-Manchester Victoria Newcastle-on-Tyne-Carlisle Alnmouth-Alnwick Oxford-Bletchley-Cambridge Birmingham New Street-Barnt Green Wrexham General-Chester General-Birkenhead Woodside Manchester Piccadilly-Macclesfield-Stoke-on-Trent Crewe-Derby Midland Manchester Victoria-Rochdale-Todmorden Bolton Trinity Street-Bury Knowsley Street-Rochdale Manchester Victoria-Wigan Wallgate-Southport Chapel Street Liverpool Central-Manchester Central Liverpool Central-Gateacre-Warrington Central Blackpool Central-Manchester/East Lancashire Liverpool Exchange-Ormskirk-Blackpool Central Carnforth-Barrow Birmingham New Street-Leicester London Road-Nottingham Midland Derby Midland-Nottingham Midland London Euston-Watford Junction London Broad Street-Watford Junction Birmingham New Street-Sutton Coldfield-Lichfield City Birmingham New Street-Redditch Manchester Oxford Road-Crewe Manchester Victoria-Rochdale/Oldham London St Pancras-Nottingham Midland Ipswich-Norwich (Local) Cambridge-Ely-King’s Lynn Bishops Stortford-Cambridge Ely-Norwich Cambridge-Ipswich Ely-Newmarket Norwich-Dereham-King’s Lynn Norwich-Sheringham Grantham-Boston Grantham-Nottingham Lincoln Central-Market Rasen-Cleethorpes Didcot-Swindon Swindon-Bath Spa-Bristol Temple Meads Bristol Temple Meads-Taunton Chippenham-Trowbridge-Westbury (Wilts) Reading General-Westbury (Wilts) Bristol Temple Meads-Bath Spa-Westbury (Wilts)-Weymouth Town Taunton-Exeter St Davids Exeter St Davids-Kingswear Plymouth-Penzance Par-Newquay (Cornwall) Cardiff General-Carmarthen Carmarthen-Neyland/Milford Haven Carmarthen-Fishguard Harbour Swindon-Kemble-Gloucester Central Cheltenham Spa-Cardiff General Whitland-Pembroke Dock Didcot-Oxford-Leamington Spa Oxford-Worcester Shrub Hill Stratford-on-Avon-Honeybourne Stourbridge-Worcester-Hereford Birmingham New Street-Worcester Shrub Hill Worcester Shrub Hill-Gloucester Eastgate Gloucester Eastgate-Bristol Temple Meads Shrewsbury-Welshpool-Aberystwyth Tunbridge Wells Central-Hastings Sheerness-on-Sea-Dover Priory (Local) Brighton-Ore (Local) Basingstoke-Salisbury Salisbury-Exeter Central Exeter Central-Okehampton Exeter Central-Barnstaple Junction
The effect on passenger services
Derailed: the complicity dividend
A retrospective on the shenanigans surrounding the Beeching Report
History has made heroes of the men who powered Britain’s economic and social revolution through the 18th and 19th centuries. Names that still inspire: Arkwright, Darby, Stephenson, Watt, Telford. More transitory and villainous was the notoriety bestowed on a few Government fall guys, hand-picked to turn the clocks back by decimating industries, only for anonymity to claim them again.
During his tenure at British Steel, Sir Ian MacGregor remorselessly shut plants and jettisoned people, preparing the ground for privatisation. He then took a wrecking ball to our coal mines, bringing regions to their knees. And yet, despite the chasm he left behind, few remember him – he has not forever become Murderous MacGregor, or something equally burning. It is perhaps unjust then that the contraction of Britain’s railway network a generation earlier is still, for many, attributable solely to an engineer and physicist, recruited from the private sector to drag the industry back into profitability – an ultimately futile task.
People have protective instincts towards the railways, even if they don’t use them. In the pre-digital age, they fitted neatly into the fabric of our towns and villages, earning favour as a bringer of employment, commodities and freedom. So we felt compelled to pin their demise on a wrong-doer, and we didn’t have far to look. It will only ever be “Beeching’s axe” that severed our branch lines and disenfranchised whole districts. That we were being royally seduced by the motor car’s independence was neither here nor there. That more than 3,000 miles of railway had been torn up in the 12 years preceding his infamous report is a reality of inconvenience. It was all down to Dr Beeching.
