What if the Beeching Axe never happened?

[Bittern]

I've been thinking about this recently, actually, and it could be a very interesting topic to speculate about. It raises so many questions such as "What would our railway network be like today had the axe never occured?", "Would British Rail have been privatized"? etc.

This comes to mind recently having been hunting down the history of railways in South Lanarkshire and the Glasgow area. I've been attempting to trace the route the North British Railway took through Hamilton to the viaduct remains over the Clyde at Blantyre. I wonder, if Beeching never rose to power, would that line, and many others like it, still be in existance?

 

[Geezertronic]

Sort of covered in:

http://www.railforums.co.uk/showthread.php?t=30670
http://www.railforums.co.uk/showthread.php?t=30130

 

[Moodster020]

I've been thinking about this recently, actually, and it could be a very interesting topic to speculate about. It raises so many questions such as "What would our railway network be like today had the axe never occured?", "Would British Rail have been privatized"? etc.

This comes to mind recently having been hunting down the history of railways in South Lanarkshire and the Glasgow area. I've been attempting to trace the route the North British Railway took through Hamilton to the viaduct remains over the Clyde at Blantyre. I wonder, if Beeching never rose to power, would that line, and many others like it, still be in existance?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4wvoO5phs-8

 

[daikilo]

Beeching did the job he was asked to do. It was a mix of short- and medium-term. It probably did not include the 1972 fuel price crisis nor traffic growth to the figures we have today.

I think the real question should be "what pre-Beeching lines would have been profitable* today if they had remained open". Probably a few. Accurate forecasting of travel patterns 50 years ahead is impossible.

* with local or national financial support if appropriate

 

[Bittern]

I'm not asking if you think Beeching did the right thing or what pre-Beeching lines would have been profitable". I'm asking what do you think the network would be like today had the Axe never happened.

 

[LE Greys]

Possibilities:
The Great Central would have been electrified in the 1970s or 80s, with the Woodhead converted to 25kV a.c. In the early 1990s, it would have received the third batch of Class 91s, allowing 125 mph running for the first time. Today, it would be the only main line carrying Regional Eurostar services, reached by a new chord at West Hampstead.
The Waverley route would have become a major part of Scotrail, and today we might see Carlisle-Aberdeen or Carlisle-Inverness services.
The Somerset and Dorset might well survive as one of the main railtour routes.

Additionally:
Places such as Woodford Halse would have a proper service, and would not have withered away as they did.

However:
We would not have the preserved lines we have today.
We would probably not have as many preserved steam locomotives, since they would not be needed to work the preserved lines.

Curious.

 

[jopsuk]

If the Beeching Axe had never happened, I reckon there would still have been some level of rationalisation- there closures before and after Beeching, and the network had far too many tiny stub branches. For instance, in the county I grew up in, I reckon the Alloa-Dumfermline line would have remained open (and become an important link), and possibly the Devon Valley railway, but the Alva branch line would have close to passengers at the very least.

However, I think mass electrification would really have required that to have been the thinking back when the 1955 Modernisation Plan was drawn up- if, rather the rush to dieselisation, a longer phase out of steam had been proposed, with more lines going directly from steam to electric. Such a strategy would have meant a different philosophy in the management of the railways, and so Dr Beeching may never even have become involved with BR. Who knows. It might have meant we ended up with less motorways, or with a toll system similar to the French autoroutes.

 

[wintonian]

A question I have often thought of; which lines that closed under Beeching would still be open? And thus which lines would have been closed since? Assuming we put a plan in for rationalisation today.

 

[WatcherZero]

I think the massive losses would have continued and they would have saved money by keeping rolling stock around even longer. Never mind 30 year old we would be using 50 year old+ today. Other countries manage to run with ancient rolling stock.

 

[CarterUSM]

I'm of the opinion there would have been rationalisation anyway, many routes were too similar and served the same locales. For instance the north british route you mention was closely mirrored to a large extent by the caledonian railway. Like you however, i'm very interested in the old railways of lanarkshire and to a certain extent glasgow too. I find it fascinating that strathaven had 3 stations at one time, and also perplexing that east kilbride's station wasn't relocated or the rails extended to the various neighbourhoods in the town as it was being built.

