Doctor Beeching's cuts

[Yuanls]

This is a thread on Dr Beeching and what he did to the railways in Britain. Please feel free to comment and critisise.

 

[Peter Mugridge]

Old quack Beeching had an axe
E-I-E-I-O
And on that axe he had an edge
E-I-E-I-O
Chop chop here
Chop chop there
Chop chop everywhere
Old quack Beeching had an axe
E-I-E-I-O



From the above, you can probably gather that in my opinion while a few cuts were justified, he went far too far with the whole process; it wasn't just him either - we must remember that there were several other villains of the piece spread across governments of both political shades.

 

[muddythefish]

Beeching was the frontman. Ernest Marples was the real villain. Do some research on his antics. If he were around today he would be behind bars.

 

[Bevan Price]

Beeching was the frontman. Ernest Marples was the real villain. Do some research on his antics. If he were around today he would be behind bars.

The tale is a bit of a long read, but this link tells you more about Marples and the Beeching closures:

http://ecologics.wordpress.com/2010/02/17/financial-scandal-corruption-and-censorship-part-3/

 

[MidnightFlyer]

muddythefish - Indeed. From what I can remember of the research I had to do into it (6,000 word Literature Review, what a joy that was ), Beeching basically just did the job he was tasked with. Nothing he found had to be adhered to: it was at the prerogative and mercy of the government ministers, like Marples and Castle, what did or did not happen.

 

[Harpers Tate]

...with Castle (Lab.) more directly responsible than any one other person. Contrary to her party's election manifesto to stop the cuts, once in place she consented to more closures than anyone else before or since.

 

[steamybrian]

This is a highly debatable subject but I will add my comments.
Firstly- I am probably among a small number of readers of this forum travelling around the system in the 1960s visiting lines before they closed.
I agree that Ernest Marples was the real villain and was looking after the road lobby and his road building company Marples/Ridgeway. The report was poorly thought out without thought for social need, future housing development. The idea of reducing lines/stations to a basic railway was not considered until about 1965/1966 after many stations had closed. In my opinion about one third of stations that were listed in the report should be closed, about one third which closed should never have closed and about third have survived.
The only defence I can offer for the "Beeching Report" was that a number of stations/lines were unprofitable and it was amazing they were still open in 1963. In 1963 many stations were gas or oil lit, steam locos were still around in abundance. We can all look bleary eyed at nostalgia and many heritage railways portray the atmosphere of pre-1963 but with volunteer staff and better marketing/publicity
Today a case could be made for closing about 20 stations on todays network however readers could prepare a case for opening 20 new stations.

 

[muddythefish]

...with Castle (Lab.) more directly responsible than any one other person. Contrary to her party's election manifesto to stop the cuts, once in place she consented to more closures than anyone else before or since.

Barbara Castle introduced the concept of the "social railway" that led to many lives being saved. The Labour government of the time carried through what seemed inevitable at the time - the running down of a old-fashioned and declining railway system that was losing passengers and freight traffic, and investing in the expansion of the bright new shiny motor industry and motorways.

If you want to go down the political route you could say the Beeching cuts were an ideologically driven exercise by a Tory party that has always disliked state enterprises. Twenty years later the Thatcher and Major govts sold off more state-owned industries and 20 years on we have had over the past few years another rightwing administration slashing the NHS in the guise of "patient choice" and huge cuts to public services.

 

[Wyvern]

we have had over the past few years another rightwing administration slashing the NHS in the guise of "patient choice" and huge cuts to public services.

And dont be fooled by UKIP hearty man-in-the-pub charm. Look at its members all tories too extreme even for Cameron.

 

[Spamcan81]

...with Castle (Lab.) more directly responsible than any one other person. Contrary to her party's election manifesto to stop the cuts, once in place she consented to more closures than anyone else before or since.

Yes I can remember the "no more major rail closures" pledge. Then we saw the GC, S&D, Waverley and Cambridge - Oxford routes closed. If they weren't major closures i don't know what were.

 

[thewiltog]

This is a thread on Dr Beeching and what he did to the railways in Britain. Please feel free to comment and critisise.

A while ago I went through Quick looking at station closing dates (England and Wales only). This is a summary of that data:-

Closed after nationalisation but before Beeching (1947-1963) - 1,834
In Beeching appendix A and closed (1964-1974) - 371
In Beeching appendix A and not closed (1964-1974) - 35
In Beeching appendix B and closed (1964-1974) - 1,060
In Beeching appendix A and not closed (1964-1974) - 431
Closed 1964-1974, not in Beeching - 191

Very few stations closed after 1974. Stations that later re-opened are counted as closed.

Beeching Appendix A lists stations considered for closure before the report was written. Many had closed before it was published.
Appendix B is the stations Beeching proposed to close.

