Has there been any attempt to create a timelapse map of the UK railways over time?

[SouthBedfordsh]

I came across this map https://www.railmaponline.com/uk-and-irish-railways.html which shows the old railways. Has there been any attempt to show the growth and decline of the network over time?

That would be a very interesting thing to see displayed visually. How much impact the Beeching Cuts had and so on?

Thank you.

 

[alxndr]

A quick search has brought up this

 

[SouthBedfordsh]

A quick search has brought up this

Thank you.

 

[DelW]

I came across this map https://www.railmaponline.com/uk-and-irish-railways.html which shows the old railways. Has there been any attempt to show the growth and decline of the network over time?

That would be a very interesting thing to see displayed visually. How much impact the Beeching Cuts had and so on?

Thank you.

I've often thought that it would be useful to have a digital railway map that could be set to any year, to show the actual network in that year. For instance, it took me quite a while to realise that some of the lines that are now quite important actually opened as late as the start of the 20th century, examples being Reading - Taunton via the B&H, and London - Banbury via High Wycombe (although both incorporated parts of some earlier branches). Being able to see what was, and indeed what wasn't there at any time in the Victorian era would be very interesting.

I remember finding the video above, but I've never found a detailed static map with the facility.

 

[norbitonflyer]

A quick search has brought up this

fascinating.

The map shows stations rather than lines, so some apparent gaps in the network, for instance in the Highlands, are just where tghere is a long gap between stations

The "railway Mania" of the 1840s shows up well. A bit of thinningb out started in WW1, but a few more came back in the 1920s

What surprised me was the quite sudden thinning out in the 1930s - notoceable although not as great as that in the 1960s.

 

[eldomtom2]

I've often thought that it would be useful to have a digital railway map that could be set to any year, to show the actual network in that year. For instance, it took me quite a while to realise that some of the lines that are now quite important actually opened as late as the start of the 20th century, examples being Reading - Taunton via the B&H, and London - Banbury via High Wycombe (although both incorporated parts of some earlier branches). Being able to see what was, and indeed what wasn't there at any time in the Victorian era would be very interesting.

I remember finding the video above, but I've never found a detailed static map with the facility.

https://openrailwaymap.app supports this feature, but its dataset via the OpenHistoricalMap project is very incomplete (it doesn't have the track-level detail of its present-day data, and you have to zoom in to see most lines because they aren't marked as "main" or "branch"). A useful project would be for someone to work through the public domain maps available on the NLS site etc. and improve it...

 

[Gloster]

What surprised me was the quite sudden thinning out in the 1930s - notoceable although not as great as that in the 1960s.

A combination of various connected factors:

- The worldwide slump following the Wall Street Crash of 1929 and its economic effect in the UK.
- The rise of the motor vehicle following The Great War and eventual catching up of the road network.
- The rationalisations following the Grouping of 1923 belatedly taking place.

 

[Shaw S Hunter]

A combination of various connected factors:

- The worldwide slump following the Wall Street Crash of 1929 and its economic effect in the UK.
- The rise of the motor vehicle following The Great War and eventual catching up of the road network.
- The rationalisations following the Grouping of 1923 belatedly taking place.

To which should be added lines that should never have been built in the first place, ie were highly speculative or an attempt to compete with another company in too thin a market.

The 1930s are sometimes called the Golden Age of British railways: whilst technological advances were certainly notable in reality the financial/commercial high point occurred in the years before WW1. It has been a decline ever since though disguised to many by the provision of public subsidies and post-Beeching politics have kept further closures largely off the agenda.

 

[etr221]

A quick search has brought up this

The underlying data for the map video is 'StopsGB: Structured Timeline of Passenger Stations in Great Britain' - see https://bl.iro.bl.uk/entities/product/56ff09f0-db5b-4ca9-8389-cfa362d5f46b , and links from there, and the YouTube page, for details and credits. This is essentially a conversion (automated) of Michael Quick’s book ‘Railway Passenger Stations in GB’, see https://rchs.org.uk/railway-passenger-stations-in-great-britain-a-chronology/ to machine processable form for historo-statistical purposes.

Having had a quick look, I have a certain wariness over it - it could probably do with a manual go through to check things (but at over 9000 entries, I'm not exactly enthused).

 

[alxndr]

The underlying data for the map video is 'StopsGB: Structured Timeline of Passenger Stations in Great Britain' - see https://bl.iro.bl.uk/entities/product/56ff09f0-db5b-4ca9-8389-cfa362d5f46b , and links from there, and the YouTube page, for details and credits. This is essentially a conversion (automated) of Michael Quick’s book ‘Railway Passenger Stations in GB’, see https://rchs.org.uk/railway-passenger-stations-in-great-britain-a-chronology/ to machine processable form for historo-statistical purposes.

Having had a quick look, I have a certain wariness over it - it could probably do with a manual go through to check things (but at over 9000 entries, I'm not exactly enthused).

I may still have Quicks in a spreadsheet actually… myself and a couple of other volunteers transcribed it to make it more accessible for a YouTube channel. I might try and do something with it if I get time. The biggest issue will be the georeferencing. I did briefly try manually plotting them on a map but I don’t think I ever made it through all the “Aber____”s… there’s very little information on some of the shorter lived Halts.

 

[etr221]

I may still have Quicks in a spreadsheet actually… myself and a couple of other volunteers transcribed it to make it more accessible for a YouTube channel. I might try and do something with it if I get time. The biggest issue will be the georeferencing. I did briefly try manually plotting them on a map but I don’t think I ever made it through all the “Aber____”s… there’s very little information on some of the shorter lived Halts.

Thanks. If you could make your spreadsheet available, that would be great, one way or another, that would be great.

As to Georeferencing, I would regard it as a 'nice to have' rather than something essential. The StopsGB project did document their process/source (follow the link I quoted for details), based I think on the localities from Quick - it didn't strike me as very robustly precise or accurate. Alternatively 'British Railway Stations since 1901 (Paul Smith and Sally Salmon)' quotes OS NGRs.

 

[JKF]

I think it would be interesting to have a map that could change by date which would have different colours for lines representing the following dataset:

Lines in passenger use
Lines in freight use
Mineral lines (I.e not public railway - colliery tramways etc.)
Lines extant but not in use
Disused rail formation (intact)
Disused rail formation (obliterated)

The latter would be for where there is no trace of the line remaining, e.g. built over or things like removed viaducts or infilled tunnels.

I can see how this would be a mammoth project requiring many volunteers to research the information, and difficult especially for example dating when formation was lifted or built over - probably not able to get it down to a single day in most cases but an approximation would be good.

 

[etr221]

I think it would be interesting to have a map that could change by date which would have different colours for lines representing the following dataset:

Lines in passenger use
Lines in freight use
Mineral lines (I.e not public railway - colliery tramways etc.)
Lines extant but not in use
Disused rail formation (intact)
Disused rail formation (obliterated)

The latter would be for where there is no trace of the line remaining, e.g. built over or things like removed viaducts or infilled tunnels.

I can see how this would be a mammoth project requiring many volunteers to research the information, and difficult especially for example dating when formation was lifted or built over - probably not able to get it down to a single day in most cases but an approximation would be good.

For completeness it would also need lines complete but not yet opened (thinking of EWR!), under construction, authorised (to what level? Some lines were authorised (up to a point) for years before being proceeded with or - perhaps more often - abandoned) or proposed (with what degree of seriousness?)