 

[kennethw]

closures of the network occurred both before and after Beeching eg on the Isle of Wight lines to Bembridge, Ventnor west, Merstone and Freshwater all had gone before Beeching, but it was a pig in a python effect, and one of the most affected areas was Devon, where the withdrawal of summer holiday traffic from the earstwhile LSWR to the GWR sealed the fate of much of that system, lines to Bude, Ilfracombe, Padstow and Exeter - Okehampton - Plymouth all going, had Beeching had all his own way there would be no Exeter - Salisbury or Plymouth - Penzance & associated branch lines.

 

[DJ_K666]

I don't think Beeching envisaged the loss of freight in the 1980s either. He had already gone when the oil crisis happened. Not that the replacements were much cop.

 

[LE Greys]

I reckon Padstow might have stood a chance of survival as a branch from Bodmin Parkway. Bude as a branch on its own is unlikely, but possible. Places such a Aldeborough on the other side of the country might also have survived with proper management, as a destination from London rather than a stumpy branch line. Lymington is a similar size, but has a ferry service so is not a fair comparison. Hunstanton was closed years after Beeching, but might not have done so if many other coastal branches had not closed.

If Beeching had looked as contributory revenue and done a proper survey over at least one year, he might have concluded that the contributory revenue from passengers going to the holiday branches would outweigh the cost of keeping them open. Perhaps he was simply no good at data collection. Calculating the contribution of people going to a station needs masses of data volume, but it is possible. When they introduced APTIS, the data was available in moments, but the Edmundson system probably couldn't handle it.

 

[ivanhoe]

We would have been left with a bankrupt Industry! Probably a lot slimmer than what it is now.

 

[Moog_1984]

Possibilities:
....with the Woodhead converted to 25kV a.c.
The Waverley route would have become a major part of Scotrail, and today we might see Carlisle-Aberdeen or Carlisle-Inverness services.
The Somerset and Dorset might well survive as one of the main railtour routes.


However:
We would not have the preserved lines we have today.
We would probably not have as many preserved steam locomotives, since they would not be needed to work the preserved lines.

Curious.

Woodhead was killed off far later than Beeching and it was water that did it: the porous limestone means it would need to be bored out half it's diameter again and an inner jacket put inside a n outer with a major drainage scheme. Not a bad route though. Ironically it seems to bare what looks like some 33kv lines today but they are well insulated!

Would the rather lovely Smokey and Dusty ( S&D) have enough population along it and enough people going over the country that way to be sensible? Doubt it. Would have made a great preserved route juding by a couple of films I have seen about it.

With the advent of the car-at-every-driveway and the whole road lobby, if it hadn't have been Beechings it would have been some one else and the more economically important routes would have suffered from the costs of the larger, lower income network.

Funnily enough, probably mentioned in one of the threads above, the transport minister who commissioned the beechings report had a brother in law. He was the CFO at Tarmac, the largest road construction company in the UK at the time. Cronie-ism was invented long before any thatcher or blair government!

While I have a beer: I wonder if beeching's report is the first instance of a UK government using an external consultant to deliver a much worse scenario and then the "kind old UK government" see fit to use: they then decide not go through with the harsh measures, a compromise, completely fabricated, and thus acheiveing a far bigger cut back than they would have got by normal parliamentary debate!

 

[yorksrob]

Yes, this is always a good one to ponder. I suppose that had Beeching and Marples never arrived on the scene, it's pretty certain that the gradual thinning out of the network which had been taking place since the 1920's would have continued. Presumably the whole process would have been slower, which would have hopefully left us with a denser network by the time passenger usage began to pick up in the 1980's. Also hopefully some of the cost saving rather than closure measures might have been developed in time to save some of them. On the other hand with the economic situation as it was in the 1970's they may have all got the chop anyway!

 

[Metroland]

Only the British did Beeching. Yes, there has been closures elsewhere, but there have been a lot of new lines too.

Indeed, a little known fact is there are now more rail line miles worldwide that at any time in history: 851,764 miles. The United States has the most mileage.

Passenger traffic has held up well in most countries, apart from the United states.

Freight traffic has also held up well in most countries, apart from in the UK and Europe.