I'm sure there are a few errors, but these figures should be accurate enough for discussion purposes.

 

[Harpers Tate]

Marple and his appointee Beeching did the ground work for sure - made proposals and cases. But, ultimately, services could only be withdrawn with the consent of the minister. Thus there is only one person culpable and that is the person whose signature approved the closures.

I do not for one minute believe that NOTHING should have been closed. But equally, I do not believe that everything that was closed was closed for good or valid reason. And there is no question that it was Castle's signature that saw more closures - valid and invalid - than anyone else.

 

[muddythefish]

Comprehensive education was introduced by the Labour government in the 1960s, but despite the Conservative governments of the 1970s abolishing the compulsion on local authorities to convert, more comprehensive schools were established under then education secretary Margaret Thatcher than any other education secretary.

Could it just be that, like Castle and the railway closures, the process was so far down the path it would have been prohibitively expensive and/or more difficult to reverse the process ?

Otherwise I'm not sure what your point is.

The fact remains, Beeching and Marples were the architects of the destruction of this country's railway system. Although Marples was a crook, I still contend one of the motivation's behind Beeching was an ideological dislike of state enterprises by Conservative administrations and the railways at that time were an easy target.

 

[MidnightFlyer]

Marple and his appointee Beeching did the ground work for sure - made proposals and cases. But, ultimately, services could only be withdrawn with the consent of the minister. Thus there is only one person culpable and that is the person whose signature approved the closures.

I do not for one minute believe that NOTHING should have been closed. But equally, I do not believe that everything that was closed was closed for good or valid reason. And there is no question that it was Castle's signature that saw more closures - valid and invalid - than anyone else.

Indeed - she authorised the closure Colne-Skipton, which is now of course, worthwhile or not, one of the most talked out reopening schemes in the country. The largest town that would arguably benefit from its reopening is arguably Blackburn, whose MP for over three decades was a certain Barbara Castle...

 

[muddythefish]

Indeed - she authorised the closure Colne-Skipton, which is now of course, worthwhile or not, one of the most talked out reopening schemes in the country. The largest town that would arguably benefit from its reopening is arguably Blackburn, whose MP for over three decades was a certain Barbara Castle...

Why would Blackburn benefit most ? It already has good connections to Leeds with the York - Blackpool trains.

I travelled on the Colne-Skipton line a few times by the way - it was busy with freight in those days too.

 

[Taunton]

It's a shame that Beeching never wrote his autobiography. Never mind, several of the senior executives he worked with wrote about it, and they all come to the same conclusion; Beeching was right in so many ways.

Stewart Joy (his Chief Economist), Gerry Fiennes (headed up the Western Region at the time), Dick Hardy (on the Eastern), etc, have all written at length how what Beeching sorted out was just right.

He pushed for (and got) government money for modern investments in what the railway could do best at the time - Freightliner (Liner Trains), coal Merry-go-Round, converting a handful of "Expresses" into the frequent Inter-City network, etc, much of which is still to our benefit today 50 years on. Look who started Derby off building version after version of modern high speed Mark 2 passenger stock. The whole Corporate Identity and British Rail image. Then he turned to where the money was being wasted and lost. Outright nonsenses (which meant quite a bit of the hopelessly outdated branch network) he got rid of. And where services did not cover their costs he said that someone, somewhere, had to cover the costs, typically government in a nationalised industry. So it was a government decision to provide these funds. Or not.

From my home town of Taunton, services to Barnstaple and Yeovil all averaged about half a dozen passengers a train, and it was still falling. It didn't help that many stations were nowhere near town or village centres they purported to serve, with half a dozen trains a day while the parallel bus was every 30 minutes and the locals had already voted with their feet. Minehead was more of a toss-up, popular in the summer but desolate for 9 months of the year, and so lasted into 1971. Did the government want to pony up the money to keep it going? Well, no they didn't. Most of what branch freight traffic remained was odd wagons of household coal, and as we all know that market just vanished.

Barbara Castle introduced the concept of the "social railway"

No, Beeching. Read the reports (all of them), which told her, via the civil servants, how to do it.

 

[MidnightFlyer]

Why would Blackburn benefit most ? It already has good connections to Leeds with the York - Blackpool trains.

I travelled on the Colne-Skipton line a few times by the way - it was busy with freight in those days too.

I didn't say benefit most, I said largest town to benefit [in any sense]. It would obviously first and foremost help Skipton, Colne and Nelson, but also Shipley, Keighley, Burnley, Accy and Blackburn. Of those Blackburn is far and away the largest (benefits from trains to Skipton, Keighley etc).

