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If you could say 5 words to Dr. Beeching today, what would they be?

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furryfeet

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Joined
17 Apr 2008
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449
"good one closing skipton-colne..."
Skipton to Colne was NOT in fact a Beeching closure. It was rushed through the closure procedure by the Wilson govt - I think Richard Marsh was the minister responsible. Perhaps someone else can correct me if I am wrong.
 

kennethw

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Joined
27 Mar 2009
Messages
196
you saved britains railways mate!

Totally disagree!! had Beeching not been shunted off to the house of Lords, he would have had another go at closing saved lines. On the shortlist were

All Cornish lines
Salisbury to Exeter to Barnstaple
All Welsh lines bar LLandudno, Swansea and associated branches ie no central wales line, Aberystwyth, Cambrian coast
Stranraer

And that's not all!! A report proposed in the mid eighties was to have the total rail network reduced to around 2,000 kilometers

Why do the general public demand a cheap efficient railway but are never prepared to pay for it
 

Geezertronic

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14 Apr 2009
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4,089
Location
Birmingham
It's an opinion that without the Beeching cuts, would be have the amount of heritage railways with the saved steam locos that we do now?

So my five words would be:

Thanks for creating Heritage Railways :D
 

37401

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12 Nov 2008
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3,276
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Birmingham
It's an opinion that without the Beeching cuts, would be have the amount of heritage railways with the saved steam locos that we do now?

So my five words would be:

Thanks for creating Heritage Railways :D

Must agree, its true, without him we would have sprinters and all that rubbish on lines such as the SVR, I beleve the SVR was a beehing axe line there was a show about it with Pete Waterman 1-2 years ago
 

yorksrob

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6 Aug 2009
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38,818
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Must agree, its true, without him we would have sprinters and all that rubbish on lines such as the SVR, I beleve the SVR was a beehing axe line there was a show about it with Pete Waterman 1-2 years ago

I disagree though. There were plenty of closed railways ripe for preservation even without the Beeching Cuts. The Kent & East Sussex Railway and Bluebell lines were both closed befor Beeching as part of a more organic restructuring of the railway which had been taking place since the 1920's.

What Beeching did was to conduct a pseudo - scientific study of traffic flows and use it as a justification for launching a precipitous programme of cuts, without any attempt to try and economise such lines. He also sold off the land in many cases, making it impossible to re-instate.

On the wider subject, one of the interesting things about the run up to the Beeching era is that there are many similarities to the current situation.

1 The railway is running at a fairly heavy loss, which requires Government subsidy.
2 The railway has recently experienced a large amount of public investment which has possibly not been spent as efficiently as it should have been.
3 The railway will continue to need a large amount of public investment.
4 The country is entering a period of economic crisis.
5 We have a mixed railway where large parts of the network carry a relatively small proportion of the overall traffic.

My question to those who view Dr Beeching, and consequently the Rt Hon MR Ernest Marples as saviours of the railway is, if a precipitous programme of route closures was so vital to save the railway then, would such a programme be the only way to save the railways now? If not why not. Also, If you feel there would be other ways of cutting down costs on the railway now, why shouldn't these have been at least attempted then before reaching immediately for the axe.

Personally I think Dr Beeching was a very competent manager in his field - manufacturing, but he was way out of his depth on the railway. A better railway manager should have developed other options as well as closure.
 

asylumxl

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12 Feb 2009
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4,260
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Hiding in your shadow
Not five words but

"Alright mate! I'm from the future. I come with a better idea! Sell our railways to the French! We'll have LGVs and TGVs coming out our ears, instead of those horrible HSTs! If you lived to join RailUK, you'd be thanking me. Ah well, Auf Wiedersehn!"
 

37401

Established Member
Joined
12 Nov 2008
Messages
3,276
Location
Birmingham
Not five words but

"Alright mate! I'm from the future. I come with a better idea! Sell our railways to the French! We'll have LGVs and TGVs coming out our ears, instead of those horrible HSTs! If you lived to join RailUK, you'd be thanking me. Ah well, Auf Wiedersehn!"

no no no noooo!! sell it to DB!, 218s on the WCML anyone :) also we'll take some CP1800s and CP1400s too for good measure

CP1400: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FFq5wpTwwPQ&feature=related
CP1800: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tFRHwqxjtSQ&feature=related
 
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