British Rail: A New History

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The majority of pages are undamaged with some creasing or tearing, and pencil underlining of text, but this is minimal. In this comprehensive history, Colin Maggs, one of the country's foremost railway historians, tells the story of over 400 years of British railway history. Using the trains in Great Britain is a difficult and often frustrating experience for many; following the privatisation of the railways in the 1990s, passengers are often treated to confusing timetables, frequent delays and ever-increasing fares. Their main replacements were diesel locomotives, with electrification proceeding painfully slowly (still today, when rail is heralded as a green alternative, only some 40 per cent of lines are electrified). Some of the best parts of his book come in the sidelights, as when he describes the special trains laid on for hop pickers (along with the unfortunate consequences), or when he explains the use of slip coaches – carriages detached from a rake at speed and allowed to drift into a station under their own momentum, letting the rest of the train proceed without stopping.

By the mid 1990s BR was an efficient and integrated nation wide organisation which cost a lot less to run than its European counterparts.

Stale sandwiches, inefficiency, and violent yellow carriages- we haven't looked kindly on the last of our state-owned organizations to be privatized. Wolmar holds up some hope for the planned formation of Great British Railways, an oversight body taking in most of Britain's railways - but since the book was written, that too seems to be suffering from government mishandling.

Choose from vintage Underground posters, personalised t-shirts and mugs and models of classic London buses and trains.By using the Web site, you confirm that you have read, understood, and agreed to be bound by the Terms and Conditions. In British Rail: A New History, Wolmar argues that, despite its many imperfections, Britain’s railway in the postwar period was a responsive and forward-thinking organization, maintaining that it was a “victim of its history and of the whim of politicians who had little understanding about its achievements and, indeed, its real failings” (xv). The first half examines the newly nationalized industry through postwar austerity, arguing that it suffered from an “inheritance” of materials from World War II that made managing the “asset-heavy industry” difficult (55). And I would have liked to have seen more detail, for example, of the seating, food provided in the dining cars and suchlike. So many mistakes made and just when BR largely had it correct, an extremely messy privatisation process that was ill thought out was fostered upon it.

Having enjoyed reading Christian Wolmar's book about the London Underground (The Subterranean Railway), I had pretty high expectations for this book, and overall, I was not disappointed.Details of accidents and other incidents are included almost randomly it seems, but with little or no context or explanations of the consequent implications for operating practices. Some of the most well-known chairpersons, in particular Peter Parker and Robert Reid, confidently reorganized and restructured British Rail. I certainly have vague memories of British Rail and of course the iconic double arrow logo still lives on today. It goes a long way to dispel the popular image of British Rail in politics and the media as a bloated state run agency, providing poor service and value for money.

The bottom line, or cost, was always foremost, with railway managers under constant pressure to make savings while starved of the investment they required to make the improvements necessary to turn the system around. Wolmar is fair in his dissection of Beeching noting that along with the poorly thought through hatchet job he instigated against the network there were many key issues including the operation of uneconomic seasonal services, the common carrier albatros, and freight traffic more generally that required attention. If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. A worthy scholarly work that sometimes it feels like British Rail telling its story in its own words. The Author provides a very readable history as to how British Rail got to this position after having struggled through nearly 40+ turbulent years of fighting against cuts to the system.This is an excellent account of the history of British Rail and ultimately the making and breaking of a national institution. No maps, diagrams or photos to illustrate the text, which is made all the worse for poor descriptive writing. The laissez faire way in which the unplanned railway madness of the Victorian era led to a network far from fit for purpose left an eternal legacy for the railway managers who followed.