This was of course a game involving a hopelessly stacked deck: misleading data, crooked calculations, vested interests. It was classic politics. Everyone knew the outcome before the process had begun; it was just a case of contriving the evidence.
A railway platform
There’s no denying that Dr Richard Beeching had a very fine intellect. Gaining a First Class honours degree and PhD from London’s Imperial College, his early career was built around metallurgy, physics and mechanical engineering research. He spent the Second World War attached to the Ministry of Supply, working in the shell design section under Sir Ewart Smith, a former Chief Engineer with Imperial Chemical Industries. He joined the firm as Smith’s technical assistant in 1948, rising at pace through a series of analytical posts before, at the age of 40, being sent to Canada where he directed the construction and operation of a Terylene plant. Returning home, his talents secured him chairmanship of ICI’s Metals Division before joining the board as its Technical Director in 1957.
Smith played one more role in shaping Beeching’s professional future, recommending him to Tory Transport Minister Ernest Marples after Smith declined the offer of a seat on the working group seeking a way forward for the British Transport Commission. The BTC was in a parlous state, thanks largely to its overburdening bureaucracy and the financial black hole the railways had fallen into. The group’s chairman, Sir Ivan Stedeford, found Beeching an impressive character but locked horns with him over his belief that only drastic pruning could save the industry. This was however music to the ears of Marples who, in contravention of Parliamentary rules, had remained an 80% shareholder in the civil engineering company he had co-founded in 1948, which subsequently secured contracts for several major road schemes. Valued at upwards of £350,000, he eventually sold the shares to his wife.
Fall from grace
Early in the 20th century, the railway system peaked at 23,440 route miles. It had developed at a mind-boggling rate, overcoming daunting physical barriers to achieve almost omnipresence. But the emergence of road transport and the pounding it took during the Second World War left the network in a wretched state, in both physical and commercial terms. Under Clement Attlee’s Labour Government, the 1947 Transport Act made way for nationalisation, giving life to British Railways – operating name for the BTC’s Railway Executive – on 1st January 1948.
Established soon after was a Branch Lines Committee, putting down a marker that set the direction for the next 20 years. It operated under a straightforward remit: to close the least-used lines, based on the contention that some parts of the network would never pay and offered no great social value. But BR’s finances continued to haemorrhage, with an operating loss recorded in 1955. To eliminate this, a bold modernisation plan was developed with the goal of making the railways attractive again: faster speeds, greater reliability, more capacity. The £1.24 billion investment would bring electrification, renewed track and signalling, vast marshalling yards, new rolling stock and the replacement of steam with diesel and electric traction.
It was destined to fail as losses mounted, reaching £42 million in 1959. This though painted a distorted picture as much of that deficit was attributable to declining coal traffic. Operating costs had been substantially cut, meanwhile passenger receipts were rising. Some branch lines actually made money. But the die had been cast. By 1962, in public ownership the network had lost over 3,300 route miles. And the railway community was being decimated too, staff numbers falling by more than a quarter to 474,000. Over the same period, car and lorry mileage soared by 10% per year, fuelled latterly by the lifting of petrol rationing.
Radical solutions were sought to the railway’s tangled finances. Stedeford’s deliberations ran out of time, having heard evidence mostly from the road lobby. But against the odds, his committee found itself unwilling to endorse the line closure programme advocated by the Ministry. For rail, its verdict proved fair and largely benign, so much so that it was not made public. The modernisation plan, which Stedeford had recommended for review, was cut back, with investment on secondary and branch lines almost drying up altogether.
