New Book about Regional Railways

[CyrusWuff]

I was just perusing a certain online bookseller and noticed that Ian Allan/OPC are publishing a third book to go with The InterCity Story and The Network SouthEast Story, in the form of The Regional Railways Story. Due to be published next Thursday and runs to 208 pages. Authors are Gordon Pettitt and Nicholas Comfort, and available to pre-order for £30.00.

 

[ainsworth74]

If anyone is thinking of buying these books (and all three look really interesting!) please consider buying through Amazon and using the link to our store to do so. It doesn't cost you anything but the forum will gain a small amount of the transaction to help towards our running costs.

Full details here

Thanks for pointing these books out!

 

[sprinterguy]

That's very interesting to know, thanks for the heads up. I was just browsing through "The Intercity Story" again recently and I was wondering whether, in light of the Network Southeast Story becoming available, a comparable volume covering Regional Railways would be produced, as there is no way that I could turn that down!

I'll bear in mind Ainsworth74s' suggestion as well, if I choose to buy from Amazon rather than my local Ian Allan shop.

 

[156478]

I've read all three books in the trilogy. They are great heavy books that tell the story of the operations.
But I feel the Regional Railways volume has tried to do too much, to me ScotRail could have easily had a book to itself and that could have freed up space to talk more in depth about the challenges Regional Railways had on routes like the Cumbrian Coast or the Tyne Valley line- both of which are barely mentioned. BUT then again that it seems is what it must have been like trying to run Regional Railways at the time- everyone wanted new trains, everyone wanted nicer stations and when everyone put their hand up not everyone got what they wanted and at the meantime cost had to be cut. :roll:

 

[sprinterguy]

That's a good point: I've had a flick through "The Regional Railways Story", and it doesn't seem as well structured as the Intercity and NSE volumes. The narrative doesn't seem to flow as well between chapters, particularly chronologically. This, however, is probably indicative of the piecemeal structure of the Provincial Services/Regional Railways sector itself (BR might as well have named it "Everything Else"!).

This isn't to detract from what is an informative text on the history of Regional Railways though, which, as a child who grew up deep in Regional Railways territory, is an essential bookshelf purchase for me. I particularly like the chapter on the work of the PTEs.