 

[Spamcan81]

Comprehensive education was introduced by the Labour government in the 1960s, but despite the Conservative governments of the 1970s abolishing the compulsion on local authorities to convert, more comprehensive schools were established under then education secretary Margaret Thatcher than any other education secretary.

Could it just be that, like Castle and the railway closures, the process was so far down the path it would have been prohibitively expensive and/or more difficult to reverse the process ?

Otherwise I'm not sure what your point is.

The fact remains, Beeching and Marples were the architects of the destruction of this country's railway system. Although Marples was a crook, I still contend one of the motivation's behind Beeching was an ideological dislike of state enterprises by Conservative administrations and the railways at that time were an easy target.

No closure was "too far down the road". Each one was subject to an appeal process via the Transport Users Consultative Committee and only after due process did the Minister sign the death warrant. Interestingly Oxford - Cambridge was earmarked by Beeching for retention and
development but dear Barbara axed it nonetheless. In an interview several years ago she claimed she only closed those that needed closing whereas her Tory predecessor closed all and sundry. Sorry Babs but your lot signed off more miles than the Tories ever did.

 

[yorksrob]

No closure was "too far down the road". Each one was subject to an appeal process via the Transport Users Consultative Committee and only after due process did the Minister sign the death warrant. Interestingly Oxford - Cambridge was earmarked by Beeching for retention and
development but dear Barbara axed it nonetheless. In an interview several years ago she claimed she only closed those that needed closing whereas her Tory predecessor closed all and sundry. Sorry Babs but your lot signed off more miles than the Tories ever did.

The whole "due process" was pathetically weak, rejection being allowable only on the rather nebulous concept of "hardship". This took no notice of the effects of closure on the local economy, congestion, even passenger numbers. Governments of both stripes bear responsibility for this.

 

[muddythefish]

Interestingly Oxford - Cambridge was earmarked by Beeching for retention and development but dear Barbara axed it nonetheless. In an interview several years ago she claimed she only closed those that needed closing whereas her Tory predecessor closed all and sundry. Sorry Babs but your lot signed off more miles than the Tories ever did.

Oxford-Cambridge should have been retained but the S & D and Waverley route had dubious merits. No credit for "dear Barbara" for creating the social railway which saved numerous lines from the axe ?

It should also be remembered that 20 years later the Tories tried to have another go at the railways with the infamous Serpell report of 1983, thankfully consigned to the dustbin.

 

[Spamcan81]

Oxford-Cambridge should have been retained but the S & D and Waverley route had dubious merits. No credit for "dear Barbara" for creating the social railway which saved numerous lines from the axe ?



It should also be remembered that 20 years later the Tories tried to have another go at the railways with the infamous Serpell report of 1983, thankfully consigned to the dustbin.

It's obvious you want to blame the Tories for most of the rail closures, even those that never happened, so I see no point in continuing the discussion. Both parties were under the influence of the road lobby and that's the root of the problem.

 

[Spamcan81]

The whole "due process" was pathetically weak, rejection being allowable only on the rather nebulous concept of "hardship". This took no notice of the effects of closure on the local economy, congestion, even passenger numbers. Governments of both stripes bear responsibility for this.

Oh I agree. It was mostly window dressing.

 

[muddythefish]

It's obvious you want to blame the Tories for most of the rail closures, even those that never happened, so I see no point in continuing the discussion. Both parties were under the influence of the road lobby and that's the root of the problem.

The root of the problem was Marples and his cohorts, as previously stated. It was also the mood of the times, with the motor industry in the ascendancy and railways in decline. This coalition government to its credit is spending money on the railways, but it is also spending huge sums on the roads too. Construction companies of course are major donors to the Conservative party, but I could not possibly comment.

 

[Yuanls]

You'll be happy to know that they are planning to reopen the line from Oxford to Cambridge.

 

[nw1]

Disclaimer: Beeching was well before my time (I first started regularly using trains in 1982) but...

Strangely enough after discovering timetableworld.com I've been exploring what the Western Region of 1965 looked like. Not that I agree with *any* closures, as I believe they are anti-progressive and inconvenience people for the sake of beancounterism, but the lines surviving in 1965 are perhaps arguably the ones which should never have closed.

The problem seemed to be erratic and infrequent services which doubtless discouraged use. If there had been a "Taktfahrplan" of the sort popular in Germany and Switzerland currently, might they ever have closed? Lines which serve sizeable places, nearish large centres of population, which should arguably never have been given the chop include Yatton-Clevedon, Chippenham-Calne, Barnstaple-Ilfracombe, Plymouth-Okehampton-Exeter. Add to that lines useful for holiday traffic such as Minehead, Lyme Regis and Bridport - and lines which serve useful links such as the Somerset and Dorset (even if diverted via Frome/Westbury at its northern end).