The 1962 Transport Act abolished the British Transport Commission, replacing it with a number of bodies amongst which was the British Railways Board. It went live on 1st January 1963. Appointed its first Chairman was Richard Beeching who had led the BTC for the previous 18 months. Controversy attended with his salary award. Whilst, at £24,000, it reflected his ICI pay, this was more than double that of any other nationalised industry’s head. Prime Minister Harold Macmillan only earned £14,000. Perceived as unjust, the sense of resentment against the Doctor intensified.
The Fifties’ cull of branch lines was not delivering results. Studies showed that it might have been cheaper to subsidise some of them, rather than opt for closure. Social benefits also emerged in favour of retention. Against this background, a noisy protest movement had formed, with the Railway Development Association adding to its volume. Professor E R Hondelink, a respected United Nations transport consultant, asserted that branch line losses were comparatively small and could be turned around through efficiencies, instead fingering bureaucracy and a bloated management structure for the railway’s ills.
But the Government was having none of it. The ’62 Act included provisions to limit the powers of the local Consultative Committees which held inquiries into closure proposals, removing the obligation to consider social and strategic factors. To deliver a transport revolution, the Government engineered an easier ride and launched a vigorous press campaign to silence its critics, ramping up the case against rural lines by attributing most of the industry’s losses to them. More would have to go.
The axeman cometh
Beeching’s much-anticipated report on The Reshaping of British Railways was first exposed to scrutiny on 27th March 1963. Amongst its highlights were the now familiar recommendations: 5,000 route miles closed to passengers and 2,363 stations shut. One third of the network was carrying just 1% of the traffic, he asserted. The least-used 50% of stations contributed only 2% of passenger revenues.
On digging deeper, the cold character of this profit and loss exercise revealed itself. Page after page of almost pure accountancy, such were his terms of reference. Social and economic benefits were disregarded; so too were the cost-saving measures that could have brought salvation for some lines.
Many conclusions were founded on passenger density figures collated as part of a major traffic census over a single week in April 1961. This disadvantaged lines into holiday resorts which were unsurprisingly quiet at this time. In a double whammy for them, the viability – or otherwise – of individual stations was determined through analysis of their ticket sale receipts during 1960, greatly handicapping places that people mostly travelled to, not from. Visitors to those holiday resorts would have far outnumbered locals heading the other way, but the revenue they brought did not count in their stations’ favour. The contributory value to the network of any station or route – perhaps as a feeder of commuters onto a main line – was discounted; they stood on their own feet or fell.
This approach effectively meant curtains for almost every branch line, depriving huge geographical areas of any rail service at all. And strategic routes would be lost too: the Waverley, the Great Central, the Settle & Carlisle, Stranraer-Dumfries. Through manipulation of the process and distortion of the figures, the case for tearing apart Britain’s railways had been set out. Accepted by the Government, Beeching’s “reshaping” prompted uproar beyond Westminster, especially in communities affected by the cuts. Rural bus services were often unreliable, running to a thin timetable and sometimes completely disappearing during winter months.
All was not lost though. In a surprising strategic blunder, Beeching’s report detailed a series of financial assumptions for route maintenance, signalling, stations and train movements – offset against income – supposedly to demonstrate the unviability of a hypothetical branch line operating an hourly service to stations two-and-a-half miles apart. The tipping point between profit and loss was, he claimed, about 17,000 weekly passengers. But what these assumptions actually revealed was a whitewash – they were all worst-case: low passenger revenues, no freight, unrealistic timetables, inflated running costs, no staff or signalling economies. With some effort, the break-even point could be halved in terms of passenger numbers. These skewed calculations were compounded by equally flawed suppositions supporting replacement buses. Beeching had inadvertently handed campaigners a stick with which to beat him and they did so with some relish.
Numbers game
Leading the opposition to the Fifties’ closures had been the Railway Development Association, founded in 1951. It fought a number of campaigns, most notably on the Isle of Wight where it hired a barrister and called witnesses to contest the BTC’s dubious figures. The most cogent challenge in the Sixties came from the Secretary of the newly-formed National Council on Inland Transport – a man with genuine experience of railway operations, something Beeching could only dream of.