India and China are the biggest users or rail by passenger journeys, but per capita Japan is the highest. Switzerland is also high.

In the UK our main lines are busier than they ever were, indeed that are no more passenger on the railways apart from the 1947 post war boom. Freight has declined by over 1/2, but there is 40% less network and a lot less heavy industry.

What really declined after the war is Bus traffic, walking and cycling. The railways real enemy is the truck, not the car or plane like very often painted. As it was freight that allowed them to traditionally make profits. Although Buses did finish off branch lines as early as the 30s!

The UK tends to suffer from years of underinvestment, and I would argue, at least until recently, a political and educational bias against rail.

In fact I remember when I was doing A levels around 1990, my geography teacher was openly encouraging people to write about the virtues of a new motorway, which many took up, and mocked me for writing about the railways, and in the end I had a write an essay on Beeching.

 

[Helvellyn]

I suppose another factor to consider is that if there had been no Beeching there would have been more rail lines to pick up the slack when the road building schemes started to hit the blocks in the 1970s! Some routes though were closed to facilitate road schemes, e.g. Penrith to Keswick closed in the early 1970s with plans to use the trackbed for the A66 trans-pennine route. The Keswick to Cockermouth section had closed earlier and a section of its track bed had been used for the A66.

I think routes like the Waverley and Great Central might have survived without Beeching, albeit greatly rationalised (a bit like Salisbury to Exeter). Other through routes like Uckfield-Lewes and Alton-Winchester might also have survived, as a strategic importance might have helped them survive rather.

Beeching also made high profile closures easier to justify, e.g the Woodhead route. It wasn't until BR's protracted battle to close the S&C in the 1980s that the tide really started to turn against line closures.

 

[yorksrob]

In fact I remember when I was doing A levels around 1990, my geography teacher was openly encouraging people to write about the virtues of a new motorway, which many took up, and mocked me for writing about the railways, and in the end I had a write an essay on Beeching.

He must be rubbing his leather elbow patches with amazement at the recent upturn in passenger numbers

 

[daikilo]

I'm not asking if you think Beeching did the right thing or what pre-Beeching lines would have been profitable". I'm asking what do you think the network would be like today had the Axe never happened.

Given what Maggie Thatcher did to the coal mines, it's not impossible that the nearly entire rail network would have disappeared.

I am not convinced that the rapid switch steam to Diesel/Electric was right, nor Beeching nor privatisation. The fact is that when I was involved in forecasting our UK rail network in the early 1970s, none came out with what we have today.

But then, none had fuel at current prices, by a factor of at least 2, and none had the current level of government support by a factor of (well as I understood we were targeting at worst net neutral contribution for the network).

Time has moved on. Beeching's deeds are done.

We now need to focus on how to get UK Rail to where the population wants it to be in 2020, 2030, ...

 

[yorksrob]

We now need to focus on how to get UK Rail to where the population wants it to be in 2020, 2030, ...

Personally I think there needs to be a concerted effort by central government to protect and re-open some of the more notorious missing links in England.

It's always interesting to play "what if" though .......

 

[Metroland]

He must be rubbing his leather elbow patches with amazement at the recent upturn in passenger numbers

Well, they were rising at the time and it was a she. I suspect all the students got top marks writing that the motorway was going to be the best thing since sliced bread, much of that turned on its head in the 90s by SACTRA. The same students would have probably got top marks for the economics essays, where a lot of the assumptions there have been proven to be shaky at best.

But that's me all over, I always did back the underdog, and get deeply suspicious of received wisdom in the education system, the media and culture.

 

[DaveNewcastle]

India and China are the biggest users or rail by passenger journeys, but per capita Japan is the highest.

Just some trivia which is connected to these facts - IIRC, the 3 largest employers in the whole world are: 1st The Chinese Army, 2nd the Indian Railways, 3rd the UK's NHS.


Anyone know why Beeching was always referred to as "Doctor Beeching" rather than "Richard Beeching" ? (His doctorate was only in engineering or physics or something like that)

 

[daikilo]

Personally I think there needs to be a concerted effort by central government to protect and re-open some of the more notorious missing links in England.