Arguably no sizeable "market town" should have lost its railway. Not sure what threshold to use, but something the size of Romsey (my local archetypal 'market town'), for instance.

Might an even-interval pattern of service on these branches with good connections to mainline services have saved them? Might through workings in potential commuting areas (Calne to Bath and Bristol, Clevedon to Bristol, Bridport to Weymouth , lessening the connections to Bournemouth and points east from two to one) have helped?

Whatever, while it was before my time Beeching seems an extraordinarily regressive, destructive action. Whether it was sleaze from Marples or just plain clinical bean-counting by bureaucrats who understand profit and loss but are blind to social need, I don't know, but either way, it wasn't good. Short sighted too.

If nothing else they could have banned any development on disused lines in case there was ever need to reopen in the future. Things might be easier now if that was the case.

 

[edwin_m]

A lot of the failure of Beeching in my view is down to the lack of understanding of the role of buses in a potential integrated public transport network.

It was probably inevitable that some lines would have to close in the Beeching era, but few of the replacement bus services survived very long. Perhaps if they had been closely integrated with train times and tickets at the railhead, they would have worked better and maintained public transport provision to the places now separated from the rail network. Perhaps proper integration of bus services would have fed enough passengers to some rail services for them to have remained open.

At the time buses were mainly within the public sector but there seems to have been a quite literal lack of joined-up thinking. Since then bus deregulation now makes integration impossible except for feeble imitations such as Plusbus, and a few local arrangements which are probably down to when the bus operator feels they will be better off financially rather than any consideration of network benefits.

Related to that, there was a failure to anticipate that the development of better and cheaper cars, which improved the mobility of much of the population and reduced the need for the rail network, would within a few decades result in traffic congestion in many towns which would render many of the replacement buses unattractive and even some car journeys difficult.

By contrast, in Germany and Switzerland buses are generally seen as feeders to rail and integrated into the timetable. When a train arrives at a railhead, there will often be several buses waiting across the platform which depart a few minutes later on circular itineraries. As this is a rural area with good public transport there are no congestion delays, so the buses can reliably return a few minutes before the next train.

 

[steamybrian]

In the 1960s the whole culture of railways was completely different and a different world to live in than today....
Cars and roads where the "in thing". The motorway network was under construction with new by-passes being built at a great speed.
People were beginning to explore taking holidays abroad and there was a decline in taking holidays in Britain.
The modernisation plan of 1955 certainly provided large investment in electrification schemes such as Southern (Kent Coast) Great Eastern (London to Southend, Clacton, etc), Glasgow suburban but by 1962 this had been completed..
By the early 1960s the railways were mainly in decline, falling passenger numbers lead to reduction in services with the loss of many direct long distance services to coastal resorts such as Minehead, Ilfracombe. There were some increased patronage in lines newly electrified.
Many stations were gas or oil lit, stations were manned from first train to last train at night (including Sundays) and needed modernisation.

 

[edwin_m]

The modernisation plan of 1955 certainly provided large investment in electrification schemes such as Southern (Kent Coast) Great Eastern (London to Southend, Clacton, etc), Glasgow suburban but by 1962 this had been completed..
By the early 1960s the railways were mainly in decline, falling passenger numbers lead to reduction in services with the loss of many direct long distance services to coastal resorts such as Minehead, Ilfracombe. There were some increased patronage in lines newly electrified.

I would say the West Coast Main Line was a huge exception to this. Electrification between London, Birmingham, Liverpool and Manchester didn't finish until 1968 and delivered pretty much all that was promised. Along with the Deltics on the ECML it probably demonstrated that intercity rail had a future and therefore paved the way for the APT development and later the HST when the government decided it had to be done without further electrification.

 

[Spamcan81]

You'll be happy to know that they are planning to reopen the line from Oxford to Cambridge.

With lots of new construction needed owning large swathes of the trackbed east of Bedford now built on. It'll be a long time coming. Mind you, if it was in Scotland or Wales then money would be chucked at it.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

The root of the problem was Marples and his cohorts, as previously stated. It was also the mood of the times, with the motor industry in the ascendancy and railways in decline. This coalition government to its credit is spending money on the railways, but it is also spending huge sums on the roads too. Construction companies of course are major donors to the Conservative party, but I could not possibly comment.

Take off your socialist tinted glasses. Both major parties were in the pocket of the road lobby. Said lobby had huge influence back in those days and we're still feeling the effects. This isn't a Tory v Labour argument as both parties are guilty of closing lines. Labour could have halted or even reversed Beeching but by and large they did sod all.

 

[yorksrob]

To be fair, the “social railway“ as implemented by Castle, was an important step forward, particularlu for regional urban areas, but alas IMO could be described as too little, too late.