Roger Calvert could see the cracks in the reshaping plan but the means of exploiting them – the Transport Users Consultative Committees – had been largely neutered by the 1962 Act. NCIT sought a legal mechanism to force the committees to examine lines’ finances, not just the question of hardship as was their revised theoretical scope. This came to a head at Buxton in May 1964 where the future of the line to Manchester was on the table. Calvert used Beeching’s own figures to dismantle those served up by British Railways, reducing the route’s projected £180,000 loss by 71%. Implementation of savings could allow it to turn a small profit. The Minister retreated, issuing a reprieve.
Calvert’s continued probing exposed a predictable truth: many threatened lines could cover their costs with modest operational changes, if they weren’t doing so already. Indeed a sizeable closure programme could actually cost BR money as main line and secondary routes lost the contributory revenue brought by the branches. The new order would not drive passengers onto subsided buses heading for a distant railhead; they’d end up buying a car.
It made little difference. In the immediate aftermath of the report’s publication, closures were halted while stock was taken. But as the 1964 General Election approached, they accelerated again, peaking that year as 1,058 route miles were done away with. Labour’s Harold Wilson secured a narrow victory on a ticket of halting the most significant closures until a national transport review had been concluded. As is often the case in politics, with power came forgetfulness.
Victim support
Beeching II, a promised report into The Development of the Major Trunk Routes, arrived on 16th February 1965. Avoiding the word “closure”, it made the case for actively developing 3,000 of the 7,500 miles “selected for retention” in the first report, an effective admission that just lopping branches off the network would not necessarily bring profit. Underpinning these latest proposals was Beeching’s assertion that too many corridors featured duplicating lines, in some cases as many as four. Instead traffic would be focussed onto nine key routes. But few took the report seriously – it was pushed to one side, as was Beeching; Wilson deciding against an extension of his contract. In June 1965, clutching a Life Peerage, ICI welcomed him back.
Labour forged ahead with the cuts, under pressure from the road lobby and parts of the civil service. Only when Barbara Castle took Ministerial control in December 1965 were the brakes gradually applied. She concluded that the network should be stabilised at around 11,000 route miles, unveiling Network for Development plans and paving the way for socially-important loss-making lines to benefit from subsidies through the 1968 Transport Act. Whilst this saved some branches, most had already gone.
On the evening of Sunday 5th January 1969, blocked by protestors and running two hours late, a London-bound sleeper train travelled over the Waverley for a final time – the last great casualty of the Beeching cuts. Amongst the wreckage were several unlikely survivors – the Far North and Kyle of Lochalsh lines, the South-West branches, the route through mid-Wales; even the Settle-Carlisle. But a stay of execution for the Hope Valley line would see the Bakewell route sacrificed, eventually taking down Woodhead.
Beeching was not a romantic. His mind was keen and methodical, just what the Government wanted. Circumstances had contrived a balance sheet conundrum so he sought solutions amongst the numbers. Data was gathered and he immersed himself in it. What he didn’t see – or perhaps chose not to – was the intricacy of the railway machine, one part driving another; a precision instrument in careful balance. Instead he took a hammer to it.
Beyond ignorance lurked dogma and conspiracy. The railway was knackered and becoming a bottomless pit; roads were new and shiny – the next big thing – and those with a vested interest in having more of them would not be thwarted. No-one thought to look 30, 40, 50 years hence to a time when the two might comfortably coexist, supporting one-another. Who could have foreseen congestion and fuel prices pushing commuters back onto the train? It was all very short term.
But it’s harsh to define Beeching’s legacy in terms of the closures. He cared about the railway and contributed much to it, championing its role in moving bulk minerals and developing the Liner Train concept for containerised freight. There will always be the photographs though -melancholy scenes of dilapidated stations and overgrown trackbeds, redundant engines quietly rusting, tunnels bricked up, villagers huddling under brollies to await the daily bus.
The man himself categorised the cuts as “surgery, not mad chopping”. They were certainly clinical, both in concept and execution. But there was nothing cosmetic about them. This was frantic amputation without a firm diagnosis. The wounds inflicted by Beeching have not yet fully healed.
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