It's always interesting to play "what if" though .......

Maybe, if you like mental torment.

Trying to play with the alternative solutions to the past is irrelevant for the hard future derived from now.

What matters today is how UKRail evolves into the future, especially as I believe it is already way ahead of Beechings predictions.

For me the issue is how to attract sufficient finance and from whom.

One thing is certain for me: one day, private transport will not exist other than for a select few. 2040?, 2060?
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

Just some trivia which is connected to these facts - IIRC, the 3 largest employers in the whole world are: 1st The Chinese Army, 2nd the Indian Railways, 3rd the UK's NHS.


Anyone know why Beeching was always referred to as "Doctor Beeching" rather than "Richard Beeching" ? (His doctorate was only in engineering or physics or something like that)

Excellent question. I suspect he imposed this on himself through his scalpel acts, as I can find no trace of individuals with similar qualifications who chose such a title.

 

[Bittern]

<SNIP>

I don't understand what your problem is. The thread was just a "what if". A bit of fun. A chance to look back and wonder. If you don't like it, then don't post in it. Simple.

 

[daikilo]

I don't understand what your problem is. The thread was just a "what if". A bit of fun. A chance to look back and wonder. If you don't like it, then don't post in it. Simple.

Do you mean that you prefer to dream of what the past was not rather than face the hard ánd explained facts? As you like.

I will continue to post with ideas and comments to take us into the next "railway age" as I believe there is one in development, and with expected results far sooner than many think.

 

[kennethw]

Beeching was an accountant with ICI and one of the national papers never let BR forget that he demanded that they equalled his salary of £20K. He simply ordered a head count and those lines not having sufficient passenger numbers were nominated for the chop - the dreaded appendix 2. Ever since nationalisation British Railways were losing money and it was decided that economies had to be made. Accusations were made as to the reliability of some statistics, whether they were accurate Incidentally another report was made in 1983 recommended that the network be reduced to around 2,000 miles. One problem reopening long closed lines is that bits tend to have been sold off, in fact at one time Railtrack seemed to be doing more in property dealing.
I agree that the hasty dieselisation was not the beast way forward. OVS Bullied thought it better to retain steam with electrification being the long term goal. BR became the butt of jokes regarding unreliability etc, have just put up another post re Gerry Fiennes' I Tried to Run a Railway when GM at Paddington the WR was one of the first regions to go diesel, and the entire fleet of Westerns and Hymeks had to be grounded due to flawed axles - "Why the h--l can't people build axles today, George Stephenson could?" Going back to Beeching, he also said that the closure of the West country branches would go ahead as the MP's were all Tory and voted aye to Beeching

 

[bluebottle]

Just some trivia which is connected to these facts - IIRC, the 3 largest employers in the whole world are: 1st The Chinese Army, 2nd the Indian Railways, 3rd the UK's NHS.


Anyone know why Beeching was always referred to as "Doctor Beeching" rather than "Richard Beeching" ? (His doctorate was only in engineering or physics or something like that)

Well, you've answered your own question there. He had a doctorate therefore he was entitled to be referred to as Dr Beeching.

 

[Metroland]

Correct. Anyone with a doctorate (the best known being a PHD) is entitled to add that to their name. A doctorate is the highest academic qualification available, and is recognised worldwide. It takes another 4-5 years over a standard honours degree and costs around £100,000. Some doctorates are 'honorary' and are awarded for services to a particular field, and sometimes well known celebrities are given these.

You can take doctorates in most subjects, including transport.

A doctor is the medical sense reflects the long study time it takes - about 7-8 years.

 

[DaveNewcastle]

Well, you've answered your own question there. He had a doctorate therefore he was entitled to be referred to as Dr Beeching.

I quite agree, and have never doubted his right.

What isn't so clear is why the title was universally used by the press and by the public at large - it is not so usual for the holder of a PhD to be referred to exclusively as Doctor by the press, (unless they're a Doctor of medicine).

My query is directed at the popular usage of the title "Doctor Beeching", and not at his entitlement.

I wonder if he became known as Doctor Beeching while he worked in industry, perhaps in recognition of his scientific qualifications which differentiated him from lesser qualified colleagues working alongside him.